There is a bit of a slide war going on, war by powerpoint, at the top of government. A chart off. A chart off, yes so, basically on saturday, we had chris being watched by m Million People and whitty and vallance showing these slides that you just couldnt read. And then, chris, today the Uk Statistics Authority kind of giving them a bit of a smack on the wrists, didnt they . They did, yeah. 16 million, by the way. Just to give you a smack on the wrist sorry i should have been more accurate. Yeah, i know. I was just saving you a rebuke next week. So, yeah, they did, and then theres that broader point, isnt there, which is when you have those next slide, please moments, and somebody off screen clicking the clicker, youre just left, arent you, as a viewer, just overwhelmed, really . Particularly when you get those kind of colour scheme ones, like something you would get in a paint shop. When actually, you know, the old mantra, less is more, you know, they might be onto something with that. Then Simon Stevens, the chief exec of the nhs, swoops in and does his own smackdown at the downing street press conference. Smackdown like you, and im sure that the Prime Minister wont mind me saying so, ive watched a number of these press briefings, and sometimes the charts can be a bit hard to keep up with, so ive just got one chart today that indisputably sets out what we in the Health Service are seeing. And if we can have that, that one chart, please . What it shows is the number of patients that are being looked after in hospitals across england. Vicki, you were doing the press conference. Did the sass just emanate off the screen . Well, it was funny because Boris Johnson was laughing when he talked about how the slides were all quite confusing. But then quite a lot of people have quite liked chris whittys next slide, please. It doesnt work if its just one, does it . I mean, you dont have that excitement. Although Simon Stevens there broke his own rule then, by showing another slide. He did, and that was all very confusing. When youre sitting there doing the press conference on zoom, i cant even see the slides anyway so i didnt know what was going on. Having said he had one, he then seemed to be talking about quite a few. And weve all watched hundreds of hours of american tv, so we are absolute experts on tv graphics now and we will discuss what those graphics mean, whether its the American Election or coronavirus in the uk, on this edition of newscast. Hello. Its adam in the studio. And vicki also in the studio. And chris in my socially distant booth, down the corridor. And we are going to talk about the introduction of the english lockdown in a bit, and well also talk quite a lot about the return of the furlough scheme, which rishi sunak announced today. Thats quite a big deal in terms of the governments handling of the pandemic. And were also going to talk loads about the American Election. And we have managed. Last week, we spoke to george osborne. Weve got somebody whos spent a lot of time arguing with him ed balls, former shadow chancellor and strictly co ntesta nt a nd Harvard University fellow and bit of an american politics geek am i right . And maker of programmes about donald trump for the bbc. Indeed. And were going to see some of the best bits of that documentary youve made in a minute. Now, i hope somebody if you are listening to this or watching it on iplayer in the future you know the result of the american president ial election because we here now are still waiting. And chris, it seems to me that the story is biden is closing in on the 270 Electoral College votes. Trump is challenging in as many states as he can. But were still basically waiting for some of the key ones to just declare, and then this bit of the process will be over . Yeah, and ijust keep bumping into people who look absolutely rough as anything because they didnt get any sleep whatsoever over the past 48 hours, and they are beginning to wonder whether it was worthwhile, given we are still in the mmm territory. But it was all very exciting and lots of american anchors getting very excited in front of colourful maps of their country. Ed, how did you feel staying up late on tuesday night as the first bit of the story unfolded . Well, four years ago, i went to sleep about 2 00 and Hillary Clinton was going to be the american president. And i woke up again at 6 00 and donald trump was on course to win. And the same thing happened with the remain vote in 2016 as well. Theres been so much uncertainty. So i stayed up as long as i could to make sure that i didnt think anything was going to happen that night, until about 2 30am, but at 6 00, when i woke up again, it felt like trump was really gaining ground, so early in the morning, biden looked in trouble. It improved over the course of the day, but it was rocky, if you are a biden supporter, at 7am. What have you managed to divine about the state of the United States from the result as we know it at the moment . Well, i think its hugely divided. And if you look at the exit polls and what they say about their belief in their candidate and their view of the other, that they are diametrically opposed. Theres not a huge amount of Centre Ground happening between the democrats and the republicans. You know, it feels to me as though joe bidens going to win, but it also feels as though the next four years of politics in america is already being shaped, and its going to be more antagonistic, more divisive. If you think of what trumps up to at the moment, it may be he thinks he can still win. It may be he thinks his legal challenges can work. But regardless of that, what he is determined to do is to start the narrative now that he was robbed, that the republicans were robbed, that his voters were robbed, the election was stolen from them by them the establishment and, you know, it feels to me as though, whether its donald or another trump family member, there are already starting now, trump 2024, and in opposition for four years, theyre going to give joe biden a very, very hard time. Joe biden dealing with the aftermath of the pandemic and without the support of the united congress. So it feels as though this is the start of what could be the nastiest, most dangerous and divisive period in american politics any of us can remember worse, worse than the last four years. Well, you mentioned Trump Supporters and what they are trying to do to challenge the results and compare and contrast this this is the scene in arizona where they are saying count all the votes. All chant count the votes count the votes . And then you hop over to detroit and the Trump Supporters there are shouting the total opposite. All chant stop the count stop the count so, you have Trump Supporters in phoenix and arizona calling for the votes to be counted, because trump is behind there and they think that uncounted votes might top him up a bit, and then in detroit, they are doing at the other way around because trump was narrowly ahead and they were worried that biden votes were overtaking him. Ed, just reflecting on what you were saying a moment or two ago, i suppose given how unorthodox his presidency has been, we should expect whatever comes next to be unorthodox. Ijust wonder, given the documentaries youve done, talking to Trump Supporters, given that, were you surprised or not by how well he did . Given the opinion polls, or some of them, suggested this could be a landslide for biden, it clearly wasnt that, and more people voting for donald trump this time than last time . I think a year ago, i thought trump was going to win. He managed to be the opposition and the outsider, standing up he managed to be the opposition outsider, standing up for people who felt they hadnt been listened to. Its important to understand, he always had two different messages for younger americans who voted for trump, it was about the economy and jobs and to older americans, it was about fear and he would protect them from things which were dangerous for them. If you look in the exit polls amongst the Trump Supporters, their Biggest Issue wasnt the pandemic or racial division, it was the economy. And trump managed to persuade people through this election, an election where lets be honest joe biden didnt really have an economic message he persuaded people that he was the best person to get the American Economy through and with jobs and prosperity going forward. But then on the fear point, i think we were all taken by the idea that maybe those older suburban voters were going to be afraid of trump and his handling of the pandemic. There was clearly some of that and that may be the reason why hes lost the election, but he also did quite a good job of persuading people they should be afraid of riots in the streets, that whole focus on what was happening in portland, in other cities. I think it did move the threat from external, migrants, foreigners coming in, to, as we kept hearing from voters in florida, these socialists who wanted to storm the barricades. Yeah, and you mentioned the documentary made of your travels in trumpland and there was that quite dramatic moment when you went out with the gun guys. So, ed, you ever fired a rifle before . I have never. In my life. Are you ready to be a man today . Laughter. Well, yes. I say, television, im about to fire. The british are coming, the british are coming laughter. You guys here goes boom done it. Love the slight tension in your voice when you say you guys but does that clip not show that actually you are probably one of the few outside observers who kind of understands trump voters and Trump Supporters because lots of observers of the uk obviously dont and lots of the Mainstream Media in the United States clearly dont. The thing about those guys was they were not racist at all. In fact, one of them came from a mixed heritage family. What they wanted was a better deal, and they felt they had a tax cut from a president who was on their side and listening. When i said but the rich got a bigger tax cut, they said, look, it will trickle down, but hes helping us, hes on our side. They believed that washington, the established politicians werent for them. Trump, they kept saying and so many other people did he is a business guy, he knows what hes doing. Hes not in it for the money, hes already rich. Hes on our side against them. Of course there is an aspect of terrible racism going on in part of the trump vote but lots and lots of people who vote trump arent racist, they arent extreme, theyjust feel as though theyve been ignored and they want somebody to stand up to what they see as powerful forces whove held them back and trump is always managed, over four years, still to be the outsider. Hes like the president whos also in opposition, its the judges, its congress, its the chinese, its the foreigners and now, if he loses, hes going back into opposition again. Hes a formidable opposition politician. But, ed, do you think that the democrats may be last time and this time, still have underestimated that support for donald trump . That they dont understand, do they, where its coming from . I mean, the polls obviously didnt help because they dont seem to have been particularly accurate, but do you think there is an element thatjoe biden was trying to get through just by not being donald trump and hoping that was enough . Well, if, as i think is going to happen, biden wins, i mean this is its a huge achievement. So lets not run down what biden has done. I actually think theres almost no other democrat candidate who could have won this from the primaries. He had to reach into the Centre Ground and have that sense of patriotism, which i think he embodies as a former vice president. Its not possible, i dont think, to beat trump from the right with left populism because in the end, that just alienates many of those people who you need to pull over to your side. If bidens done that, hes done it by actually making it a referendum on trump and, you know, trump has ended up i mean, its an astonishing result for trump compared to history, but maybe not big enough compared to what, for biden, is also a historic vote if hes going to win this election. Now, vicki, at westminster, people are obsessed about american politics because of the west wing but theyre are also obsessed about the politics because of what it means for the relationship with the United States, our biggest ally. What sort of stuff have you picked up about how the government ministers are feeling about it . Whats interesting here, isnt it, i think it depends on whether you think that relationship, that special relationship that we do go on about an awful lot, and i think probably is a bit more important to the uk side. I hate even saying it . Than it probably maybe it is to the us, but is it about a personal rapport between two characters and personalities, or is it about the office . I think thats what it comes down to, isnt it . We saw theresa may with donald trump and it was just so awkward, it always looks awkward, and you just think how could this happen . Then there were those leaks, werent there, of the conversations that went on on the telephone and her rolling her eyes and all of that . Him bullying her. Yeah, so, and then that time when she clutched his hand, he clutched her hand, all of that. So its whether the fact that donald trump says, yes, borisjohnson is my best mate, hes just like me. Does that mean that that relationship works better or not . Now i think of it is of course the case that borisjohnson doesnt have a relationship Withjoe Biden but i suppose the point being whatever you think about donald trump, and even if borisjohnson does have that personal rapport, he is erratic. Hes difficult to deal with. So in the longer term, it might be actually easier for the uk government with someone likejoe biden. Ed, do you think sometimes we exaggerate all this stuff . I think about your old boss gordon brown and obama are said to have not had that good a relationship but they still managed to deal with the financial crisis and there was lots of Foreign Policy stuff that the uk and the us just had the same interests and actually, maybe itjust doesnt make that much difference to life in the uk and life for a british Prime Minister . I actually think it makes quite a lot of difference. Not necessarily the personal chemistry. Lets be honest, obama had political reasons why it helped him with his vote to appeal more to David Cameron than to gordon brown in that particular period of history. But if you compare domestic politics, the leave vote, delivering brexit, what trump has done. Winning the support of older voters who dont like change, who are suspicious of westminster or brussels, clearly there is some parallel between borisjohnson and donald trump. Maybe in some of the ways theyve conducted their politics, think of Boris Johnson taking on the judges in the run up to the brexit vote last year. To sum up then, eddie, are you suggesting that it might be harderfor the uk to get a trade deal with america under a Biden Administration, and so that makes it more important that they strike a deal with the eu . I actually think getting a trade deal with the Trump Administration that has any substance is very hard, and getting an actual trade deal with a Biden Administration will be even harder. Im not sure thats the most important issue. I think next year the government is going to be as focused on the Climate Change talks, on finding ways to get the Global Economy moving, as happened after the financial crisis ten years ago. And biden, across that whole international agenda, will be a much easier partner for britain to deal with. But if we are in an antagonistic relationship with our European Union partners, and biden has to choose, i think hell choose the rest of europe. So its in our interests, i think, to try and get a deal which means that we can work in the g7 with our European Partners on that broader international set of issues. If you make the biggest test of actual free trade agreements, well, you know, that is a pretty dangerous thing for the government to do, because im not sure theyre going to get a good deal from either. Yeah, because the American Farmers interests dont change depending on who the president is. Lets look at purely british events today. Vicki, weve got a downing street press conference. And Simon Stevens, the chief exec of the nhs in england, was alongside the Prime Minister. We talked earlier about his sassiness about the slides, but he also had a bit of sassiness aimed at people saying, mm, do we really need to worry so much . Arent these projections of coronavirus cases a bit over the top . He had some facts of his own. Just for comparison, the 11,000 coronavirus patients weve got in hospital compares with about 3,000 patients that we would typically have in hospital on any one day during a very bad winter flu season, for flu. It compares with about 7,000 patients who would be in hospital today being looked after for cancer. And so this is not really speculation, this is fact. And we know that in certain parts of the country the number the number of coronavirus patients hospitals are looking after is already significantly over the number that they were having to cope with during the april first peak. Vicki, its almost like Simon Stevens was there to kind of justify why the english lockdown was