James O'Brien - The Whole Show: Should smoking be banned in pub gardens?

good morning 3 minutes after 10 is the time we're getting a second summer aren't we it's lovely um I got some good news for you and I think it's good news I I was a bit downcast yesterday by the apparent decision of sakir starma not to engage in the in the youth Mobility scheme you remember on his visit to Germany one of the headlines was that they had um Turned down or or rejected the opportunity to join the youth Mobility scheme so I did because I'm a bit weird I I I did consult some expert but yesterday afternoon and the general consensus is among the people who really know what they're talking about and I see this reflected in some corners of the media this morning that um that this is how you negotiate so because the European Union the big actors in the European Union wants to engage in the youth Mobility scheme because although it's obviously good for us it's also very good for them it gives us a little tiny bit of Leverage as the very very very Junior partner in any negotiations as a third country so the clever people tell me that it is most likely that that is something which will be returned to as a as a negotiating tactic so starma or his people will say well okay if you give us that then we will go in on the youth Mobility scheme so in many ways I thought that that is the essence of brexit Britain in that that that that we have to use something that is good for us but arguably as good or even better for our negot negotiating Partners rather than just saying yeah we'll take that thanks that's great we have to we have to that's that's the only leverage we've got in these kind but it's still good news because most people who know what they're talking about um told me yesterday and and as I say the newspaper some of the coverage some of the commentary seems to support this today that it will probably um be something that we do do or he does do as a consequence of uh of other negotiations and other checks and balances because I you know I read somewhere that you reach your Peak as a negotiator at the age of three have you ever heard this think about it you probably got more achieved at the age of three during negotiations because you could just scream or you could just sit on the floor of the supermarket and go all floppy and refuse to move or or you could shout that the absolute loudest you were physically capable of for 20 minutes the negotiating skills that you have at the age of three are never surpassed but um obviously that is not tactic despite the best efforts of David Frost and Boris Johnson to deploy the negotiating tactics of three years three year olds when they were actually negotiating uh brexit it it sadly doesn't work in the in the adult Universe um and it is to the youth that we turn first this morning that there's there's quite a few stories like this around at the moment and we have to be careful not to feed ourselves an unleavened diet of unhappiness don't we uh the only countries in Europe where well I I'll give you more details in a minute because the headline is is that the average 15-year-old in Britain more 15year olds in Britain are reporting low life satisfaction than almost anywhere else in Europe it has been described as a happiness recession we sit at the bottom of European rankings in terms of Life satisfaction across 27 Nations this is analysis by the uh children's Society what one interesting measure would see 25% of 15y olds here reporting low life satisfaction compared with just 7% of Dutch children um and that is the lowest level for us of any of the countries surveyed Girls and Teenage children from disadvantaged backgrounds in Britain are particularly affected food poverty isn't that a heartbreaking phrase food poverty highlighted as a significant reason behind the poor well-being numbers so if you find a 15-year-old who reports being unhappy one of the key reasons in brexit Britain will be that they're hungry or that they are experiencing food poverty the only countries that are worse than us in Europe on that specific measure on food deprivation are Bulgaria Romania and Lithuania but the bigger picture will be more nuanced won't it the bigger picture will be more detailed and look we're not way ahead of every other country we are just ahead of of countries like Poland and Germany and Island who who come in sort of um behind us on this and something occurred to me yesterday when we were discussing the visit of K starma to Germany and and our callers from Continental Europe once again provided us with insights that we would struggle to find I think from a uniquely British perspective it occurred to me that the best way into this conversation today would be to call first upon people who possibly can make direct comparisons so I could sit here now and tell you why I think British children are the saddest in Europe and you could probably predict many of the things that I would say and you could probably predict part of the response which would be well that's not unique to the United Kingdom so spending too much time on smartphones for example is not unique to the United Kingdom is there a case I wonder for the English language being a contributor to the obsession with smartphones if if you don't have great English is is the internet as seductive as it is for for people who do have great English I'm thinking of American influence here on social media and platforms like that how much time would you spend on Tik Tok I know there's french Tik Tok and Dutch Tik Tok and Chinese Tik Tok and all the other Tik toks but I presume the massive bulk of it is is going to reflect the English l i mean maybe Mandarin is huge but most people in Continental Europe don't speak mandar I don't know I'm just thinking out loud because you need to point back to something you need to push back to something that you could reasonably argue is specific to Unique to or peculiar to the United Kingdom to to to to Britain and I don't know what the answer would be so what I do know is that many people listening to this now will have experience of life in both the UK and Poland or both the UK and Germany I'm going to do a few of these or both the UK and Ireland or both the UK and Italy or the UK and Sweden the UK and France the UK and Spain Romanian teenagers are infinitely happier than our well considerably happier than ours even though they are among the few countries close to us on the food poverty measure so why with the comparison with a little bit of um m you make me laugh Mark with this I can't believe they're unhappy they've got smartphones and Xboxes and we never did that's a beautiful contribution from the perspective I presume of early middle age because I would have thought you'd have thought the same I always remember my first producer on this program lovely bloke and he he used to get very R was very mild mannered he very rarely lost his temper even working with me in my pretherapy days he very rarely lost his temper he was a he was a masterclass of of of moderation and modesty and he used to get so cross about the phone in Trope of young people spending all their time playing video games and not instead of being outdoors because he would point out quite reasonably and this is 20 years ago goodness knows how much things have improved since then it points out quite reasonably that rather than having to stand in the dripping rain Frozen tea or marrow while someone twice the size of you sat on your head in a scrum or pushed you over on the football pit or or you're running through the woods holding a stick and pretending it's a gun he pointed out you could sit in your sitting room with your best friends and actually play on a screen a level of football that you would never in a million years unless you would David Beckham be able to achieve on a foot used to get so exercised a Bas of course they're not playing outside have you seen the quality of the technology and I know that that's the point that Mart is making and it makes some I mean it has some uh it so and then Chris comes in with exactly the same point and arrives at exactly the opposite conclusion he says it's obvious why they're unhappy they've got the smartphones and the computer games that we never had so but it's not unique to UK you see it's not unique to the UK um and the fact that Romania has food poverty but not teenage unhappiness means that it's not going to be that either so knowing what you know why is it and I'm going to say harder to be a 50 15y old in the United Kingdom than anywhere else in Europe knowing what you know about 15y olds it's highly possible you were one once knowing what you know about 15y olds and knowing what you know about other European countries why is it harder to be 15 here than anywhere else cuz this stuff really matters you know an unhappy child is is a I don't want to say an unproductive child because that makes them sound like um uh units of production which sadly of course most of us are probably in our adult lives but an unhappy child is is not going to achieve as much as a happy child an unhappy child is probably not going to do as well at school they're not going to get the the same results and I know the pressure of getting good results might be one of the reasons for the unhappiness that's why it's a phoning topic it's nuanced and complicated and unpredictable but an unhappy child will be a lower achieving child and that contributes to everything in the fure future from their own personal well-being health happiness through to the national health happiness economy the more successful and productive a human being is the more contribution they make to society I don't just mean Financial I mean in every way I I Community Society togetherness St points out it is finally one area in which we can realistically claim to be World beating well we're ahead of Europe's stew I I don't know how we'd compare to much poorer countries part of me dreads to think to be honest with you so why is it harder to be 15 years old or there or thereabouts you know we don't have to be absolutely specific on the age that's just where the researchers have chosen to focus why is it harder to be a 15-year-old in the United Kingdom in 2024 than it is anywhere else in Europe 0345 6060 973 and as a side order because we didn't find time to talk about this on Tuesday 500 children A Day in England alone are currently being referred to the NHS Mental Health Services for anxiety that's more than double the rate of before the pandemic and again it's hard to think of circumstances or conditions that are unique to Britain or unique to the United Kingdom isn't it which is why I think the question needs a or the answer needs a comparison well why is it harder to be 15 in the UK than anywhere else in Europe hit the numbers now you will get through okay it's quarter 10 0345 6060 9973 is the number you need and we'll talk after this 10:17 is the time so I there's this thing right when you do what I do for a living and the there's a an Unwritten rule that you listening now are not particularly interested in what I sitting here can see and do in this room so if I start talking about the air conditioning or I start talking about um I don't know the state of the upholstery or a or an unpleasant stain left behind on the desk by Nick Ferrari the the the general consensus in the world of radio is that you are not interested in that but I think you are interested in the fact that my phone lines are currently broken and it is impossible as many of you are telling me via WhatsApp it is it not via WhatsApp VI yes via WhatsApp it is impossible to actually get a line into the studio I and do you know how I know this shall I reveal a trade secret to you the reason why I know this is because I just tried to phone my own radio show um it's August right the news agenda is a little bit thin and therefore the the switch War doesn't always explode at 6 minutes 16 minutes after 10 in the way that it does on almost every other month of the year but when I see absolutely movement at all on the gray and forbidding screen in front of me then I am now I think arrogant enough confident confident enough to think there's something wrong with the system there's nothing wrong with me this is a really interesting conversation I've got brilliant I got millions of texts and and and um messages coming in there's something wrong with the system there's nothing wrong with me so I rang the number and lo and behold you can't get through in fact it says this number is UN obtainable which I poses a considerable challenge to a radio phone in host indeed there's an almost cfes element to the prospect of hosting a radio phone in with no phones I'm reminded of the time I I've told you about this many times I I came perilously close following a story about the number of people the tiny number of people who had neither a phone a mobile phone nor a landline I came perilously close on the program to inviting people to ring in and tell me what it's like not to have a phone perilously I was half way through the sentence before I realized how absurd it was 90 minutes after 10 is the time um so we will work with that okay and I will start with some of your answers to the question of why the um 15y old why a 15-year-old in the United Kingdom is going to be sadder or is currently sadder why it is harder to be a 15-year-old in the United Kingdom than it is anywhere else in Europe um I don't know about this well I know that I'll agree with with everything that you say Andy you're very kind uh Andy and grinby says excellent a three-hour monologue James I'm just going to go and get my popcorn we should be able to do stuff on FaceTime can we do stuff on face should we trying so I I don't know how this is going to work but anyway um and they've just turned it off completely now what are you doing pressing have you have you have you literally just turned it off and turned it on again is that is that we've got there are about 30 people in the engineering department and they've just turned it off and turned it on again is that well and and how do I know whether it's working or not well it's a phone in show would you mind ringing me on 0345 why it's harder to be a 15-year-old in the United Kingdom than it is anywhere else they've now turned off my inbox so I haven't got that either oh here it is what a relief um but I haven't got the ones that I just put to one side in order to read out to this is just a disaster so um higher depression because of higher societal expectations so Stephen I like this and this is where the peculiar nature of of being British in 2020 before kicks in so you suggest that we have higher societal expect expectations here than we do for example in in Germany or France and they are cultivated you right through online platforms such as YouTube Instagram Tik Tok and the rest telling them how easy it is to become famous and Rich and then the quick realization that it's not so easy and I don't know whether or not raising a teenager in France actually involves less likelihood of addiction to precisely the sort of platforms that that Steve refers to which is why in the first instance the People Best qualified to answer this question are the people who can actually make direct comparisons between the UK and the Netherlands the UK and Romania Spain Sweden Italy Ireland and Germany few of you pointing out that Myster is going to be an absolute hoot isn't it unless we can uh get our phone lines working sometime soon but um in the meantime I will have to deal with your uh answers to the question exclusively via WhatsApp and texts um the world is on fire James the water companies the water company is perhaps peculiar to the UK Juan pumping sewage into our Rivers threatening to charge us 60% more for the privilege food can be half rotten by the time you get it home from the shop the NHS Mental Health Service is overburdened children are expected to choose their career for Life by the age of 16 do you think there's a chance that we have put a tiny bit too much pressure on them yes I do actually think that that's possible um this is from Annabelle I'd say that whilst children in Estonia or Romania as parents and Elders are working hard to make life better our 15year olds have grown up in a country where their Elders actively voted to make things worse do you know and you probably won't believe me when I tell you this I was toying with the idea of banning the b word from this conversation but I think that that would be uh dishonest to be honest I don't I don't think the average 50 15-year-old is sitting there specifically citing brexit as a reason for their sadness but I do think that some of the things that are making them sad may be consequences in in part or in whole of brexit so indeed does Reese no opportunities James brexit locking them out of Europe they can't afford a house wages are stagnant higher education is unaffordable what are they supposed to do I don't know but what about that diagnosis is unique to or peculiar to the United Kingdom out of all of the things that you list are there greater opportunity is it easier to buy property uh is being locked out of Europe really likely to contribute to a sense of malays a sense of sadness that Caesars have the most depressed 15 year olds or the or the 15 year olds reporting the lowest levels of of Happiness of Life satisfaction in the whole of Europe I don't know and I what I don't want you to do is Project your own reasons to be not cheerful onto 15y olds it's a it's a question very specifically about 15y olds and Simon suggests and oddly enough in the Guardians reporting of this survey the the The Strange Case of Kirsty oop earlier this week is cited as Simon refers back to it it was something you talked about last week James parental paranoia was earlier this week I think parental paranoia uh and and I wonder how true that is I wonder how true that is is again in the context of being peculiar or or unique to Britain so the curs the oop story as you know um prompted a debate about parents who restrict their teenagers Freedom the possibility that they're infantilizing teenagers she allowed her 15-year-old shortly before his 16th birthday to travel in Europe with a 16-year-old friend and and some people went absolutely Bonkers about it it was a a really strange and quite possibly a peculiarly British story but again if we're costing our teenagers more than other countries are why would that be what would it be about these islands that has created in recent years a level of paranoia that you don't see reflected in other European countries it's 25 minutes after 10 my my switchboard is currently not working if you're just joining us this is one of those very rare exercises in radio phoning programs with no phone in with no phone um but I'm cool with that if you are we can muddle through until the phones actually start working can we try and set up some FaceTime calls if we can get if you if you WhatsApp us on 0345 606 0973 and so w it's going to be too complicated to do that any word from engineering Keith okay could they turn it off and turn it on again might work the second time I know they've tried is that it then is that the full is that the full extent of the engineering Department's Contra one thing I'm not going to do is is mock the engineering department uh any more than I have already because they are are brilliant and they are absolutely superb and they keep us all on air and they were the people responsible for me being able to have we got is that is that working now is that is that could it no or are you ringing out on that one is that no okay um we were also going to talk to will guy of course our technology correspondent about the um she could get Chris Moes on quite a few of you are suggesting but that's the kind of in joke that is probably not suitable for a radio phone in program that has no phones okay so the phones I think are ringing now if you want to contribute to this conversation 0345 60609 73 what I don't want to happen is for roxan and Emily to spend the next 10 minutes dealing with people who don't want to come on the program but are just ringing in to tell us that they can actually get through to the studio even though they don't actually want to come on to the program but you know be careful what you wish for we're going to take this all the way up to half past 10 do you think without taking a call it's not even a record this I I've done monologues about brexit that have got to 104 three without drawing breath but this is this is close to the first time that we have um not through Choice elected not to take any calls anyway look here's the question we're asking on the day that we discover British teenagers suffer from a happiness recession on a level or a scale that dwarfs the same peer group it dwarfs Children of the same age uh in other European countries I want a very specific Focus on why that might be what it might be about and shall I say brexit Britain or would that be factious what what might it be about brexit Britain that has created a a happiness recession that is not being seen in our closest Neighbors in in in the nearest countries both in terms of geography and in many ways in terms of socioeconomic status all right the number you need is 03456 6973 but but I do want and actually you'll struggle to get through now not because the phone lines are broken but because the phone lines are full Jack in Brighton Jack thank God you're here yeah through I've never been so pleased to see anybody in my life chat how are you yeah very good this could you could now just to put you at your ears you could be the worst caller I've ever taken on LBC I'll still be delighted to listen to you well yeah don't speak too soon J big fan I'm big fan I'm reading your book at a moment it's what a perfect start there you go I just uh I just want to say so when I was at University I wasn't 15 um but I got a chance to to live in Spain for a year okay um and I did that finally through the arasa scheme which obviously we can't do anymore which is a big shame but different topic but it was just yes and no yes and no just to say that um obviously the the phrase kind of Manana Manana was was we we lived by that when I lived in Spain you got past sort of 300 p.m. you sort of stop be like I guess we'll do that tomorrow and it was there a world life balance you're if I see this a lot I spend more time in Greece than anywhere else in in Europe and and see gas see gas slowly slowly just that idea that that you you can take your time a bit you can breathe you have a little more space that's it and I think like you said a lot of the a lot of the things that would trouble a 15-year-old are not unique to Britain but I think we just we are as a as a culture we're quite highly strong and we are quite you know we're worriors and we want to make sure that we're being as productive as possible and we're finding partners and we're having kids at the right time and I think as a as a as a culture we are very just a a stressed country why um which um as you say I think there's a lot of pressure a lot of expectation to but is it is it this is generational rather than rather than geographical I think because I I S I don't I don't have the measures or the or the data to to make the comparisons in other countries but your generation is is is among the first first that are likely to be less secure and less well off than their parents' generation that that perhaps creates a crucible of of of anxiety because Manana or seaa taking it easy is is built upon the idea of of the you know the ship just bobbing along quite gently if you feel that you're falling behind where your parents were then that stress and anxiety is going to be compounded I think it's difficult isn't it like my my my dad was was a slaughterman for from from the age of 16 and he and he brought up me me and two siblings and now you you can't just you can't just you know have have a job at the coffee shop on the corner and and live a f i don't want to say fulfilling that sounds a bit dramatic but raise a family in comfortable circumstances that's a perfectly reasonable thing to say so the job is just to keep your own head bobbing above water the notion of career or longevity seems increasingly um unattainable and you know I was looking at the a-level results of my my daughter's peer group and the the to get into universities now I don't understand this this is the conversation for a different day you need to get the kind of grades that would have got you prizes at my school just just to go to a decent University I don't I don't understand how that's happened the proliferation of A's and a stars and the rest of it um thank you Jack it is 10:31 this is no longer a radio phone in with no phones Thomas wat this here now with your headlines it is 10:34 you're listening to James O'Brien on LBC you want to know something ridiculous even after having to F pretty much half an hour uninterrupted because of technological problems in the studio I just came back from the news there thinking oh I might just take a few minutes to set my stall out share some thoughts talk about what's coming up later I'm encourageable it's pathetic frankly I don't know why you put up with me let's get to the phones as quickly as possible Smiler is in Nelson in Lancashire Smiler how are you I'm good thank you how are you very well indeed what's what what what what have you what answers have you got on this one um I don't know if there answers um I was just talking to the lady and I was saying that you're talking about unhappy 15y old I've got one um um there's two things that came into my mind um when you started talking about this firstly I was thinking about what's the age of the parents that that these 15y olds belong to yes so if the parents in in my view if they're quite Young say if they're in their early 30s late 20s and they have a 15y old they're not going to be in their late 20s are they well 29 14 when they had the baby I mean there will be people in that cohort but they're more likely to be late 30s than late 20s so I was thinking if they are at that age where they're still uh where where they're quite affected by the politics of this country and they just maybe the children are just projecting their parents' misery and if they've got financial troubles they're just struggling generally it just depends on what kind of family they come from I'm I'm in my late 40s quite financially secure I take my son on holiday two times a year he's not that miserable um but I because He follows he follows your lead you know as you say that Mike texted to say your scope is too narrow millions in this country are unhappy and children are very good at picking up parental Vibes governments who pitch people against each other have dominated for 14 years the last bit I don't know about this is why I'm Keen to make more comparisons I'm just back from francey right people are at peace with themselves there I don't know that that last bit is true from following the French news um I was I was also thinking that these kids that are 15 now were about 10 and 11 when covid was around yes and those are really crucial years and I think back to when Co happened it was the end of year six which is the end of primary school and all these children did not get a goodbye party they kind of like just fell out of primary school and were dropped into high school they had no transition days they had no way to um kind of like e in don't I mean other countries certainly had lockdowns yeah but of schools but we think you're thinking that possibly they handled them better we yes I do think that they handled them much better I can just remember like all my son's friends kind of like floting going are we goingon to have a goodbye party what's going to happen where we going to go and not not even knowing which schools they're going to go to and um and um one of the things was when they did get to the new school they were still in their year bubbles so they couldn't really meet with children from other years or and it was 18 months of bubbles that they were in and they couldn't there was a certain schoolyard that you had to play and you couldn't go to another schoolyard um they kind of suffered it affected the social sorry social skills they're communicating with other people yeah I mean you making a strong case but as you make it I'm just refreshing my memory on what other countries did with regards to school closures and and we were far from unique I France did the least France shot schools for about 10 weeks but it was 35 in Italy 28 in Germany and 27 in the UK so unless someone else can provide us with evidence of how they handled it better with regards to the mental health of that cohort I don't know that this is going to make the cut Somaya um because they did it in they did it in the other countries as well and we're trying to measure why things are worse here than they are in the other countries where they did the same thing I was also thinking that our government in the last few years has uh completely decimated um all kind of um youth projects uh youth centers anything that go is about children developing themselves has been decimated completely I think my son does better and his friends as well because I pay for a lot of things that he does um there's nothing for children to do that is free so if we go back to the parents that are um struggling not as financially well off and struggling a bit and politically kind of cross cross yes that those children aren't going to get the kind of facilities that mind us he's and couple that with with the lockdown point and maybe maybe it works better because you had the alternative Outlets the the alternative um thank you for that did did you did you ring me last did you you Rong me before I've spoken to you a couple of times yeah did you did I did I did you not get something I thought I sent you something no I I'm getting you mixed up with someone else forgive me somila the um couple of things you said someone else in Lancashire it must have been but but um I can't send things to everybody it is 10 coming up to 10:40 there it is that idea that the peculiar to the UK 14 years of austerity closing thing do you remember I used to be quite dismissive of people talking about youth clubs if we were talking about knife crime or stop and search or whatever it may be but about three or four months ago we did a phone in and it all slotted into place and I suddenly thought yeah it's not just a throwaway line just because lots of people say it to me when we have conversations like this doesn't mean it's boring it means it's true and she's right and that is perhaps peculiar to the UK just less to do less fulfilling lives Jacob's in Durham Jacob what do you think hi James I called you last week about a similar topic and you asked me why I thought it was so much worse now than it had been in the past I'm I'm 18 now okay and if I had to yes put my finger on one thing it would be there's nowhere to go yeah and I mean that in a number of ways uh your Coler the previous Coler had already mentioned lack of uh youth groups lack of Youth provisions and I think that governmentally uh on both the level of the council and on the level of the uh you know higher up the government um there's s there's not a sense of the youth existing as an investment yeah I think that they um we you neither of us are in a position to make comparisons with other European countries are we I I I'm not I'm not I'm not I'm just checking I'm not suggesting for a minute that your analysis is is is is wrong or or or not worthwhile but but I don't know what opportunities are available to a 15-year-old in France for example well it's partly due to opportunities but also partly to do with uh how oh no don't don't do that that no no no no no oh boy Sam's in Birmingham Sam what would you like to say hi James that pause killed me Sam it wasn't your there was a little glitch on the line I thought the phones had gone down again um Carry On what would you like to say what do you think it is uh well I think it's austerity James uh I'm 19 uh personally first in my family to go to university and I had some support left over from the labor government luckily so I got a child trust fund oh yeah so by the time I was 18 uh I had some support I was able to buy my first car with that money and commun commut University but I think you know kids today Youth Services have been cut by 90% many kids don't see a future because of austerity they don't think that the government supports them and I think you know because their parents have a negative view of politics that's all they've experienced all their lives really and and the the siren voices encouraging their parents and and therefore them to blame all of their problems on people who don't look like them or people who've come here from somewhere else is going to make everything worse not better isn't it in that in that context that's exactly right yeah and and so we can't make comparisons with other countries yet but if you were to take the UK in isolation and look at things that are happening here that might explain why 15y olds are so sad the the the big political picture is both at the same time it's quite an obvious answer but it's quite a detailed answer as well of course I mean why wouldn't you be sadder than previous generations and sadder perhaps than other countries When Hope is at a premium hope is under constant I think it's because as well a lot of decisions have been made without young people in Scotland young people have been given the vote for example at 16 I know the conversations about 15 year old 15y olds will be 16 very soon Sam some of them some of them even today yes so um they've got the vote in Scotland and they were I think if I recall they were able to vote in the Scottish uh referendum or I think I may be misremembering but I think they were able to and I think they're able to vote in national elections now as all at 16 just a level of political engagement I don't I don't know if if the figures break down according to the division between England and Scotland but in terms of feeling seen or or or engaged you've got to be on to something there uh and of course what are we talking about politically what is most of the media obsessing about pensioners again that's got to be part of what Sam is describing well tell your radio on oh pensioners it's terrible pensioners pensioners 14 years of having their tummies tickle and hey I got no beef with you and I think some of the people who are losing their wins of fuel payment should not be losing their wins of fuel payment but if you're trying to work out why year olds are the saddest in Europe perhaps the political obsession with pensioners largely because they are more likely to vote conservative or right-wing parties than than anybody else might explain why 15y olds feel dispossessed and disconnected but there you go so that there is the media at the moment obsessing about winter fuel payments for pensioners the massive massive massive majority of whom can afford to lose that benefit but what about the 15y olds who've lost infrastructure opportunity hope oh yeah get rid of them and if you talk about possibly giving them the vote then you just portray them all as being feckless idealists 10:45 is the time something remarkable has happened I don't know if you remember when we were talking about K st's speech on Tuesday wasn't it that's why I'm getting confused we had Monday off didn't we so we talked a bit about rot and my friend Gary who I'd had a drink with the previous evening uh he was listening and he he came in he's a decorator he came in with a decorating analogy he said the rot analogy works very well James first you have to detect the rot then you have to remove it it will look worse before you start rebuilding again but pretending that the rot isn't an issue will never resolve the problem it's a long-term repair as opposed to a quick botch job now guess what K starma said yesterday like literally okay this is word for word the whole point of this exercise is to make sure that we can bring about the change that we need if you don't clear out the rot and you don't do it properly you've got nothing to build on and therefore this is a vital step if you're redecorating your house and you want it to look much nicer it's usually better if you strip it down get rid of the damp and the cracks first rather than painting it in 5 minutes thinking it looks much better and by Christmas the cracks and The Damp have come back so there you go Gary's analogy is now Prime ministerial policy 10:46 is the time 1048 is the time Phil's in Germany he writes that lady has a very good point referring back I think to shanila Germany has Community sports clubs in every town city and even village where children can do a huge variety of activities and sports for a small monthly fee in the UK it all has to be paid for through the nose children in Germany are also a lot more independent from a much earlier age most primary school children in our community cycle or walk to school this all helps build the confidence and social skills needed to cope with the stresses and anxieties of Modern Life um quite a few comparisons coming through now uh I mean I'm not going to open idiots Corner today because it was such a strange opening to the program but if you are thinking of getting in touch to say that you don't agree with the research that's just silly it's like saying you don't believe in the common cold because you've never had one this is detailed and authoritative authoritative that's not how you say that word is it authoritative authoritative it's like quantitative easing is it quantitative do not adjust your radios um so don't don't do it's just silly to do that do that and and a little bit rude to be honest with you but hey ho on we go Monica's in rate Monica what are you reckon oh yes hello bit nervous um first time call us oh don't be ridiculous everything will be fine we're all friends here um now my mother is Dutch so I spent quite a lot of time in Holland and uh I've had loads of Dutch family um one of the big differences is seeing kids all over the place on their bike no adults in sight cycling to schools I don't know where they're going but they're they're there in without adults yes and the environment the built environment is designed to to to be as safe for them as possible you know cycle Lanes pedestrian areas Parks it's there there's very few Park cars for instance okay um and and and and and and just the the other the other difference I think is in Holland is very strong family bonds and the family is really important I mean uh and and you know people spend time a lot of time with their extended families so two things why don't we then why don't we why don't we what spend more time with our extended families because we're a bit more atomized as a population we've moved more for work or or we don't like them I I I I don't know I don't know I'm maybe too too Dutch to to uh although I I live this you know but but families very important to me as well and so I don't really know why um sorry about that no I Ian it made I'm just trying to look for things that are um specific to the UK whole Freedom thing is that you know walking to school on your own my kids they walked to school on their own from when they were eight hardly any the other kids did there is there is a level of paranoia that is perhaps why would it be peculiar to the UK because 24-hour news being I bet you have that in other languages you have that I remember when it started when the so start was it was it well so more meline mcams combination Mur maybe yes yeah but there was some fear that kind of came into this country then that that that just isn't there in other country or certainly not in the Netherlands listen to this from Dad who's in Norwich you speak about parents infantilizing teenagers my mom has been trying to persuade my sister not to go away on holiday in a month's time to Monaco on her own with her son because the world is quotes much more dangerous now and Anything Could Happen she's absolutely worried sick about them traveling alone my sister is 48 her son is 15 uh my mom watches Jean B news all the time it's her main source of information remember um when my my daughter had her 16th birthday party she's 25 now yes but and I had on the way back I had three girls in the back who were either 15 or 16 and none of them had ever spent an evening in their own house on their own and I said to them I said well what would happen they said oh a burglar might break in and attack me gosh I thinking they're 15 they're almost adults so this is probably media this is probably tabloids trying to terrify people all the time I don't know I don't know why they I mean my own daughter model babysitting other other children since she was 14 and she ran a little business for a while doing cake baking parties and stuff yeah I mean and this is parents who think they're being protective and being good parents who are actually contributing to I mean almost certainly contributing to the anxiety epidemic that we're looking at and possibly almost certainly contributing to this happiness recession as well um and how much fun do you have if you never go out with your friends you know and yeah and how much more likely you are to be less happy if you never have fun uh Johnny has one answer to one of your questions Monica he says Holland is such a small country you can't get away from your family even if you wanted to well that may be true 1054 Allan's in Fulham Alan what would you like to say well my experience of Germany is always that everything is on Merit right there aren't any private schools no it's up to you if you're good you will be backed by whatever funds are needed uh you never got a sense that someone has got a um a start on You by the checkbook um of his parents whatever however good you are you will go to the top um a true a true meritocracy then absolutely abolutely I did you live there I what what what are your what are your experiences drawing on how did you live there work there or just G all a day well I was I was sort of as a late teenager yeah more or less um treated as a third Son by a German family of friends of my family oh how nice they always wanted a third son and when they talked about how how are the boys doing they say well irin has got a new restaurant and daa has got a big promotion at work and he earns double the salary and Alan has now been top prosecutor in Lancer and blah blah blah and I was sort of treated as a third that's lovely so the idea is that your effort because I don't I mean Merit is a funny one your effort and your talent will be rewarded yes whereas a sense in this country it perhaps increasingly in recent years when we've seen how some complete puddings have risen to the very top based entirely on privilege you know some of the most Talent as politicians imaginable have ended up in the in the biggest jobs of all I don't think we should mention any names Alan but Jacob Ree and Boris Johnson spring to mind immediately so the idea that your effort and your talent will be rewarded creates optimism yes and there was a secret you see ardin had some help General lay said to ire you're not using your best talent and ardin now said what on Earth do you mean and he said you've got half the world's best managers in your country and you're not using them they're doing Mickey Mouse jobs as servicemen in the American forces a lot of them are qualified with master's degrees and better in the management management colleges of the United States they'll work for nothing rather than do the jobs they're doing board stiff say if they felt properly properly engaged and and properly excited I like that Alan Peter adds to the point you make from Germany we have lowc cost sports clubs music orchestra minimum yearly fees can be as low as €1 15 it's mostly funded by volunteers organizing Fates and the like members work for free and the proceeds go to the club it makes everything accessible for everybody plus we have great and frequent events with music food and drink which can be great for the community um priia is in Northwood priia what would you like to say hi James how are you very well first time callers are definitely very nervous say that prer it's it's you know it's it's unless you're a sort of weirdo you're going to you're going to get a very warm welcome who knows we'll find out well let's find out um so I was 15 16 when uh brexit was happening and my dad I don't know if you like this word was but is a massive Ramona okay um so I went on a lot of the anti- brexit marches at we prefer the phrase we prefer the phrase Vindicated realist on this program I'll pass that on to him good um so I think that I was definitely highly aware of the political situation at the time and I also saw How Deeply it was affecting him and I think I would go to the point of saying that he was quite depressed about it and I was really aware of that at the time um I think also hearing politicians like Jacob Reese's Pieces saying things like people who were antire yeah were elitist I think as a 15 16 year old that was really bizarre for me to hear because I didn't feel like I had an elitist life no but if you couple that with what Alan was just telling us and you see someone like that flourish and rise to the very top of our political tree while being a not very bright and B not very nice you you begin you come you marry the two things together and it it creates an obstacle to optimism you think what's the point of doing my best or what's the point of trying hard because I'm never going to get the glittering prizes that are reserved for people with Plums in their mouth and equally they've damaged my future and they're not being held to account for it exactly and I think especially on that point of damaging future um my dad really I guess emphasizes things that would be different and I think obviously at that time we didn't really know exactly how things would be different but for example like the arasmus scheme studying in France was something that I was interested in and I was trying my best in my gcss at the time in French so I could go on to do that and I think that it's a very different situation now yeah and these are I mean that everybody's experience is going to be different but you're specific to your 15th year or your 16th year um these These are are all pertinent points and there'll be a lot of people in similar situations and the sad thing is if if you're going to be completely holistic about things is that the people that caused it aren't happy either it's highly unlikely that the children of all the people who voted for brexit because they thought that they were going to be better off or they thought that the waiting list would be shorter or they thought that there would be less immigration um if you've sadly polluted your children's Minds with those kinds of ideologies you you you all the things that you thought you were going to get because you believed what Boris John John and and Jacob Reese's Pieces and Ian Duncan Donuts and David Davis and the rest of them told you they're going to be miserable and cross as well so nobody wins it's it's lose lose uh at which point the instruction to get over it begins to ring a little Hollow doesn't it uh it's coming up to 11:00 3 minutes after 11: is the time so I was in a beer garden yesterday and uh since you asked to celebrate my eldest can you believe if you've been listening to this program for a long time you would have heard me on air when my eldest child was born um some of you very kindly congratulated me at the time do you remember what happened I got picked up by mini cab at Hammer Smith hospital and the driver didn't let on that he'd recognize my voice it didn't happen to me very often back in those days and he rang this the presenter who was doing my cover while I was off on paternity leave to reveal that my daughter had been born so it was announced live on LBC before I'd even told my mom who was quite quite extraordinary um and I I mentioned that CU you like me will reel from the fact that she's off to University in September and we were we would had a little celebration last night about the fact that she'd got into her first choice University and I noticed and it's a funny thing to notice but that there was an ashtray on the table which I just moved I was only having a ginger beer still quite early um but we moved the Astro off the table and I was sitting by the uh uh barrier if you like the bottom of the beer garden is a there's a canal so you you know it's lovely it's a Waterside beer garden and I'd not noticed it before I don't go that often but I'd not noticed it before there were a lot of cigarette buts there a lot of fagons as we used to call them there were quite a lot of cigarette butts which meant that the people who'd been smoking rather than use the ashtrays which were liberally available in in the in the Beer Garden in the outdoor area of the pub they would um quite understandably really just just toss it over the glass barrier and enough to make me think oh that's unpleasant and I don't know whether that's relevant to this conversation that has been started by the front page of the Sun newspaper today the uh I mean fair play for the headline the butt stops here but oddly when I read that the government was contemplating a ban on smoking in Pub Gardens I I had two thoughts the first thought was that's a bit over the top isn't it and the second thought was I'd be surprised I'd be quite surprised if that actually happened but we're going to conduct this conversation on the presumption that it will all right we're going to we're going to presume that the leaked documents that the sun has apparently seen are in fact policy rather than conversation we're going to look at this as something that is I would say under consideration and for my money I I still think unlikely to happen but we're going to have the conversation about whether or not we want it to happen because would you hate me if I said I don't know I don't smoke and I don't like smoke and when you don't smoke you notice smoke a lot more than you do when you do smoke so even outside and you don't really encounter it indoors anymore but even if you're eating particularly if you're eating actually outside which is obviously not a particularly commonplace experience for the average Brit I believe it is called al fresco um it it it spoils your meal if someone at the next table Sparks up doesn't it it genuine does it you does it genuine is it not an age thing this is it this would be true of everybody it's a particularly noxious fume I I I'm not a massive fan of vaping either but I don't come across that as often which means it's not as noxious cuz there's bound to be people vaping in the pub Garden but it's not putting me off my dinner in the way that a waft of Benson and hedges or a waft of silk cup making its way across my chicken keave is going to actually put me off but I I wasn't actually going to talk about this until I heard the news bulletin there at 11: because when the hospitality industry warns that this is just going to add to their burdens I find myself wondering whether it's actually quite a bad idea an outdoor cigarette ban will be a hammer blow to struggling pubs desperate to pack out their beer gardens with punters well I will it I don't know you see because I'm probably more likely to spend a bit more time in a beer garden if nobody else there is smoking I'm certainly more likely to have a meal if nobody else there is smoking but I don't know and I wonder how much of a conversation we can have about the the liberty or the libertarian element of this as well in that the I mean the politics of it is questionable because it just triggers every single Nanny State accusation that the kind of lazy knee-jerk journalism that is largely responsible for us having the saddest 15y olds in Europe um uh routinely foist upon us the The Nanny State allegation is quite um is quite clear here as well the problem with smoking in a in a a beer garden though is that it takes away my freedom to enjoy my meal without a lung full of your smoke doesn't it so I think this is a really interesting one I think this is a um a little bit more nuanced perhaps than first glance allows we are being encouraged by The Usual Suspects to get cross about this because somebody is telling us what we can and can't do the massive majority of us don't smoke right smoking tobacco massive majority it's very Niche these days it's also I think quite stigmatized correctly it kills people even kills people who don't smoke although happily the sort of incidence of passive smoking has been enormously reduced by the legislation that's already been brought in so here is the encouragement from the sort of lazy rightwing of the British media to get cross about something that if you stop and think about it it's probably only going to affect you in a positive way unless unless you think that your right to spoil my dinner is somehow more important than my right to enjoy the dinner that I'm paying for so just give me give me what you think on this one I find of all the things I've reached that stage you've probably noticed in the last few days because I've done it a few times what was what was it what was it yesterday when I was talking about oh music I talked about music streaming a couple of days ago and I don't think I've ever sounded older just that sense of Marvel at the idea of being able to stream anything you want I can't really make many music recommendations to my children because spotify's beaten me to it you know I caught one of them listening to the Smith the other day and I thought oh I was going to introduce you to the Smith we better not have the morresy conversation yet turns out they knew about that as well because they're permanently online but the but the things that you tell your teenagers from your youth sometimes seem unbelievable to them so do you remember what our clothes smelt like after a night in a club that's insane right you would youd spend a night in a club and and you could smell the next you could smell your clothes from across the room that especially if you didn't smoke so it wasn't your smoke that was soaking your clothes it was somebody else's smoke and that was completely normal you go into pubs that had yellow ceilings they've been painted white but they had yellow ceilings so common place was the miasma of tobacco smoke everywhere you went and it was completely normal until suddenly it wasn't so I I I I want to know what you think about this one because part of me said yeah of course my right to enjoy my pint without having to breathe in your secondhand smoke trumps your right to smoke in the big on provide a little area like a little bus shelter or that thing out of 2000 ad do you remember that thing in 200 ad where where they have a GU it's called something like a smok atorium and everybody in there SM and no you're not allowed to smoke anywhere else you can't see anyone you walk in there it's so Smoky correct and complete stigmatization of smoking so you can do that you can have a little spot where you won't affect anybody else but for the rest of the garden I think it's a good thing so here's where I am right this is why we're going to talk about it this hour this is my problem now which turns it into your topic I think it's a really good idea when I think about it from my point of view but and I still think it's a good idea when I think of it from your point of view as someone who wants to ruin my dinner by blowing smoke all over the garden but oddly if I take a broader view of society our freedom to do things that are bad for us because we like it I think that's a crucial freedom in some ways it's the most crucial freedom of all otherwise you really do start living in a in a potentially orwellian environment and the the the damage it would pose to the hospitality industry you wouldn't be allowed to smoke outside football stadiums nightclubs or on restaurant Terraces even some small parks would see it banned and I want strong opinions on this so you might not ring me often you may never have rung me before but this one really floats your boat you can't believe that in 2024 we're even entertaining the possibility that people should be able to smoke in a space where your children can play you you gen I really want the kind of passionate anti-smoker to explain to me why this has got nothing to do with civil liberties or the freedom to do things that are bad for you this is about creating a society in which your bad choices don't result in bad outcomes for me and mine smoking is disgusting I know it's also quite pleasurable but it's simultaneously disgusting so Banning it from Pub Gardens is potentially politically difficult and yet the more I think about it yeah the more I think about it the more I think that um this is definitely the right thing to do should we have a look in idiot's corner here we go Vanessa is an idiot's Corner this morning she says um okay and then you're not allowed to have a point outside either let's all live in a Muslim state so you think I exaggerate what's happening to people who are spending their lives on social media uh the idea of uh Banning smoking we ban smoking inside pubs Vanessa I hope this doesn't come as a major shock to you we baned smoking inside pubs without Banning beer isn't that incredible also is smoking Haram I don't know that smoking is necessarily Haram certainly shisha seem to be very popular in sort of Middle Eastern catering establishments are we going to ban those as well I don't know what's the health impact of of one of those sort of Hubba Bubba pipes so there's the question I I I've got a feeling that this is actually a really good idea but I've got a suspicion that it might actually be bad politics and it is at this point that I ask you what you think um finalizes are open and the the switchboard is working 0345 6060 973 is the number you need it is 17 minutes after 11 Jake mate come on give your head a wobble we didn't ban beer when we banned smoking because the government makes a massive amount of money off alcohol Jake the government made a massive amount of money off tobacco sales as well but they still banned it because it was bad for us there is a case to argue that if alcohol was invented now it would be criminalized because it it causes so much harm but you're never going to get that one over the line um the smoking ban and and oddly it was the last hour where I wanted to do all of the comparisons with other countries but of course it works here as well uh Wayne's been in touch in Sweden he tells me um there was majority support for the introduction of a ban which was then extended to include outdoor seating in bars and restaurants as well as public places such as playgrounds bus stops and train stations so fin lines are a bit full at the moment but I let me add another dimension to this conversation which is it's being sold to us as G down with this sort of thing I'm not sure it will work if they do bring it in I'm not sure it will actually have a negative impact surely most PE maybe smokers are a bit like people who like speeding in their cars they're very loud very vocal very over represented on a certain type of radio phoning program but actually the silent majority the quiet sensibles like you and me all right I'm not very quiet not necessarily very sensible either but you take my point we would mostly approve of this because why wouldn't you I demand the right for my children to be inhaling tobacco smoke while eating their ice cream in the in the pub Garden or sliding down the slide uh just over the way I don't know it's 11:18 Steven is in Melbourne in uh linkshire or Australia Australia austral so um for once in your life you're you're you're hitting the nail on the head so um in Australia we we brought in the the n I think I think that's a bit unnecessarily rude Steven no I'm sorry I'm being cheeky sorry forgive me I CU I got tempted then to cut you off oh no no no don't do that why not if you can be rude to me I can be rude to you well no you you can you can you're you're absolutely but I'm going to be bigger than you and I'm going to let you carry on fair enough Point well me it okay so in Pub pubs in Australia what what I I'm I'm in Melbourne so in Victoria so they brought in the rules originally where they stopped the smoking in the pubs same as anything same as a UK did it kick off much did it kick off much no it didn't it was brilliant it was so my background I I ran pubs in Australia for 10 15 20 years um and I I I was running pubs as we were going through that the the big big pubs in the city in Melbourne yeah while we were going through this transition from being a pub where everybody smoked to a pub where no one smoked so yes it didn't have a negative impact on trade so the first thing that happens is your Pub internally becomes nicer and more pleasant to be in because all the things you mentioned earlier there's not as much smoke the the place looks better it's more attractive to people did you smoke yourself did you did you smoke yourself sorry so I I did actually smok myself and I I quit about a year before they started bringing these ke was a DJ Keith was a club and pob DJ and and back in the day he he was working six or seven nights a week and when they brought the smoking ban in he got withdrawal symptoms cuz he was so used to spending three four five hours a night breathing in other people's cigarettes smoke that he suddenly noticed he was getting itchy and irritable and almost craving to go out because that's when he would get a nicotine hit that wouldn't surprise me at all because you're in an enclosed space the smoke was just wasting in your face and everything it was it was horrible back in those days it was horrible you made you made a point earlier on about five butts being thrown everywhere that's one of the worst things in a pub that you used to have to do with clean up after all the dirty asres the the point I wanted to make was the next stage that they brought in in Melbourne was to stop smoking in any area whether it be inside or out where food was served so the little alesco dining areas outside your rooftop bars whatever yes if you if you served food you did not allly smoking so at at the time that was coming in I was running a relatively big bar in in Melbourne and we were renovating and we were building a rooftop so this beautiful big rooftop which had um you know capacity for a couple hundred people so reasonably good size B so about a year before it came in whenever we opened this I I well I say I we need the the the choice to ban smoking on the rooftop while it was still legally able to smoke so we we stopped it no negative impact to trade whatsoever the place is packed out and all I would get was people coming up to me going I think it's great you're not allowing smokeing up what did the smoke what did the smokers do do we know well they just go downstairs and go outside and that's the point they'd have to be somewhere they could do it wouldn't there and also it would encourage people to cut down or give up as well wouldn't it so so there's no downside at all look you know what you'll find is the industry bodies will tell you this is going to be a disaster now it will be a disaster for some people it will be a disaster for some pubs that there will be some pubs that will lose trade off with this and this will particularly in the current climate we push them over the edge but the vast majority of pubs if they have a good offer and this is probably key to it's about the offer you got you got in your Pub if you've got a good food beverage offer creating a really nice space whether it be indoors or Outdoors that is attractive to people will only enhance your trade over time you'll find people that wouldn't go to the pub like like you said you don't want to sit down and someone cracks a cigarette on the table next to you and it last across across your table my my my partner would be the exact same she hat hat smoke she hates being in an environment where there is smoke she wouldn't go to pubs or she wouldn't go to outdoor areas where there's lots of smoke going on because of that so so she she becomes she becomes more likely to go into the yeah and that's is from a from someone in the in the hospitality business albeit that wasn't a very hospitable opening to the call but I don't know and I think it's the job of the hospitality uh spokes people or or the you know the the the trade bodies to to resist change that is possibly going to have negative impact upon trade they've suffered enough goodness knows from increased costs Staffing problems brexit related issues you know all of that so of course you should push back against it but whether or not they need to be doing that is a question that only people who've been through a similar process in other territories will be able to answer for example Stephen it's true that about Keith he just told me that so you know like a DJ you know what a DJ is probably do you still need DJs you still use but it's anyway with just a conversation for another day so he would be in a pub six seven nights a week a club or a pub six or seven nights a week spinning spinning his platters the Wheels of Steel and there was so much smoke that environment was so Smoky that he was addicted to nicotine despite never smoking a lot of people of my age will think now of the late great Roy Castle who was a jazz Trumpeter before he became a very famous television presenter of a superb show called record Breakers record Breakers um and he would would famous infamously famously died of of lung cancer despite never having actually smoked in his life but he had been a trumpet player so he wasn't just breathing in Smoke Field clubs he was really breathing in Smoke he was sucking in enormous lungfuls of of smoke and as a consequence of that it it was believed he got lung cancer so you know the the realities of this are inarguable 24 minutes after 11 is the time Tony is in Stanford Hill Tony what would you like to say hi James pleasure to speak to you just like that just just let me pause you there and see that's how you open a call to a radio program isn't it you see we b a bit of mutual kindness respect none of this you know the first time ever you've said something you just don't need to do that it's so unnecessary carry on Tony you're my favorite yeah U pleasure well just like yourself of being a radio presenter DJ Club DJ back in the 80s 90s in wardor Street and there was a basement club and I had to come out every night and wash my clothes and have a shower before I could even go to sleep CU I absolutely R of cigarettes yes um going further I drive past the world famous jazz cafe every other night on my way home and there's like a 100 200 people outside there I don't know 11:00 12:00 at night and having said that further on I've just come back from Croatia which is somewhere I've never been to oh yeah and I saw how clean the streets were how clean you know everything was so clean so SP and span and the restaurants and they've got these canopies everywhere but everyone seems to be enjoying themselves having a good time and there's not this you know so I actually think you've hit a nail on the or you've hit a nerve with certain people but I think you've really hit the nail on the head well I mean in the actual beer garden though any anywhere food is served that would be a really good way of doing it so that wouldn't include outside football stadiums or outside nightclub but why should I have to walk why should we have to walk through clouds of noxious smoke I'm still a DJ so I still do these pubs I do a lot of pubs rather than bars and restaurants now sure and and there and I do agree with you maybe they should be given a little bit of space somewhere in some corner but the attitude of a lot of these people they do throw the cigarette over the fence or throw any lobit anywhere rather than put it in the ashtray provided there is um there's another dimension to this conversation I think this will actually win over any waverers Nigel farage has written a piece for the Daily Telegraph under the headline it I'll never go to the pub again if outdoor smoking is banned that's fantastic right abolutely got any any Pub in the country will finally be safe of course unfortunately he's not got a very long or proud track record of actually keeping promises or telling the truth but that would be any any waverers thinking that this might be a little bit over the top it would it would remove entirely the prospect of ever bumping into Nigel farage in a pub forever what club on wardor Street did you it wasn't the brain was it no do you remember Jacqueline bananas called crackers no vaguely I was more of a a techno head by then a house music head by then but you you were you were catering for a more sophisticated CLE onel I don't thank you Tony 11:27 is the time Chris is in Horn Church Chris what do you reckon yeah hello mate nice to be on the on our first time caller welcome so yeah Allelujah so listen i' I've been smoking since I was 11 years old well I need to know how old you are now to really get the full measure of that statistic okay well I'm a young 57 year old that's 46 years that is Chris that's a long time yeah and the way it started was my dad used to smoke the the gold Virginia rollups indoors yes so you're watching your your dad smoke and you think well that's cool and you think that's normal and acceptable and then you go and play in the park somewhere there's older kids there and they're smoking a cigarette and you say give me a two on that so you start having a drag on a cigarette right and now you think you're cool now you think oh yeah I'm all growing up now and um and it just flowed from there yeah and I think the smoking band in a you're absolutely spot on cuz look how the laws changed right so where will you go then where will you go for a crafty smoke well out of sight out of sight out of mind right you take a school right you never see the teachers pop out for a cigarette all the kids around them do you not anymore no you would have done once you would have done once but that was a teacher would just get shacked on the spot for doing that yeah it's true and and you know do you know I always remember Chris I think you'll like this when they brought in this smoking band there was some really quite hard-hitting adverts including one that had like a cut off of an arm and they used they used cigarettes to represent the cholesterol so it was it was as if the whole of your body was getting clogged up as a consequence of smoking but rather than picturing the cholesterol or the fat or whatever it actually is they used cigarettes in the in the and they got the advertising standards Authority got loads of complaints from people saying that they hated that advert because it was really putting them off smoking really but you know like if I go and buy a pack of cigarettes in Cas go right yeah it's all other supermarkets are available yeah it is isn't it it's all covered up on the shut all in black boxes because they they don't want people to see it and and frankly let take a beer garden right why should a family sit there a mom and dad with their kids yeah and people are puffing a [ __ ] yeah you and the kids can see it and I think oh that's cool I might have a crack at that why have you not knocked it on the head have you tried it's hard one is it I do I do smoke and I Vape okay and I'll tell you what I see what happened to me before I stopped for 12 months oh yeah years ago well done I saw I had a friend who didn't smoke and that inspired me and I went C turkey and I stopped smoking for 12 months yeah and what happened was in those days you could smoke in a pub so it was Christmas time and I'm in the pub with all mates and I thought I'll go on this Christmas have one oh so I borrowed a [ __ ] off someone I went all dizzy your legs went heavy yeah and before you know it you're having another [ __ ] before you know it again you're you're back again ni you just got to cut it away like if you're a smoker you can't be seen in public I like it I like it and I like your kind of recognition of the fact that it's not doing you any favors and therefore you don't want other people to fall under its evil spell moving forward even even though you managed to break that spell for 12 months and then fell back back again thank you Chris um you brought me a little late for the news I was hanging on your hanging on your every word quick quick line from Paul though will farage never go going to the pub again be in the same manner as his leaving the country if brexit was a disaster I almost certainly Paul actually here's Thomas wats with your headlines it is 26 minutes to 12 mystery hour on the way and um we are planning to speak to will guyatt about the arrest of the Russian fellow that runs the telegram platform and the question of whether or not it is likely to impact upon Elon musk's stewardship of of Twitter or X as he likes to call it um it's it's an interesting story this he's been charged in Paris paval dorov and um the idea do you know one of the very first phonin we ever did technology wise or generational change wise which I am obsessed with I've been obsessed with generational change since I was very young since well you know 20 years ago I started doing this job and we talked about who has jurisdiction over stuff that comes into your home via the Internet and it it was a bit of a mystery hour question at the time but it has become more acute a more urgent question in the last two years than perhaps any point in the last 20 isn't it so you know dark web stuff and and access to disgusting images and things like that who holds responsibility for that as far as I can tell the telegram Founder's defense is that he can't be held responsible the owner of a platform can't be held responsible for what appears on a platform could you imagine if the owner of LBC tried to argue that or could they argue that you are held you can't be held responsible for what a caller says before I manag to press the dump button if they commit well ofcom would disagree if it went out so you are held responsible for everything that happens on your platform but I just thought find some of the nuances some of the detail of this story and um and will is very well placed to talk us through it because Twitter itself as as most of still call it has is becoming close to unusable now if you are relatively normal or sane or not obsessed with um the idea of focusing entirely on ethnicity when discussing any subject Under the Sun whether it's criminality policing or football um and and that's largely because of the people that have managed to buy blue ticks so they dominate your replies which means there's no point looking at your replies anymore which means you miss all the nice people and you know the the the the pleasure of blocking wears off when you're starting to get repetitive strain injury from doing it and I noticed Gary lka said exactly the same thing it's gone from having millions well he's still has millions and millions of followers but there's no point tweeting anymore because people who get their pleasure from I don't know what it would be really it's like people who people with halosis who get their pleasure in life from breathing all over people including complete strangers people they profess not to lie if I'm not really interested in what you've got to say and you don't pose a threat to me or mine or or or you're not actually agit to my country to make my country a worst place to live from a position of relative power I'm more than happy to completely ignore you but these people are the opposite of that they're obsessed with just breathing their feted breath all over people who would much rather never hear anything from them in their life and they are mosque's people that's what it has been turned into so it's it's an intriguing combination of of of circumstances isn't it it's but but it is going to see the people who've helped turn Twitter into a big platform is going to see most of them move on and get replaced presumably by sort of little to Steven yaxley Lenin fans and and whatever else grows up in the darkness uh 11:37 is the time sorry that was a bit of a departure let's get back to the beer gardens and the question of smoking and my suspicion that the massive majority of people will welcome this that it won't actually have a negative impact upon the hospitality trade and that attempts to use it increasingly desperate right-wing media to use it as a stick with which to beat K starma they'll probably fail as well but I could be wrong Lucy's in buckton that is a lovely part of the world hello Hello Lucy what would you like to say hello I'm first time caller by the way you're very nous it's only me I know I know I listen to show all the time I think you're great oh well I let's just hope that Kida get a release a result against buckton later this season and everything will be hunky D oh right um oh I see are are you with buxon or kidster kidster Lucy oh right well oh then okay yeah we'll teach you list we'll teach you a list no you won't we'll teach you a l i was in boxton not long ago that's got some very nice beer gardens yes I was I love that part of the world all right which did you go to I can't remember I stayed in a very nice hotel in between I'm not going to remember now what's just north of boxton uh what's the next town up uh either wayy Bridge your Chapel the wayy bridge between Buxton and wayy Bridge I walked to Buxton I I walked up the Old Railway line oh nice it's beautiful isn't it and so what and so the pub I would have gone to was just on the river there what would that have been called I don't know because why are you asking me what Puba went to then if you haven't got the facts at your fingertips oh I don't know I'm all nervous that's why well I'm sorry I was trying to put you at your ease and it's backfired horribly what would you like to say about what would you like to say about beer gardens um I don't agree with you at all on this what we were going on so well I know but I normally agree with you on everything oh well that's no fun so I'm I'm quite sort of disappointed go on why why why not um because um I think most people who go to the pubs who most of their trade is Drinkers and it's been a huge shot well spotted Sherlock what I said well spotted Sherlock I know I know I'm very bright like that no yeah I know but I mean alcoh obviously alcohol drinking you don't get many people going to the pub to buy a car do you Lucy not really anyway carry on but I I think people who sort of like drink most of the beer I'm far more likely to smoke than the people you know what I mean no no no not anymore they banned it indoors ages ago and the pubs have survived I know I know but I just think I don't know I sort of feel sorry for the smokers really well that's fine got to have somewhere they can go somewhere else no I don't think you thought this through Lucy to be you habitu are you a habitu of beer gardens um no yeah no you're not no no you're not don't don't FIB to me well I'm not I mean I used to I used to um I used to smoke and I used to drink and I don't do either now well there you go well not really because you can't have a a completely theoretical anecdotal Theory being offered up against all the evidence we've had from everybody from publicans right through to smokers who agree that it should be banned in beer Gods what about the little children won't somebody think of the why do you hate children Luc children I I don't I love children why do you want children to be breathing in these disgusting fumes while they're trying to eat their fish fingers well I I don't know I don't think pubs are good for children anyway s beer gardens that fames in beer gardens oh it's glorious it's one of the Great British tradition McDonald's oh then yeah you can't smoke in can you smoke in McDonald's Gardens outdoor bits M I don't know Lucy I wish you well how how was that did did you relax a bit as the call went on not really yeah s of I'm trying to find I'm trying to find the place I stayed at just near buxon but I've got I can't find it in my inbox must have must have dropped out it'll come to me shortly I'll tell you next time it might oh it might have been no I can't remember either I'll tell you I'll tell you the next time what's the book shop in Buxton the old the old the old antiquarian book shop uh are you sure you've been to buckton Lucy in Bon I live in Bon well you say that I don't know if you could what's the what's the lovely antiqu aquarium Bookshop called you mean the one on the corner no the other one oh um anyway you don't even know the name of the one on the corner do you no no we must do this again 11:41 is the time boxton is a beautiful beautiful part of the world although I grant you that Lucy hasn't done a very good job of bigging it up for the for the uninitiated that was probably my fault uh Gerald's in Nottingham did I ever tell you about the time I went to not I'm joking Gerald what would you like to say James great show thanks for having me on um so 22nd of August 2014 10 years ago over I lost my sister my older sister to lung cancer oh I'm so sorry yeah she smoked 40-day um and she was given six weeks to to live I think she lasted about 10 so I've seen firsthand the impact of of cigarettes um now I'm a father of three um I just think that this is a great policy I go to the playground with my with my three-year-old there's someone smoking right next to my daughter on the swings I just don't get that um so I think we need to make smoking there's an ignorance to it isn't there there's a there's a strange because a few people have made this point about sitting there and people come and sit next to you and light up it doesn't seem to cross anybody's mind Outdoors that the smoke is still obnoxious and and yeah it's because it's a perception that the cigarette's going to rise into the atmosphere but it doesn't it lingers um and you know I used to work in in a bar years ago and I used to come home sing cigarettes and I just think that we need to we need to fast forward in life and make it not socially accessable to smoke around others that don't want to simple as yeah and that's why I think that any attempts to turn this into a sort of Nanny State stick with which to beat the government if indeed it does come to fruition which isn't certain although I think the sun story today is in good faith I think it's a genuine leak um I don't think it will land I don't think most people are going to respond to it by sort of feeling AG grieved or feeling because I mean a tiny proportion of people who smoke in Pub Gardens anyway so what you're relying on is the people who don't do it but think that everybody else should have the right to and I don't think that's a very big constituency because the right for you and me and our children to sit and enjoy a meal without breathing in somebody else's smoke seems to me to be bigger yeah here's the thing I've Got Friends at smoke and and they're on the other side of the camp they they think I think problem is people don't want the government to tell them what to do exactly that's what it comes down to exactly that but we'll we'll make a choice I just think that this is a positive choice for positive outcomes so if my friend Danny needs to go outside of the front of the pub to smoke off you go and come back when you've done with your cigarette and and do you know I I you just made me have a thought there JD which I've not had before people don't like being told what to do by the government but they do like the government telling other people what to do don't they so I genuinely think that I've never thought of that before for it's like that line about policing Everyone likes the police until they're the ones being policed so I I quite like the government telling you what to do telling you that you can't smoke I tell you what I really like I like the government telling you that you can't drive at 100 miles per hour up and down the road or that you can't drive with six pints of Stellar inside you I quite like the fact that you you know the government has told you that you there's loads of things you can't do it starts telling me what I can't do do I feel a little bit AG grieved I don't know I can't think of anything I do that the government does tell me that I can't do a lot of people are talking about cannabis and of course that is also a problem in including in Pub Gardens but it would be easier if you're not allowed to smoke at all in a pub Garden I don't think people are going to give up cigarettes and start sparking up spliffs as I believe the kids call them or dues because it would be smoke per se that becomes bannable or banned so I think it would actually cut down the amount of of um cannabis smoke that's wafting around the garden of the Dog and Duck as well it's 11:4 5 12 minutes at 12 is the time Thursday mystery hour thank goodness we got the phones working again what on Earth would have happened to mystery hour if the phones didn't work and if you've just changed in and you're wondering what on Earth I'm talking about the phones didn't work for the first half an hour of the program said do you know what we did we phoned will Gatt and had him on like reserve like in case of emergency break glass and there's will gy waiting to talk to us about something technological although we had already booked him to talk to us about something technological because I'm really interested in the charges that have been brought against the founder of telegram an encrypted messaging platform in in France the platform's not in France he is in France um and then we didn't need to speak to will guy because the fin line started working again so we pushed him back to the slot that he was originally booked to to to speak in and here he is what's the story Morning Glory this is an interesting story and I have no idea where this is going to end up with pavl jurov um we always think of tech leaders being interesting people James but let me tell you pavl jov has 100 children I'm going to start there that's the first bit of information I'll give you Christmas must be a nightmare yeah just imagine and he's now in a situation where he appears to be up for 12 different criminal charges in uh France as the basis of leading this platform and it's the first time this has ever happened he has um uh residen in in France and he also is now in the United Arab Emirates he is a Russian and he's a Russian who left Russia in 2014 when he refused to hand over loads of information to authorities on who was using the service now if you've never heard of telegram it's a platform that has about a billion users most people think it's fully encrypted and is therefore safe for them to do ridiculous things on and post whatever they want right the chat it's not actually fully encrypted it's one of the weirdest myths that's ever been perpetuated every everybody on that platform thinks they're completely safe when they're posting they are not however it's been used by lots of people in lots of different countries and the challenge they now face is it would in in European law there is an understanding and a feeling that they're not doing enough to communicate with authorities it's being used in illicit transactions by organized gangs and there's also a complicity um in organized criminal distribution of child sexual abuse images drug trafficking and and money laundering so so the charge would be aiding and abetting which is absolutely fascinating and and makes it very easy to understand why Elon Musk has got his pants in a bunch because if if you are own a platform upon which crimes are committed the idea that you are aiding and abetting those crimes could conceivably extend to inciting riots yes but I cannot get my head around why the French representative of meta and the French representative of x has not yet been called for a similar situation because if we're looking at this fairly I don't think there is anything worse shared on on T and this is a damning indictment of the modern world yes there's nothing worse on telegram than there is shared on the other platforms uh given that Elon Musk has basically told the European uh Union to do one and that he'd see them in court you're quite surprised that there hasn't been a similar situation where the representative in in in France has been called in because the platforms you reference are bigger as well so if the offense if the offense is urgent then the greater offender would be the bigger the platform do you want to speculate on that at all do you want to wonder out loud why it might I'm intrigued because they got to start somewhere haven't they if they are serious about addressing this kind of thing yeah no I agree with that but why start with the least consequential of platforms meta has billions of users in Europe um X probably doesn't have definitely doesn't have billions of users in Europe but it's talked about by lots of people and in terms of press coverage it over indexes it's talked about all the time in places for mostly being a Cess pit in 2024 but nothing happens with it James nothing those organizations don't get don't have anything happen to them Elon Musk can bait the EU there are some theories they're taking action against uh Twitter aren't they X Twitter Twitter X they are there are there are there are legal wheels turning their illegal Wheels turn they haven't arrested an individual could it just be because he was in France oh cuz you're saying he could have arrested the Nick CLE equivalent in France of there are there are leaders Mark zuber's representative on Earth as it were yeah no exactly and that's what doesn't make a great deal of sense there is potentially depending on what you believe the the political motivation here but he's not pro- Russian pavl jurov has not supported the Russian State and for a period of time telegram was banned in Russia it does get used Now by a load of crazy Russians like Dimitri medv the former president who's suggesting every two days that the UK should be nuked etc etc it's used by a lot of um lot of people in Russia and it's one of the most used platforms there some I know this is the one bit of the story I do know a little bit about there's some debate about whether or not his estrangement from the Kremlin was was either authentic or permanent so I I the the Russian element is interesting I'm I'm intrigued by your why him and not the other's argument could it just be an organ grinder monkey issue so that if Elon Musk landed in Paris tomorrow possibly they'd feel his collar as well I'd love if they did because musk has argu I'm just trying to solve your riddle I'm he is the head hono and they had the chance to get him which they haven't got with Zuckerberg or or musk yet yeah maybe I think I think that that's likely the reality he was there at the right place at the right time and because he had residency in the country they could probably lock him up um but for me I'm I'm intrigued to see where this goes next James because is is this a start of uh Europe saying enough is enough you you social networks have to do more and you have to take all this stuff seriously or is this something else that's politically motivated there allegedly are convers suggestions of conversations between uh macron and jurov in 2018 where he tried to get jurov to relocate um uh telegram to Paris and other stuff but that's all heay really I I just I'm Keen to see if this is um I always thought this was going to be the year of big Tech versus big law but now we've kind of got one step up from that it's not lawyers fighting over who's in control you've actually got a state trying to lock up the leader of a company so it's going to be interesting to see what occurs and and and it will hinge upon the statement in a sense that dorov has issued saying that telegram abides by EU law but this but it is absurd to claim a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform which is not as clear as dorov would like everybody else to believe I mean just to draw a tiny parallel with what we do if I mean ofcom don't have criminal sanction the broadcast regulator but we would seek to demonstrate to ofcom that we had done everything we could to um mitigate or avoid the breach of their regulations the idea that we can't take any responsibility at all for what goes on on this platform that's absurd yeah it is and it's also I always find it really interesting when the number of people sort step forward and say oh you know this social network is trying to cancel X Y or their person they're privately run organizations they can set whatever rules they like but also I don't think they can back away when somebody says they're not doing enough the fact that independent experts for example are saying there is this organized Criminal distribution of child sexual abuse images on that platform and uh they can various embedded European organizations recognized as world leaders in trying to get this stuff off the internet cannot get proper conversations with people at telegram should tell you all you need to know about how seriously they're taking their responsibility as a platform and and one wonders finally well whether or not all of the um hard of thinking social media users currently bleeting about free speech and orwellian Nightmares realize what it is that they are actually supporting exactly and you've nailed it on the head and for all of those people James who think this a free speech it's it's a free speech Empire um Elon Musk puts uh non-disclosure agreements on pretty much everybody that leaves his company so so much for Mr freedom of speech we got beautifully put and thank you as well for allowing us to ride rough shot over your schedule this morning and being there behind the glass lest we need to break it in cases of emergency um I'm grateful to you it is just kind up to 11:58 time for at least one more call Christine is in il Forum another beautiful hello Christine sorry to keep you how are you oh I'm fine my heart has stopped banging so much now that was good calm down a bit that was probably because I just had a cigarette oh topical yeah so bear Gardens yeah I think it's a good idea that we really hard to do to police or whatever you know because when people get drunk which people do in pubs just going to want to smoke and you'll be having arguments and fighting or whatever you know so is so that you're talking about your average weekend are you Christine I'm talking about my average weekend and I was about 18 so I haven't drunk for years but oh I see but you're you're a committed smoker but I smoke yeah well I mean how did they police it indoors if they can police it indoors they can police It Outdoors can't they well they won't they really because you know what's happening now with all the PBS closing and stuff like that I can imagine a landlord saying well I got time to go around and say put that [ __ ] in the you know yeah maybe I I I think it'll police itself you'll probably have the occasional Mis James it won't honestly it won't it will it will it won't I always go on swings when I'm so who goes on a swing next to a child that guy was saying that he had his child on the swing yeah and somebody was smoking next to the child yeah the person was pushing their own child in a swing probably while having us crafty smoke as well you don't well also that also happens yeah but what I'm saying is people should just be nicer and more considerate can't argue with that but you're a smoker yeah but I go to a pub to have uh food yeah and afterwards after you having a meal oh I'm gonna have a cigarette now lovely me and my husband will go outside and if there's people there we'll go as far away as possible as we can from the people be more Christin without even thinking about it you know be more Christine be more Christine but unfortunate until everybody is more like you we're going to need a little bit of stick instead of carrot and uh the discouragement will have to be a little bit more robust they've Managed IT at airports there's loads of places where they've managed to successfully Implement a smoking ban indoors and in other Count's Outdoors but time will tell two things Christine number one whether it is actually going to come to uh policy fruition or legislation fruition and number two whether or not it is Police or implementable if and when it does um that is the end of the program proper we move next onto the improper part of the program which is Mystery hour your weekly opportunity to achieve the sort of satisfaction not ordinarily available anywhere else on your radio dial if you have a mystery that needs solving a riddle that needs unraveling or a question that needs answering well you know what to [Music] do this is LBC from Global leading Britain's conversation mystery hour with James obrien 3 minutes after 12 is the time you're listening to James O'Brien on LBC where the um phone lines are humming with the questions awaiting answers um let me remind you some of the terms and conditions or or T's and C's you can win a game you can win a mystery hour board game which is a lovely bit of Kit it really is uh number of people have turned up to book signings with the not inconsiderable box under their arm you know the cross is i b do you know how hard it is to sign a shiny box with a Sharpie pen I have to then wait for the ink to dry before I can move on to the next person awaiting a a signature on that book that's how care that's how much I care but anyway you can win a box the mystery ey ball game in a box a shiny Box by being my favorite contributor of the week uh the full terms and conditions for the competition are lbc.com at mystery hour. co.uk is that it is that all I have to say is it is it there's nothing else te's and C's Myster hour .co.uk lbc.com mria most weeks I think oh I could do that on msta that's a good one and then by Thursday absolute blank it's like jokes isn't it some people have got archives of jokes in their memory banks some of us cannot remember jokes for all the tea in China I'm in the latter category same in Myster I think of a question most weeks by the time it comes to Thursday can't remember it and the other thing I can never remember is the one from last week that was brilliant and didn't get an answer what was the brilliant question last week that didn't get an answer God say it's just not there was one really good one I mean they were all good but there was one that I really wanted to know the answer to and we didn't get it they I'll see if it comes to me that's not a mystery don't ring in with that just just just drop me a text on 8485 or Whatsapp me on 03456 06973 don't use upper phone line to remind me of what it is that I've forgotten from last week that was my favorite question should we start Will's in whopping will question or answer hi James a question please um my question is about ambulance sirens oh yes and why do they have as far as I can tell three different tones are you sure that go on yeah well I I was walking along the other day and an ambulance went past and there was kind of a long sustained wailing siren and then there was a kind of rhythmic whooping and then there was a very short like a frantic yeah and then there was kind of a frantic kind of yeah but it was all in one go it was one siren with three compartments compartments what's the word I'm looking for so then yeah I'm I'm uh I don't know sections no it was something a bit fancier than that three distinct compartments probably no anyway compartment so what is the question then the question is why what wherefor the compartments well played because it is it invades your Consciousness more effectively as you are proving by both noticing it and noticing it to such a degree that you subsequently asked a question about it if it just went woo woo woo woo woo woo it wouldn't invade your Consciousness in the same way it does when it goes yeah true yeah but I mean like a do an air raid siren do that did they do that back in the day didn't need to do that with an air you didn't need to get out of the way of an air raid Tyrant do you yeah oh well you might have answered it I I doubt it tombras textures God there some fancy word cadences three distinct um someone's just texting me ghost cats is that is that the question from last week that I couldn't go why have you texting me ghost cats anyway segments segments distinct phrases segments go got some wordsmiths out there so why does the ambulance siren go three distinct yeah or maybe more than I heard three yeah we'll do it and and did you get out of the way uh yeah yeah I was well out the way good uh it's on the list we shall find out for you thank you will uh if obviously the number you need to provide answers to any of the questions that you hear remain the same why do ambulance sirens have multiple sounds in in one snatch as it were so it's not like they've got one siren for going to the hospital another siren for coming coming back or or or do you see what I mean it's like that that is a really horrible sound I think I've probably answered it but I need it to be confirmed by an actual expert uh James is in Bristol James question or answer it's a question James S can I just say I love your show um the question is about onions um I was having this conversation with my friends that like people always always talk about crying when they chop onions but for the most part it seems to have like been like onions are actually okay to chop apart from you get that one Rogue onion like just one in a 100 that will actually devastate you it's more than no no no like no I think you're a complete wuss if you generally cry um it's not it's a physiological response it's not it's not a question of woess anymore than if I hit your knee with a hammer and it goes Bing that wouldn't be wuss would it it's it's a reflex response it's a physiological response no okay so what we were thinking is um that and we haven't googled this so it still counts um we were thinking that what has happened over time is we've bred out like the stinginess I don't know I don't recognize the premise of your question well it's just like basically it's just like no onions have not become less tear inducing over the years they just they are do you really let me just check something what do you think Roxy do you find onions have become less tip well you're only about 24 aren't you how are you going to why are you going to compare it when did you start cooking do you think onions have become less tip perhaps you could ask your grandma have they become less tear inducing over the years they have you think they have really do you keep your know hey you know me I'm nothing if not a Democrat do you keep your onions in the fridge uh no I don't oh it's not that then this is and the other the other was you can't just come on and share theories what do you think this is what's your actual speaking of that was there a broken Nick Nicks advert who rang me earlier this week complaining about kiss up ringing Nick this John in Liverpool was it ringing Nick with exactly the same call and then getting into to the advert we' got to raise our standards a bit on this radio station this is Absolut but you can't just come on and share your theories what's the question the question is do you get like just one in a 100 onions that is way more pungent other onions all right and if so why that was the actual question right so are so it's a bit like um padron Peppers hello hello yeah I'm still here padon padron Peppers James yeah what well I don't know what a padron you got to say so you see you can't you've got to say sorry I don't understand what you're talking about James the way you said yeah gave away the fact that you should have just blagged it so padron Peppers apparently this sounds like a sounds like a tongue twist of this Peter Pipers padron Peppers padron Peppers apparently padron Peppers one in every sort of 20 or 30 will be hot we we we'll have a chilly hotness to it oh okay in that case yes I was right when I said yes like even though I didn't know what I was agreeing to exactly we will make a phone in host of you yet James with your ability so camouflage ignorance as enthusiasm uh it's on the list I mean do are onions like padron Peppers is is the question we've ended up with is it like one onion in 20 or 30 that actually will um emit the chemicals that cause your eyes to water and and I mean just as a side order of onions is he is he is he right have they got less tear inducing over I don't think they have I but I could be wrong Alec is in Leicester Alec question or answer hey James there's a question carry on Alec so my daughter's getting to the age where she's starting to ask questions where I have to think about the answers now and she came up with a good one she 23 is she 23 is it uh three and I'm already struggling um and the question was why did people put x's on the end of their texes obviously it means obviously kisses but where did that come from was the next question was why so she's in the Y stage so it's why so my question is where did the X turn into kisses I'm I I I think oddly it's quite a British thing you know it it's not like massively International I think I think if it's come up before the answer as you'd expect when you think about it is Christianity AC cross like as a sign of blessing but then when when did it become a kiss remains a question that no no self-respecting three-year-old is going to consider answered by some loose illusion to Christianity are they she's a tough cookie there you go I mean isn't she just do you know her negotiating powers are currently at their Peak absolutely I am I am nothing but a peacemaker negotiator uh so what what when did next start representing a kiss there we go indeed do you want to mention her name so that she can listen back to this later go on then she will do uh Eva Eva we will find out for you Eva uh or we won't but we will do our very very best to find out for you thank you Eva that's a brilliant question uh 12:13 is the time and three questions on the board room for more Tony's in romsey Tony question or answer hi James I got a question for you please carry on Tony um during lockdown yeah we seem to befriend little Blackbird called him snowy and he used to feed out of our hands are you serious how long did it take you to tempt him to feed out of your hand not long really you just kind of flipp on the ground first and they got closer and closer but what over a period of days weeks months years probably weeks no days Days probably it didn't take long what do you mean probably you were there I wasn't so you put some food on the patio and he came along and pecked it that was a long time ago lot and then and then yeah I know but then and then you put you put some food in your hand and he landed on your hand and pecked the food out of your hand yeah and he's done it um every year since how delightful carry on and anyway so I make this bird food out of lard and peanut flour and F's bits and Bobs okay and he'll take it away and then he will take it into the garden and um just dip it in the soil and there's I making it as hygienically as I can and he's just dipping it in the soil to get bits of dust and sand on it and then he takes it away to his nest why do they do that he's gizzard why are you laughing you're not supposed to laugh more I it's his gizard the black birds have gizzards yeah but they don't do it with the raisins if I give him raisins he'll put seven in his Gob and he'll take him over to the nest and still make a noise when he flies with seven in his mouth which is another weird one raisins have got little gritty bits in them already haven't they maybe I don't know go deeply into it so what's his name again snowy snowy yeah oh I feed a pheasant as well but he doesn't do that a pheasant you feed a pheasant yeah doesn't how that mean that's how long has the Pheasant been visiting you uh a number of years but he went missing when we went on hallway for a week this year so I don't know where it's G that was and he brings FL his wife in as well he didn't go missing did he mate well that's the nicest thing I can say mean we know no well we had a brilliant question about why pheasants are so stupid ones I don't know if you heard yeah they are yeah but but's not that stupid because if you survive the first season of shooting then you actually begin to develop instincts that mean you're more likely to survive than they so like Crossing roads and things like that the reason why pheasants seem so stupid is because they're bred to be shot and then they get shot so they don't have time to learn anything or to or to sort of pass on their lessons or or spread you know their their exp anyway so why does the Blackbird dip his food in the soil before eating it yeah I like it when he comes back when you say comes about every year are they not do they hi do they do they immigrate do they migrate black birds uh I don't know but in the breeding season in Spring you we loads maybe a dozen in the garden maybe he's feeding the chicks with the raisins back in the nest but the food he's dipping in the soil is for him no he does go off with that as well well she he he yeah it's a male yeah yeah all right how can you tell males are black and females are brown all right that's a Fairly reliable technique it's 1217 mystery hour on LBC with James O'Brian it's 19 minutes after 12 you're listening well you know who you're listening to it's mysta your weekly opportunity to achieve the sort of satisfaction not available anywhere else on your radio dial so far we would like to know why is the ambulance siren so um multi-tonal there you go why do only some onions make you cry and are they becoming fewer and further between than they you than what they used to be when did a cross or an X become a symbol for a kiss and why does Tony's black snowy wipe its food in soil before eating it if you know the answer to any of those or you have a question of your own or you know the answer to any of the questions that haven't been asked yet which you won't know whether you know the answer to any of the questions that haven't been asked yet unless you're a time traveler or psychic but when they are asked and if you do know the answer to them then the number you need will be the same 0345 606 0973 Steven in suton Steph question or answer uh got an answer come on then uh answer about the ambulance oh so ambulances have three different tones they use when they're driving along same as most other emergency service Vehicles so you'd have a short tone which is like a noo noo noo yes as you're coming up to a junction to try and alert people that you're coming up to a set Junction yes you would have a longer tone which is for when you're driving along the road so instead of the quick KN or it's like a KNE or kind of vibe that is so then people can uh tell basically just driving down a road nor and then finally you'd have a third tone which would be different to both of them for when you're driving in Convoy with another vehicle to other drivers can uh tell there two vehicles rather than just the one blind me um why then do we think that will encountered all three in one go because there probably was two vehicles driving in Convoy the lead vehicle would have been had his long tones on as he was driving down the road got to a red set of traffic lights put on the short ones to get through the red set of traffic light and the vehicle following it probably would have then gone through to would have had the other one on or you have to cycle through all three in one go so he could have quickly or they could have I should say um go through it all three in one go but you can't select them you have to go through it one at a time okay qualifications firefighter firefighter and and you have distinctly you have different sirens for police cars and fire engines but you would recognize them all the average punter probably wouldn't initially yeah you you can notice them I think the more you're around them the easier it gets and you can be nerdy and go okay fine I can hear the fire engine or what no that's an ambulance or that's a police car but so how does it work do you press a different button yeah so normally in a fire engine there's a pedal by your foot so most fire engines what that we would use are all automatic so you use your left leg to cycle through the tones by a pedal on the floor oh wow well that's a fairly comprehensive answer I thank you for it have a round of applause on me you cheers thank you very welcome love it uh Jill's in beckingham Jill question or answer a question carry on why do we call our children kids which are baby goats we don't call them kittens or puppies well well but how do you know what came first the chicken or the egg I don't understand that well how do you know we didn't call our kids kids first oh I see well and then goats and then goats copied us but why then the question would have to be why why do we call um goats babies the same as ours so why kids for kids are not I quite like the idea of Pops puppies puppies is nice isn't it puppies is what's a baby beaver called a sett no no that's where they live there be beavers are in the news a lot at the moment I there's a beaver up the road in eing that I'm very keen to go and visit and I was reading today about beavers being reintroduced into the rivers in Devon Jill not far from ilon where our friend ouria caller smokes like a chimney all day I shall um I shall put that on the list why do we call kids kids and not kittens kids goats children humans thank you Jill uh janen alante come I've had four call oh oh yes and when I've had the four accident I'm s seemed like it was likeing um slow motion was it really you're not imagining that no uh the first one the first one I was in a mini when I was about 15 and I we got hit from the front and the side right and the glass I felt as though this what had the seat belt on I was like going forward and coming back back and the glass that was falling in on top of me it was like it was all in slow motion say and the three other accidents I've had have all been similar so I don't know if it's just me or it is the norm what does your brain why does your brain make you feel like that I I I mean to begin at the beginning you're quite unlucky yes are you driving normally or or or are you just an unlucky passenger no no I was I was driving in two and the other too with someone else but I got out wow uh the first the first one I broke my collar bone and everything but the others I got up and walked away which was totally amazing cuz one of them was across two carriageways upside down in a ditch on the a13 well I can see why you [Laughter] immigrated are the Spanish Road safer do you think are you a bit no oh yeah no no there's nothing we're Wheeling live you're lucky if you see another car we can drive for about 30 miles and not see another car that's delightful um I find out for I me I mean you've had it I can't really query your research because you've you've had four accidents so if you'd only based it on one I'd be thinking maybe you know you got a bit hallucinogenic or something but if it happened in the second third when you see when you see films on TV the the sort of like the cars turning upside down always sort of shot in slow motion they so they're reflecting the reality of The Human Experience rather than that's what I'm thinking but I don't know yeah you're on uh I shall find out well I shall try to find out for you why why do why does the human brain switch into a form of slow motion at times of of of Epic trauma or or emergency 26 minutes or why do we think it does may be the more pertinent question 26 minutes after 12 um it is well we just crack on shall we James in Hackney James question or answer uh answer carry on mate so the onion the onion question yes I was thinking about this it didn't take me long to think about actually it's quite it's quite it's quite obvious is it it's the quality of the onions yeah right so I currently grow onions down in a lotman and when I give those onions to people as you do they will cry not when I give them to them as they're cutting them and they cry a lot right and I think that's down to the fact that they're fresh they're so fresh fresh and they not been kept sitting around so that guy I think he don't know his onions I don't know where he's don't know his onions he's not he's not getting them organic must getting them from they've probably been sitting around for a while yeah but if you take a bag of onions yeah and only one of them the chances are they've all come from the same crop isn't it and and and had the same life journey and being in the same storage and being on the same transport and only one of them makes you cry yeah but I don't think that's that Rings true I don't think anyone's done that test he do that test the average onion chopper is going to have a bag of onions very few of us buy our onions individually and if you notice that one of them has made you cry but the rest of the bag hasn't you've got something else going on no I don't believe I don't believe that really I think that's non nonsense yeah no then that's a bit Strong James nonsense I think yeah so he's actually saying he bought a bag of onions yeah and only one of them made him cry how many how many onions in the bag seven all right he just made that up let's say seven it's got to be the quality of the onions when I chop the onions i c so much I have to go and have a little sit down put the T on and then go back to there's a couple of things you can do if you're interested don't you know you chop it in half and then you chop off both ends of the half and then you chop the onion yeah leave leave one end on so chop it in half and then leave one end attached to the rest of the onion until you finish chopping the rest of it and it won't release as much chemicals and you won't you won't cry or or pop it in the freezer I've done that quite a lot all right then clever clogs or pop it in the freezer or or or or keep it get it much colder so so there's no I've not tried the freezer one I'll try that so they might be less Fresh So I mean the second bit of the question was whether or not they've become less tear inducing over the years to which your theory would work because they've probably become less fresh over the years yeah stored in suspended animation in lores for for months right yeah they they lose their freshness like when I store the onions I hang them up over the summer nice they go they go through to the winter really yeah really and obviously as you start hitting sort of those months you get a few more ones you have got to throw away and they lose their freshness what um there's many layers to this Theory oh yeah um what is the when I mean when you get them fresh from the allotment do they all make you cry yes well that's the I think that's the proof of the pudding don't you I think that I think that is before you go what's coming up now what what do you plant about now do you plant anything now well some people do but I'm not because I'm a bit lazy oh but um well I'm not lazy I'm busy yeah have a bits and Bobs sure um Tom tomatoes are coming up now my tomato no no not what's coming up now what could you sew now cuz the tomatoes have never had Greener Tomatoes than I've got but none of mine have turned pink yet oh really oh well mine beautiful and red are they really you can plant c yeah you can plant some cabbages now I might plant some red cabbage I might plant some what about Sprouts are you any good with Sprouts yeah I'm doing them for the first time this year they're they're about foot high already when did you sew them I sewed them in Spring they'll they they'll be yeah so it's too late for me to sew spouts unless I can get some plugs isn't it yeah but you can sew load of other little bits you know yeah I just wondered my beetroots come up a treat this year I'm eating more of it than ever I love my beetroots I love it it's my favorite you want a good recipe for beetroot yeah go you give me yours and I'll give you mine all right what you do you get you get the beetroot obviously clean it a bit Yeah rub it with some olive oil and some rock salt yeah and then put it in the oven at 200 just like you would a jacket potato do you not wrap it first no you don't have to wrap ites to wrap it yeah go on you you can do but then all the salt sort of penetrates the skin and then eat that yeah beautiful beautiful that does sound nice here's what I do mine's a Greek recipe called panaria all right is that the one with the your no you don't need the yogurt you can you can serve it with yogurt if you want or you can serve it with what they call Scalia which is like a garlic and Potato Dip but I don't what I do is I boil them you know just till they're firm but and leave them in the water to cool again so that they reabsorb all of the nutrients and then peel them obviously you leave the root on when you boil them peel them chop them pop them in a bowl olive oil bit of red wine vinegar uh and and you're laughing and then serve it serve it James with some soft goat cheese I'm salivating I am salivating as well and I had it last night round of applause for James thank you very much thank you very much H H happy happy gardening I'm jealous of your Sprouts James I really am here's Amelia Cox with the headlines mystery hour with James O'Brien this is LBC it is 1233 you are listening to James O'Brien on LBC where the um questions still in need of answers include we had the nice one didn't we about the ambulance sirens Tony sorted that one out did was did two jameses on the on the onions was a question and that's never has that ever happened before it must have happened before well I'll tell you what hasn't happened before the person who asked the question is called James the person who answered the question is called James and the person who presented the program is called James that can only happen with one name that's not an opinion that's counting uh when did X's come to represent kisses uh and why do blackbirds or specifically Tony's Blackbird snowy wipe their food in soil before consuming it why do we call kids kids instead of for example puppies or kits that's what a baby beaver is called Keith a kit kit kit uh and well I've written accidents next to Jan's name and I've forgotten oh slow motion why does why does why yeah why do humans see things in slow motion at times of Epic stress or trauma uh 34 after 12 quick shout to Tammy she says I'm here in traffic there's an ambulance nearby I'm listening keenly for the different sounds that's how mystery hour affects lives changes lives for the better makes us more Curious and more informed keep us posted Tammy Chris is in exitor Chris question or answer good afternoon a question please carry on Chris um it's a question that's been bugging me and my wife and our two kids for quite some time now ex back when the two kids were in reception or at different ages but the both the same teacher they were taught by Miss Brown the next class up year to the teacher was Miss White she then moved on and which then LED my son coming home wondering what color his next teacher surname would be sweet yes so um uh you know the question quite simply is um why do some surnames have colors and others don't you mean you don't to go to the doctors and see you know Dr turquoise or I I don't know France I don't know but no generally speaking so so I mean black white brown what else can we think green black white brown well mustard I thinking of cludo now so you've got scar Scarlet have you ever met of scarlet mustard Colonel Mustard in real life you're not met Colonel Mustard have you if you that would be I mean there quite a few there's quite a few character names from books and Charlotte gray and Charlie Brown ETA gray yeah well a lot of Grays I had a teacher called gray uh so why yeah I mean I I suppose the possible answer is that they're not referring to color oddly they might be referring to something else so Brown could go Brian I mean these names change over the years or or we wonder whether black originated from like a blacksmith hair color I mean little little indicators back in the day that that marked you out from the rest of the group rest of the tribe or Community I don't know so why do some colors why are some names colors why are some colors names it doesn't matter which way around you ask the question does it my two kids would very much appreciate the answer to that one thank you we shall do our best what are their names uh Noah and Amal Noah and Amal we shall do our best for both of you thank you very much 12:36 is the time and actually as a special message for Noah and Emily you've got a very special dad there because a lot of dads would have made up an answer and then you would have gone off into life believing the madeup answer that your dad had told you and at some point subsequent you'd have offered up that answer in public company and everyone would have laughed at you for believing something so obviously stupid which you believe because you trusted quite rightly your dad so well done dad for not making stuff up if only we could all be like Chris 12 which reminds me I must play some darts later today 12:37 is the time you're listening to Mr I've got some phone lines free for answers ideally and there's still room for questions so we've done the onions James certainly knew his onions black birds kisses kids and kids slow motions colors and names 0345 60609 73 there is indeed a cricketer call F mustard but where would the name that's I mean it's not really a color is it mustard yellow comes from the condiment of mustard but anyway if you can answer any of these 0345 6060 973 is the number that you need uh W is in rickmansworth W question or answer afternoon James uh question please second time call out seven years ago last last spoke to you about a question thank you for keeping thank you for keeping such a close tabs on on proceedings every week that's Love It Go On um why is it that we have a high proportion of bungalows in coastal towns yes so I went out to I don't remember where I went out to somewhere last last week yeah um and we noticed that there's a number of bungalows in coastal towns yeah this is true why is that well there are two reasons for this so you've noticed it oh yes yes yes yes yes oh yes okay so I'm not the only one oh yes yes yes there are two reasons for this the first reason is TR that uh Seaside resorts are popular retirement destinations where zero of me a symy of Brilliance beun where Beauty fox in digit of Genius Soul takes [Music] flight inorms the dream dreams unfold a TBL Tre of stories told in circuits Hing the cosmic they naate the stars and oh Shining [Music] goog that and I did not Google anything I'm not allowed to Google anything in fact you can see on YouTube I didn't Google anything at all hey by the way I'm honest if I'm honest I Googled it and that's the answer that I got I wasn't convinced well I haven't my my litus for the for the actual what do you mean you you got an you're not allowed to go I don't know what the rule is if you ask the question of course it's part I haven't finished yet you interrupted me it's part of the right answer high winds aren't you no okay all right go on then I'll give you a chance so obviously elderly people are less likely to be able to negotiate the stairs so if you as a as a builder were preparing property with the hope of selling it to retiring people then building a bungalow is is is is quite a clever commercial move right what's your qualifications James genius and now here's the second bit ready done views so everyone wants to see view right as you make as you as you move back from the shore and the land Rises gently on a gradient if if everyone's in a bungalow then everyone can see a bit of the sea instead of just the back of next door's house okay I think I'm convinced on the second answer it's the two that's one not necessarily but marry the two together put the two together and you're golden right Humble Pie yeah nice I was quite pleased with that round of applause for me please Keith and and they'll be planning rules as well but they're probably linked to the view side of things as opposed to the retirement side of things I'll see you in seven years well 20 20 20 I'll see you in 2033 oh he's gone oh no there he is there carry on uh you are allowed to ring in more often than uh every seven years it's just John in Liverpool who rings in several times in the same week to say exactly the same thing to slightly different presenters I can't believe I didn't pick up on that myself guess we won't be ringing this program any or getting on this program anytime soon to repeat his nonsense about K stama and the uh winter fuel payments George is in York George question or answer H question please carry on George so basically we're having a child work the other week and there's a pigeon in my garden yes what am I gonna do specific sound is that a UB 40 song I don't know I would't be able to tell you there's a pigeon in my garden what am I going to do okay but basically there's one at my the office I work at that's about TW about 20 minutes away and it still sounds the same as the one that's in the garden yeah but then my friend who lives in birmingam who I work with said that the pigeons there sound completely different so I was wondering if pigeons have accents based on where they where they live and because obviously they're migratory how does that how does that work yeah just a bit confused by it really is it possible that your colleague from Birmingham is is is yanking your chain potentially I have fallen foul of that before my dad did tell me when I was younger that sheep on hills have one leg two legs shorter than the other things you don't roll down and I discussed that with people and it was quite you're proving the point that I made a moment ago to Noah and am about their dad Chris being a good dad because he hasn't infected them with a madeup answer to a question or given them Duff information that they then re repeat later in life uh to their own embarrassment I a lot of dads made that line about the sheep with the shorter um yeah it worked on me well it's hard to know cuz you haven't witnessed the accent have you no well the ones at my parents they live about 40 miles away and that they sound a little bit different they're not like completely how do they sound can you can you illustrate the difference at all the one in York is do do do do do and then the one at my parents is a bit more like do do do do do do like they I should know this cuz me D my granddad used to be really into pigeons but oh what did he race them did he raced them did he yeah he had a lot of them quite a lot but that's not a I think you're describing wood pigeons or collared doves I think you might you might be looking at two different species of bird here oh so the Collard Dove I think is the oh that's the one yeah that's the one I he yeah whereas your wood pigeon is more of a W wo wooo wo wo wo so maybe there's just two accents then I don't think I think it's two birds it's two different birds George not two different two different species you've got a Collard Dove and then you've got the the wood pigeon I think oh see they all sound kind of similar to me so I thought it was they do sound similar they do sound similar but not exactly the same which is what you picked up on with your Eagle light ears well he learns menu every day don't you well I hope you do I hope you do round of applause for me cheers oh thanks George I like that one I mean a normal pigeon like a common or garden pigeon that's just a straight coup isn't it that's just a straight co co anyway uh Michael's in Cardiff Michael question or answer answer James hry on time is an illusion thank you next caller [Laughter] please mystery so as well sometimes it feels like it's going on forever sometimes it really quickly is true like life really indeed absolutely um people don't P people don't really perceive things differently in moments of stress and tie trauma usually people talk about car crashes and stuff like that it's quite a common thing it's been researched by people David Eagleman specifically he's a brilliant neuroscientist um and he actually threw people off towers and they looked at a clock that was going fast to see if they could actually see what was coming up on the clock W they were falling and they looked and it was too fast to see normally it's like well can they actually see it and it turns out they can't so after throwing people 30 meters off a thing hundred and hundreds of times they came to the conclusion that it's about recollection and the Brain there's so much going on when we perceive stuff the brain is trying to integrate it all and different things are at different times like they use a starting gun in the Olympics to start the races and not flag or a visual thing because we react quicker to that so we've got all these kinds of different senses and they're all bringing stuff at a different time which is why it's an illusion because there's all these different factors all these different modalities all these different parts of the human body that are giving us our perceptions and then the brain sort has to integrate them into a narrative and a story that makes sense so when when Jan recalls her four accidents she thinks that everything went into slow motion but in the moment it didn't yeah well we know it didn't because there were L of people around but it can't have done can unless unless it's a sort of Leonardo DiCaprio film or something like that and then everybody else would have noticed so it's matrix it's only Neo that can do it right exactly that so it's her memory not her perception or her memory of her perception in fact they've tried to disprove they've tried to find out for sure and this this study seems to prove that it's not perception you're not seeing things quicker because that was one of the theories that we see things quicker um because we're reacting quicker because we need to because of adrenaline or something like that but actually it's more like it's such a rich thing and so mad for your perceptions it takes longer for you to encode it all and then it's really it's high resolution because it's stressful and you might need to do something different to what you're normally used to so it all sort of the temporal spread of all the stuff needs to get integrated the brain takes a long time to do that and then when you recall it subsequently because we don't really remember things properly anyway every time we remember something we're actually recreating it and re-encoding it as yet another thing to be experienced again in the future so there's no such thing as real memory anyway it's all really messy um and it's all about time is an illusion to end where we began time is an illusion yeah something like that qualifications uh I studied philosophy of cognitive science at suix University and uh I listened in half of the lectures and this was one of the things I one of the things that Stu and just to be clear on that experiment was it Eagleton Eagle was D David Eagan he didn't he wasn't killing he wasn't killing people they they landed on something soft they were volunteers and yeah it seemed that it lasted 36% longer the fall um but then they tried to test whether they could perceive things quicker and they couldn't so it is about perception rather than uh experience it's about recollection rather than yeah the actual experience itself Round of Applause for Michael there you go thank you putting his degree to use his parents will be so proud uh it's 12:47 mystery hour on LBC with James O'Brien 12:49 is the you're listening to James O'Brien on LBC Simon's been in touch he says James down here in Hampshire we have our wood pigeons who sound as though they're singing Don't Call Me Baby from whatever popular song that was if you could please coup that before the end of the program it will make me very happy I'm tempted actually I'm tempted actually Keith remind give give me a chance before Sheila takes over just I may I may bottle it I may get a bit of stage fright but I'm I'm quite tempted to have a go at that one a lot of you enjoyed that segment of the program when I was doing pigeon Impressions and I just had another one of those moments where I wonder what happens if you've just turned on the radio and you hear me say the first words you hear me say today that was a rather good Port part of the program where I was doing pigeon Impressions or or indeed callor doves CU I did the whole range um we shall see uh and a lot of Douglas Adams fans listening as well which is very gratifying Nile and Nick and others because of course time is an illusion as as our last caller reminded us but as Douglas Adams wrote lunchtime doubly so uh Gideon's in Guilford Gideon question or answer question please carry on mate hi James yeah so I've just started growing uh chilies hang on I don't know if you've accidentally tuned in about 10 minutes ago and thought that you were listening to a gardening phone in I actually I I woke up this morning and I thought about it and I've been mean to call you okay that's good then cuz me and James were just chewing the fat about gardening like as fellow gardeners yeah it's all right you're allowed to have a gardening is if indeed that is the direction in which you're going yeah go on so um as like I said I've been growing chilies uh like I'm an amateur grower so um when what you meant to do is you me water the chilies at you know certain time yeah um if you don't water them yeah if you reduce the frequency of you of you watering the chili plants yeah they are meant to get hotter yeah but I don't know why come on think about it you tell me that's the question all right okay I'm going to do a little experiment in your imagination yeah go on it right take a chili yeah yeah yeah put it in the flask of your mini food processor yeah add one cup of water yeah it up y okay have a little sip yeah okay now add five more cups of water yeah have a little sip yeah what was hotter the first one there you go yeah happy that's straight that's straightforward then nice one round of applause for me thank my there you go Gideon that's nice gidan in Guilford I I love those sort of serendipitous collisions of of of name and place uh Florence is in Camden question or answer Florence answer carry on um so I originally call with an answer to the Blackbird question but I have something to add to the pigeons as well well let's do the black birds first because I have to be careful about allowing people to go off piec okay um so why does a black bird dip its food in the soil before taking it to the nest so black birds um particularly when they're feeding they young often kind of wipe wor earthworms through the soil yeah um and it's for two reasons either to take the Slime off or as you alluded to when you mentioned the gizard to add grit because bir don't have oh go me so they need help breaking down and digesting their food and that would be particularly the case when they're feeding their young so they work like sort of mobile teeth almost don't they the bits of grit the bits of grit love it that's right so as it goes through the Digest tract uh the grit kind of helps to break down the food and then they can digest it why they were doing this with the pellets and not the raisins I'm not sure but I wonder whether the pellets are more earthworm like yeah yeah I like it raisins yeah qualifications I've written a book called wild City about Urban Wildlife that'll do so take a ah Round of Applause you missed something on the pigeon okay go on then if you if I let you do if I let hang on if I let you do this you have to make Simon Happy by cing to the tune of Don't Call Me Baby Oh my God it's up to you take take it or leave it but I don't know what which one is don't call me bab I'll let hang on this here it is no it's not that one it's not that one s sorry me right back yeah me is that Betty Bo no who is that anyway K you go on tell me about the black the the the pigeons well pigeons not specifically but birds in general can have different dialects oh um that is a thing I think you were completely correct in your answer it sounds like there were two species of pigeon he was talking about much um but birds can have different dialects um or accents it just depends on the species because some birds like they know how to sing in nly when they're born but others are taught um and the reason I know this is I co-founded a bird song recognition app called warbler that's like Shazam but for birds and when we were training our machine learning technology we had to be fairly specific about the area of of well isn't that interesting that we used to train it with I'm going to have a look at warbl because I use choatic which is presumably like VHS versus betamax is it well we came out first and I'm going I'm going to have a look at wbl cuz I've been a bit disappointed by they told me the other day I had a king fisher they said I had a king fisher on cha Matic and it was a great tip yeah that's that's a bit far off I know I know and I got a buzzard came up as well at one point when I was in my back Garden there's no Buzzard in my backyard um so you are Florence Wilkinson author journalist co-founder of bird song recognition app and citizen science project person that is correct me have a round of applause on me thank you no thank you lovely St it's a beautiful looking book as well wild City uh melan's in fora melan any question or answer answer James hry on it's the descriptive surnames um brown gray white black and so forth they they're all um they're all descriptive of uh aspects of a person or the place they came from you also get things like wh head and there was uh news reader Brian red head yes I remember him well actually I was talking about him yesterday when someone was interviewing me about my first experiences of radio would you believe well there you go and there some people think that Reed might be red as well okay um and then um near the green would be for green um there are a few other ones like um ball which is a description of Bal um and then um hang on we've got enough now qualifications um I am a Committee Member of the surname society and my really yes fantastic the next Sur that I study is actually an old Celtic word for brown which is Don Don uh how many people are in the surname Society oh 300 400 something like that and you're the chair are you I'm not the chair no have have you had have you had any honorific positions in the surname Society yes I'm the editor of the newsletter right that's it then you get one I'm Rota and you're listening to James O'Brien on LBC if you build it they will come there you go there you go no there you can stick that in the newsletter won't you I will I should hope so some people thought Florence deserved a a ra otor and to be fair they may have a point but it's too late now and anyway Tim's in Ry get afternoon James with with an otter I am an otter on quickly cuz I want to well this is it I got to say I think you should start every show now with a different bird each day um you know just for to lighten the get on with it get on with it right kid the word kid um a number of different possibilities um but mostly from where we get words like kith and kin from Yes um it's Old English Germanic and Route and it comes from kin really rather than K kin means to so they could have play equally so they they have just arrived they' have arrived at the same place from different different place yes exactly Al know the word comes from thousand years ago it only started being used about 300 years ago for English as kid for humans yeah refer to kids goats I'm no expert further back qualifications uh English teacher and sax and historical inter of course you are round of applause h no um okay I'm going to have a go cuz Simon asked so nicely so I think the tune that he's got is is this one and I'm going to coup it in the style of a wood pigeon it's don't call me baby so what tune are you hearing when I say don't call me so it' be like this [Music] yeah what's that what happened then Keith you can't you can't just stop playing Rand yeah that's not the chorus of anyway that's what I think happen if you missed any of today's show I'm not sure you missed much you can listen back up on catchup on global the first half an hour the phones weren't working so it's all it's a it's a collector's item this one uh you'll also find all of LBC shows there to catch up on as well who won the thing um give it to Florence because she probably should have got a rot but she gets a mystery eyeball game instead download Global player for free from your app store or head to Global player.com coming up at 4 on LBC it's Ben ksh but now it's Sheila fog psh but now it's Sheila fog psh but now it's Sheila fog psh but now it's Sheila fog psh but now it's Sheila psh but now it's Sheila fog psh but now it's Sheila psh but now it's Sheila fog psh but now it's Sheila psh but now it's Sheila psh but now it's Sheila psh but now it's Sheila psh but now it's Sheila psh but now it's Sheila psh but now it's Sheila fog