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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: I’m joined by the former Head of the Armed Forces, Lord Stirrup, by the actress and writer, Joanna Scanlan and by the former Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Lord Blair. Very good morning to you all.

JOANNA SCANLAN: Good morning.

LORD BLAIR: Good morning.

LORD STIRRUP: Good morning.

DM: Let’s dive straight in. Lord Stirrup, take us through your first story.

LS: Well, my first story is the very sad, awful case of the Marine convicted of murder in Afghanistan. There has been quite a bit of debate about this over the last 12, 24 hours, in particular about the sentence and whether there should be some degree of clemency. It seems to me important because one of the defining characteristics of armed forces in our modern society is that they are the organ of State that under certain circumstances can legally use lethal force in the international arena; legally use under certain circumstances. In other words, the Armed Forces are bound and constrained by law, and that’s very straightforward, and when it comes to murder, there is no question. In this case, the marine was convicted of murder and it should be for the Courts to decide what sentence he should get. If there were any extenuating circumstances which might argue for a degree of mercy,  that is for the Courts to decide: they have heard the case, they have heard the evidence and we should leave it to them, it seems to me. But it brings a wider issue into focus because there has also been debate about the degree to which our health and safety, human rights legislation are beginning to impact on the Armed Forces and indeed, on other services. The reason this is important is not because the Armed Forces want to be outside the law or outside legislation; it’s quite the opposite. It’s because they are inside it and once there is a case, as here, with murder, then it is for the Courts to decide what happned and what should be done.

DM: Going into this, I know you’re very interested as well. I mean, it’s a mandatory life sentence and we know what mandatory means.

LB: It has to be, and actually, I do think this is a very good case for the armed services. Military justice has worked. This is a military jury, so the people who are sitting on the jury had all presumably had service in Afghanistan and so on and they could see murder when it happened. The whole armed services are based on legitimacy. If you do not have a rule of law, you don’t have a proper...

DM: And it’s important, as I’ve been talking with the Defence Secretary, as we exit Afghanistan, it sends an important message to those that remain behind there.

LB: Yes, I mean some of the stains in previous wars have been about atrocities that have been uncovered years later and everybody has covered it up and so on. But I certainly also agree with Jock that the police service has got the same issue. I mean, obviously it’s a much less lethal force that we use but it’s still lethal and we had the same difficulties over health and safety legislation and so on, and we had to have a long conversation as to what was possible because there were situations in which police officers were given instructions that they couldn’t go into fast flowing water to rescue people, or up ladders to rescue... all that sort of stuff. And so once you have got a framework like this, as clear as it has gone in this case, I think it’s good for the armed services.

DM: I want to bring in some more stories here because we lost a lot of time there with the mix-up with the line to Philip Hammond in Afghanistan. So Joanna, you’ve got this intriguing story here. Lawyers are seeking to bar Prince Charles when he ascends to the throne, from taking a Christian oath.

JS: That’s right. I mean, ‘Soldiers, armed services fight for Queen and Country’ will one day probably be ‘King and Country’ and the National Secular Society is launching a challenge so that should Prince Charles succeed to the throne, in the investiture, the coronation, what they want to remove is any mention of, I suppose, Christian God. Now I don’t know whether it is God in total or whether it’s just the Christian God, because I think Prince Charles himself has talked about having some kind of a multi-faith element.

DM: That would mean rather than ‘Defender of the Faith,’ ‘Defender of Faiths’?

JS: And at the coronation, having a multi-faith service. So to me, it’s a fascinating question. There are two things that I feel about it instinctively. One is there is something right to me about addressing the question of what is going to happen in the coronation in due course, because we are an evolving country. There are hugely diverse religious positions as well as secular and atheist positions, and I don’t see how the new monarch should, and when (it may be many, many years ahead).

DM: It may and hopefully it will be, yes.

JS: Is going to kind of represent something for the people. In addition, it’s about authority. It’s about by which authority does anybody rule or pass down any judgment.

DM: Yes, those are the big questions. That almost in a way, is for the Prince himself to decide but whether the law should get involved here and force his hand is all rather strange, isn’t it? A bit strange.

JS: Well, it’s opening the debate, isn’t it? It seems to me what it is, is this is a... Actually, they have been successful. The same National Secular Society did influence the succession question as to the gender.

LB: That’s where I disagree with you, Joanna. I don’t think they can claim that. There is a very broad consensus that in the modern age, it was a very difficult idea that Kate could have a girl and then a boy and the boy would succeed to the throne. Whereas this is about the nature of the Church of England settlement from the 16^th and 17^th Centuries and that’s an awful lot of stuff to untangle.

JS: It’s arcane. It’s an arcane subject which so many people simply don’t understand, simply haven’t got a grasp on and I think that we do need people to raise this as a topic so we can all understand it more.

DM: Well, Lord Stirrup is going to bring us an arcane subject and he’s going to unravel it for us and this is the very thorny issue of Iran and its nuclear ambitions and the talks that are going on, or have just completed right now. This story in the Independent, Lord Stirrup, of whatever Israel says, it’s Iran that’s offering the concessions. Do you read it like that?

LS: Well, I’m not sure that anybody has offered concessions at the moment and if they have, I’m not sure what they are. It’s right that we shouldn’t be sure because if these negotiations are played out in public then they’re much less likely to be successful. I think the difficulty; first of all, we should recognise that this is extremely important to us here in the UK. If there is a nuclearisation of the Middle East then it’s going to be very bad news for all of us. The difficulty of course, is the thing that has brought Iran to the negotiating table largely, is the effect of sanctions. They have been very effective, and that’s good news. But the problem is, of course, that what Iran is looking for from the West is an alleviation of sanctions but that alleviation of sanctions can only be achieved substantially when you’ve got substantial concessions on the Iranian side. Now, none of that is being addressed at the moment. These negotiations are about getting a holding position so you can talk about those things.

DM: I knew you’d bring some clarity to it. We’re nearly out of time so I want to bring in this last story from you, Lord Blair, you’ve got on the Sunday Telegraph. Green taxes, more of them to come.

LB: Well, I think the only important point here is the fact that it’s the front page of the Telegraph and the Mail about energy taxes and this whole issue that Ed Miliband raised at the party conference has actually put a new urgency into the debate. Both parties, both the Tories and the Lib Dems are struggling to find a position which actually equals the simplicity of what Ed Miliband has been saying. There does seem a little oddity, by saying, ‘We’re going to take the money away; you don’t have to pay any gas bill but you will have to pay a tax instead.’ I’m not quite sure how that works.

DM: What do you feel on it? Do you feel that, is Ed Miliband, as some people say, making the political whether with all this, whether it will work or not, but it’s an idea that has captured the public’s imagination.

JS: Yeah. Because it falls onto our doormats or through our email boxes every day of the week. It is something that people; everybody: middle class, squeezed middle, is having to look at what they are paying for fuel and what choice they are going to make about how they spend their money. That is a winning topic for Ed Miliband.

DM: And fundamental to the human condition. Thank you very much indeed. I’m afraid we are out of time now. To Lord Stirrup and Lord Blair, Joanna Scanlan, thank you very much indeed. Very good to see you. You’re watching Murgnahan here on Sky News.

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