ANY QUOTES USED MUST BE ATTRIBUTED TO MURNAGHAN, SKY NEWS

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Welcome back to Westminster, the start of a new political term in which the Prime Minister will begin putting into practice the biggest political decision for a generation, Brexit of course.  On her first outing on the world stage Theresa May has warned there might be difficult times ahead as President Obama said that America’s focus would not be on a trade deal with the UK but with the EU.  Joining me now from his Maldon constituency is the high profile Leave campaigner, former Culture Media and Sport Secretary, John Whittingdale who was sacked by the PM in her second day in the job.  A very good morning to you Mr Whittingdale and just let me ask you about that, on the personal side of things, is that sacking still smarting.  People said you were quite a natural fit for that job.

JOHN WHITTINGDALE:  Well I enjoyed the job and I was very pleased to have the chance of doing it for 15 months but a new Prime Minister was appointed and it was her right to bring in people who she wanted to bring in to her cabinet.  As you know, something like 10 members of the cabinet left as a part of the change of regime, I was one of those, that’s politics.

DM: But you’ve got some firm views we are going to examine right now on Brexit and the shape it would take, you’d have been in a better position to influence how it goes from within the cabinet.

JOHN WHITTINGDALE:  Well obviously I enjoyed being in the cabinet and I’m sad to have given up a job I really enjoyed doing but no, I didn’t expect to be given it in the first place and even though I am not in the cabinet, to some extent that gives an additional freedom. Of course if you are in government then you are bound by collective responsibility which is only right but outside of government you can speak up and speak freely and that is something which I certainly intend to do.

DM: Let’s do some of it right now then on Brexit, as you know we are going to be hearing later in the week, getting a statement from David Davies who is leading or is part of the leadership team, on the whole process. What should be his red lines?

JOHN WHITTINGDALE: Well I think there are very clear reasons why the British people voted to leave the European Union, it was the fact that there was a general feeling that we had lost too much sovereignty, the ability to govern ourselves and there were certain areas where we wanted to take back control. That obviously was in the area of borders and of law and tax and our economy.  So we need to make clear that we wish to have control over our own borders once again and to determined our own immigration policy, that is absolutely one of the fundamental reasons I think why people wanted to leave the European Union.  Equally we no longer want to be bound by the regulations which we felt were never in the interests of British business or the British economy and we want to obviously stop paying the considerable amount of money that we currently have to contribute to the European Union budget.  

DM: So reading into that do we have to accept right now that it is bye-bye to the single market if we want and as you say must have those immigration controls, well we’re hearing it quite clearly from other members of the European Union including the most senior ones, well you can’t have the bits you like without the bits you don’t like?

JOHN WHITTINGDALE: Well we’re not going to be in the single market, what we need to have is access to the single market, to be able to trade with other members of Europe and I hope without tariffs but that is going to be something which is going to be subject to the negotiation.  It’s obviously very much in Europe’s interest to have that trading arrangement, after all they sell considerably more to this country than we sell to them and nobody wants to get into a trade battle so we’ve got to talk to Europe about retaining access so that British business can sell goods in the European single market but at the same time we cannot continue to allow uncontrolled migration and people coming into this country without any ability to control the numbers nor do we want to be bound by the regulations that are part of being a member of the single market.

DM: But what about this, talking about trade, we’ve had it explicitly now from the biggest trading nation in the world, the United States, from President Obama saying yes of course trade with the UK is enormously important to the United States but not as important as deals that are under discussion with the European Union.  We are slightly diminished.

JOHN WHITTINGDALE: Well those deals, the particular trading deal between Europe and America has been under discussion for years and years and is making glacial progress.  Actually one of the things we are now able to do is reach our own trading agreements and we don’t need to go round and get the agreement of every other member, the 28 members of the European Union, we can strike our own deal with countries like America, with China, with India, with Australia and that I think we can do far more rapidly that the European Union which has been trying to reach these deals for years and still not achieved them.

DM: What do you make of Theresa May also saying today that there could be some difficult economic times ahead?  I mean we’ve seen this post-Brexit bounce almost with the devaluation of the pound, do you think it is just going to get better and better or she’s right?

JOHN WHITTINGDALE: Well it was always clear that if Britain decided to leave the European Union that would create a period of uncertainty whilst we reached the new arrangements and that would have some economic effect but you will remember the dire predictions, what we called Project Fear, about what would happen if Britain did vote to leave.  None of those have turned out to be correct, indeed the actual figures coming out show that consumer confidence is still high, the manufacturing industry in some ways is benefitting from the fact that there has been a devaluation in the exchange rate which has made our goods more competitive abroad and certainly the recessionary predictions that we were given if we did decide to leave, none of those have proved to be well founded but it’s obviously the case that it will have an economic impact and certainly for the short term, there will be some uncertainty about precisely the arrangements which are going to be put in place.  

DM: While the Prime Minister is in China of course looming large is this Hinckley deal with the Chinese which she’s put on hold.  Now that of course affects your constituency as well doesn’t it, relations with the Chinese and the nuclear programme, because the Bradwell power station in your constituency which the Chinese are also involved in.   Are you worried that it all might go down the pan?

JOHN WHITTINGDALE: Yes, I am.  I’m a strong supporter of nuclear power because I think it’s the only real option that our future generation needs to produce enough power commercially at a time when we are running out, when our existing power stations are coming to the end of their lives.  Now the deal with the Chinese which was reached by David Cameron’s government was that the Chinese would provide financial support for two power stations in Hinckley and Sizewell and that the third would be a Chinese design with major Chinese finance and that would be in Bradwell which is as you say, just a few miles from where I’m sitting in my constituency here.  Now Bradwell has had a history of nuclear power, it was an old Magnox station which was tremendously beneficial to our local economy here, it created a lot of jobs, a lot of income for the local economy and certainly my constituents are very keen to see a new power station and if that is Chinese built and Chinese designed we would be very happy if they want to come and invest here.

DM: Okay and as you say, now you’re out of the cabinet you’re in a position to speak more freely, can you just speak to us freely then about what went on during the course of the referendum campaign when of course you were in post and you talked quite tough it must be said about certain aspects of the BBC, that White Paper on its future came out and everyone said well actually there’s not really much in there, it doesn’t have an awful lot of teeth, a bit of a change in governance of course.  Were you leaned on to tone it down?

JOHN WHITTINGDALE: No, I mean we had a long discussion with the BBC and I was very happy with the outcome and I’m pleased that the BBC also welcomed the outcome but the first thing that I would say is that the White Paper does represent some really quite significant changes in the way the BBC operates which I think will have a long term effect, not just the governance which you rightly highlight but also the fact that every single part of the BBC schedule will now be open to competition from the independent production sector.  We’ve also made it absolutely explicitly clear that the BBC needs to be different, distinctiveness is now one of the key measures in terms of BBC programming, the National Audit Office has full  access – so there are a number of really important changes that I was very pleased to see.  Now at the time we were having this discussion …

DM: You must have left some stuff out.

JOHN WHITTINGDALE: Well it was a discussion, there are one or two areas where personally I would have liked to have gone a bit further.  The BBC was very reluctant to agree to certain things, in the area for instance of the publication of top salaries for people employed by the BBC, we eventually agreed that the names and identities would be published of anybody earning over £450,000.  Now I would have liked that figure to have been a bit lower but the BBC was very resistant so we agreed that we’d start off there so this was a negotiation and of course there was some movement on both sides but the outcome was one which I think will make some major impact on the BBC and ensure it is fit for the new broadcasting age we’re moving into and that the BBC were also content with it but we were somewhat distracted by these lurid reports in the press about how I wanted to close things down or tell the BBC what they could programme and what time it should go out.  None of this was true and that proved something of a distraction to what was a perfectly amicable discussion about the best future for the BBC.

DM: Okay and lastly, as the former chair of a high profile select committee yourself, what do you make of Keith Vaz today, allegations about his private life in the Sunday papers today?  He’s decided to step aside it seems for the time being from the Home Affairs select committee, do you think he’s done the right thing?

JOHN WHITTINGDALE: Well I haven’t read the whole of the allegations and therefore it’s difficult for me to comment on them but Keith Vaz, as I understand it, has said that he will stand aside from the chairmanship of the select committee and given the areas for which the committee is responsible, that does seem to me to be a sensible course of action but I wouldn’t want to comment beyond that.  

DM: Okay, great talking to you Mr Whittingdale, thank you very much indeed for your time.  John Whittingdale there.