The Full English with Alexander Brown - Episode 88 - The Spy Who Loved Xi
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00 [Music]
00:28 Hello and welcome to Full English, a show that combines politics with not being an agent of a hostile state.
00:33 The same allegedly can't be said for everyone working in Parliament, we're just now on the lookout for Chinese spies.
00:39 Let's get into it.
00:41 This week it emerged a parliamentary researcher had been arrested on suspicion of spying,
00:46 which would somehow combine one of the coolest jobs with one of the most mundane.
00:50 Instead of cool sports cars, skydiving and all the other stuff James Bond does,
00:57 or having cups of tea and listening to debates about potholes,
01:00 who'd have thought espionage could be so profoundly dull?
01:04 I mean anyone who's watched the last few James Bond films, absolute dirge. Terrible, terrible.
01:10 And what's interesting here is not the individual accusation, but that Parliament has no idea how to respond to it.
01:17 More than one MP has told me the only way to be sure would be just to ban everyone who's been to China,
01:22 which you can't really do, that's not a feasible approach.
01:26 At the same time, the Prime Minister is so desperate to have improved relations with Beijing,
01:31 Richie Tunac won't even say if his foreign secretary has raised the issue with his counterpart.
01:36 We know China is spying, what to do about it?
01:40 Because we do know China is trying to influence our democracy, but what MPs don't know is how to stop it.
01:46 And that is a very scary position to be in, indeed.
01:54 So what have we learned? Firstly, that China are far more interested in Westminster than most of the general public.
01:59 And secondly, there isn't an obvious way to stop spies, which is not good.
02:04 Until next time, I've been Alexander Brown, and you haven't.
02:08 Zaijian. That's goodbye in Chinese.
02:11 The pronunciation is probably wrong, but I listened to it several times before filming.
02:16 [Music]
02:22 [BLANK_AUDIO]