Friday Night Comedy from BBC Radio 4 - The News Quiz - 14th October

Episode Date: November 11, 2022

Andy Zaltzman quizzes the week’s news.

This is the BBC. This podcast is supported by advertising outside the UK. All day long. Taxes extra at participating Wendy's until May 5th. Terms and conditions apply. BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. We recorded this week's news quiz before the news that Kwasi Kwarteng had been the Chancellor of the Exchequer and that Jeremy Hunt would become our fourth different Chancellor in less than five months, as many as there were in almost 22 years up to the 2015 election, won by the Conservatives on a promise of strong and stable government. So yes, satire might now be pointless, but still, on with the show. We present the News Quiz with your host, Andy Zaltzman.

I'm Andy Zaltzman. Our teams this week, we have team They've Done What against team They've Done Squat. On team What, we have Lucy Porter and Anand Menon. On team Squat, it's Simon Porter and Annan Menon. On Team Squat, it's Simon Evans and Jessica Fosterkew. And Lucy and Annan, you can take our first question. Who this week was reported to be openly revolting? Is it the men who put their hands down their trousers

as they walk along and then sniff their fingers? That is a phenomenon I have yet to notice. Downtrousering. It's the male version of upskirting, and yet somehow they're responsible for both. Conspiracy. I'm sure downtrousering is some kind of economic term, isn't it? I think, in all seriousness,

it's the Conservative Party are yet again... They've had a new prime minister for about a few weeks now and they're just checking for the receipt. They're like, we're happy to take store credit, to be honest. That is the thing about a trust, isn't it? Generally speaking, if it doesn't work, you can take it back. You can't return a trust, no. Slightly soiled.

It's been down-trousered. So is that the answer you want? That is the correct answer. Yeah, Conservative MPs openly revolting. And, I mean, it's been a crazy time politically, well, for what seems like ever now. I mean, particularly these last few weeks. How have you found it?

Well, I see it as sort of stage four of the natural experiment that started with Brexit, continued with Covid, continued even further with Boris Johnson in charge of a country. And now we've reached the sort of the best bits, the bloopers. This is about the budget. I mean, The Economist, which isn't prone to being funny, pointed out that it had taken essentially the shelf life of a lettuce for Liz Truss to trash the reputation

of our economic institutions. And it's just bonkers. But we're not allowed to say that it was the mini-budget that caused anything to go wrong. Jacob Rees-Mogg picked up Michelle Hussain for saying that. She's violated BBC protocols on bias... If she's violated BBC protocols on anything, it's stating the bleeding obvious, I would say.

How dare she associate cause and effect. Well, there are perfectly plausible alternative explanations. The one I favour is that the markets panicked because they realised that this mini-budget was such a catastrophe that Labour would inevitably win the next election and then trash the economy. Anticipation of that is the problem. The mini-budget

in itself has no real consequence. How far ahead can you go with that? If Labour then doesn't win the next election, that would then make them winning the following election more likely, which could then spook the markets. Yeah. So then you can't risk that. I can tell you what has happened without any doubt,

because Truss and Quarting in particular are far more intelligent than they look or appear, you know. Or behave. Listen, I'll be honest with you. For some of us, the last few weeks have been quite reassuring because if I had a significant doubt and fear about the modern world, it's that modern governments have very little that they can actually do to have a significant effect on the modern economy.

It's in the hands of the multinational corporations and the Wall Street bankers and the traders and the speculators, but it turns out there are one or two levers you can still pull. I, for one, welcome that news. You know, that's what Brexit was all about. You look at the new... Italy now has a genuine far-right government of the kind that Truss can only dream of,

and yet they haven't managed to tank the euro because the euro is a German currency, and therefore it's inoculated against Italian shenanigans. So I think that's what Brexit was all about, holding the government accountable. And now it's happened, you're all complaining. Taking back control of our own chaos. Well, you mentioned Jacob Rees-Mogg.

Jess, this question can go to you. Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Secretary of State for Denial and MP for Strangely Wittering, which is a lovely little rural village just outside the 1760s. What did he blame for the market turbulence that many have ascribed to the government's mini-budget? Was it A, Gareth Southgate's lack of tactical flexibility? Was it B, hedgehogs? Was it C, the Fed? Rees-Mogg turned his fire on recently retired eight-time Wimbledon champion Roger Federer.

Or was it D, the Fed, as in the Federal Reserve, America's rather unoriginal rip-off of the Bank of England? Well, he's blamed the last one, the Americans. He said we've not reacted quickly enough and we've not done the same thing that America have done. What we've had now is days of

and I'm tickled by the fact that even the mini- was obviously just far too cute a name for it. Chief economist at Deutsche Bank's calling it the 23rd of September event. I mean, we've reached the point now where the Bank of England has basically said to the government, we can't do this anymore. I mean, you're just so utterly crazy. we can't bail you out. So the governor said, we'll help the gilt market till Friday. But, I mean, after that, you're going to have to become sane. You've got to sober up, guys. It's not even really that helpful, though, is it,

saying we're going to shore up the gilt market until Friday. You've got until Friday to sell everything. I mean, that's not actually great psychologically. I mean, it may come out in the wash. I mean, they've got an announcement on Halloween. I mean, they really are putting on a symbol. You've got to spook the markets. Spook the markets.

Do it properly with a hockey mask and a chainsaw. It is like almost everything that happens, though, in... I don't think it's just Britain. I do think it is like the West. We have had virtually 0% interest rates since the last crash, basically. It's obviously insane, it's massively beneficial to homeowners and hideously hostile to renters. But rather than just kind of gradually approach it, give some decent communication strategy

and shore up that direction of travel, they kind of, like, ping, everything's off, you know. And that basically speaks to the arrogance of the pair of them. I think if they communicated it properly and set out a proper brief, they only introduced the OBR ten years ago and that was to stop future Labour governments making a mess of things like this. It's like a classic Tom and Jerry cartoon

where he sets a trap for the mouse and then pops back to see if it's caught one and gets his paw slammed in it, you know. You can't just say we're going to have these cuts and not tell you how we're going to fund them. And I'll just tell you on Halloween. I'm going to celebrate Halloween by dressing up as the ghost of the economy. But on the subject of cuts, Simon and Jess,

can you complete the following classic economics joke? When is a cut not a cut? When it's a typo in The Guardian. Any other suggestions? When is a cut not a cut? Well, if you're a school dinner lady, it's not a cut unless you can see the bone. Get back out on that playground and just grow up. If this is an economics joke, I don't...

What has really annoyed me about this is it's made me have to learn about economics. I thought private equity was a character in Dad's Army. I've got no idea. I don't think anyone understands economics. I think that is an important thing. There's a lot of imposter syndrome all the way to the top. I would suggest that probably Andrew Bailey

has to shake it off quite frequently as well. Some years ago, we moved into a period of economics, which we're still in, where most of the policies were the things that, as a seven-year-old, you would ask your mum, why can't they just print more money? Oh, bless your little heart. That's exactly what they've been doing for the last 12 years. But as much as we don't understand the complex economics of it,

we all understand that you can't trust someone who says they're growing something while we're watching it visibly shrink to dust. There's no such thing as Schrodinger's economy. To complete the joke, when is a cut not a cut? When you technically maintain the overall level of government expenditure whilst

inflation means that in effect you're spending way less than you were previously. It's not laugh out loud fun. It's more comedy of economic and political awkwardness, kind of like Ricky Gervais meets John Maynard Keynes. Conversation which you can hear on the new BBC podcast, We Just Having a Chat, where live and dead legends commune via the occult,

available on BBC Sounds and on other podcast platforms in 200 years' time. In other money related news, this can go to Anand and Lucy, why could 50p cost you £11? Because they have to be bigger to fit Charles's ears on.

I know this one. They have issued three new commemorative 50p coins to commemorate 100 years of leftist status broadcasting. Yes, this is the BBC, which has caused a sudden spike in inflation to over 2,000% by making

50p cost £11 in a leftist plot to bring down the government and end all capitalism. Is that balanced enough for you? The coin features the classic BBC tagline, inform, educate and entertain, a philosophy that has underpinned such shows as El Dorado, Don't Scare the Hare,

and Zippy and Bungle's Jacuzzi Jazz Time. Yes, well, here we are with the economy still in a state of, I think, considerable confusion, we can put at its best. It's been another tough week for, as we record, still Prime Minister Liz Truss. Charles met the prime minister for their constitutionally unavoidable chinwag this week and has recorded saying to truss and sorry i'm not very good at impressions back again dear oh dear

back again dear oh dear is what he said now probably this was just ice-breaking conversational bumble mumbling of no real meaning, but it might, just might have been the monarch of the realm speaking on behalf of his entire nation. At the very least, one of the great examples of Freudian small talk. It's all been eerily reminiscent of the time the captain of the Titanic sat down with his senior management team at a hastily convened and an increasingly wet emergency meeting and said, right, concentrate everyone, item one, playlist for the band.

Want something you can dance to, not that modern rubbish. At the end of that round, the scores are four points all. Our next question can go to Team What, Anand and Lucy. Why might Roman Emperor Hadrian be chuckling knowingly to himself in his grave this week, saying,

don't say I didn't warn you in Latin? Because the Scots hate us even more than they did Hadrian. So I don't know if anyone ever said they detest Emperor Hadrian. Right. But Nicola Sturgeon did say that she detests the Tories and they were very hurt and very upset. Very upset. Which is, anyone who knows Scottish women,

you go to Scottish women for opinions where they don't mince their words. Right, that's just what they do. If you want sort of nice passive aggressive things come to pinna where i live and people will say things like well you're very brave going out in that yeah so is this that the scots are revolting like the rest of us but only in scottish yes now alan you were at the SNP conference. I was. It has the worst food of any party conference.

I mean, seriously, they don't do bacon rolls. They do bacon rolls with cheese and iron brew. Ooh, lovely. I love the sound. I will be leaving this programme to go into rehab as a result. If it's bacon with cheese, so it's meat with dairy, that's not kosher, not kosher, double negative kosher. It does sound like the most exciting bit of the SNP conference was when she said, I detest the Tories,

and it's brought me great joy to hear Tories saying that that needs to be investigated as a hate crime. We're not meant to be that direct anymore. We're meant to say, I'm not a Tory, but some of my best friends live in Guildford. Simon, how likely do you think this Indyref 2 is? Are you excited by it? Well, I totally understand the motivation.

I mean, anyone looking at Brexit would think, well, let's do that again, you know? Let's see how many times we can keep dividing and winning. How did you see the mood at the SNP? Was there confidence that their long-hopeful independence is more imminent? I think the SNP just love having the Tories in charge here because they don't have to do anything. It sort of does it for itself for them.

Are you saying Boris Johnson and Liz Truss are an SNP sleeper cell? Yeah. Because, I mean, the relationship has been a little rocky because Scotland agreed to give it one more chance as a relationship in 2014, after which the Brexit vote didn't so much move the goalposts as do to the goalposts what Scottish football fans did to the goalposts at Wembley in 1977,

if any older listeners might remember. So it was sort of a bit like, you know, going to a restaurant, from Scotland's point of view, ordering the dish of the day, which had been told was a lovely vegetarian pasta dish, and then being presented with a piglet gaffer taped to a restaurant, from Scotland's point of view, ordering the dish of the day, which had been told was a lovely vegetarian pasta dish, and then being presented with a piglet gaffer taped to a slate. You'd probably want to be able to choose again, wouldn't you? There are negotiations

as we speak to try and keep Scotland within the union, including the ceremonial return of William Wallace's plummetons. The nanny state will only apply on the 31st of December in Scotland and be referred to as the Hooter Nanny State. Commitment to large-scale joint infrastructure projects like the construction of a high-speed Edinburgh to London golf course.

At the end of that round, the scores are... Six to Team Squat, Jess and Simon, and four to Team Watts, Anne-Anne and Lucy. and Simon, and four to Team What, Anne and Lucy. This next question can go to Simon and Jess. Only 238,000 people in the country have apparently done what this year? Got Wordle in one.

Is it reused a bag for life? Is it down trousering? Possibly any other suggestions? 238,000 people. Lied to their partner about whether they haven't put the heating on yet. Is it the number of people who have visited a festival of which I was only aware this week when this story came out that nobody's been to see it i think it's vernacular

is the festival of brexit or something but yes but it was actually called something like outbox or something like that unbox yeah not outbox that's a that would be junk mail uh yes it is the so-called festival of brexit the unboxed festival of uh only the rest of you taken part in this glorious celebration of Britishness? It didn't even have a venue, as far as I understand it. It's a sort of series of half-hearted gestures around the country. Yeah, a lot of it's sort of touring works of creativity, and it's cost £120 million. And one of the last things left to happen is a touring scale...

I love that they had to say it was a scale model of the solar system. It's making its way all around the north-west of Britain over the coming months. Yes, this is the Unboxed Festival, the world's first homeopathic festival. It contains barely discernible traces of actual festival, but some people are insisting it's still basically the same as a full-blown Glastonbury.

An investigation has been launched following reports that visitor numbers were less than 1% of the target figure. The government insisted this was all part of the festival's aim of being an expression of modern Britain. The 1% were very well looked after. Well, let's have a quick game of spot the festival now. When you've crowd-surfed

at as many festivals as I have, they all start to blur into one. So help me salvage my precious festival memories in our game of Spot the Festival. You have to tell me, were these things from the Unboxed Festival this year or from Woodstock in 1999, the sequel to the classic Woodstock 1969? So this is the event. Which festival was it from?

Violence and vandalism occurring during and after a performance by Limp Bizkit. Was that Unboxed or Woodstock 99? Both. If the Limp Bizkit is capital L, capital B, that's Woodstock, but if they're just Limp Bizkits, that sounds like it. A soggy custard cream. Well, you're basically correct.

Limp Bizkit is, in fact, Liz Truss's secret service codename. If you ever hear the words, the biscuit is dunked in the tea anywhere near Downing Street, you know she's toast. Next event, a man drove a stolen truck into a rave whilst Fatboy Slim was DJing. Was that Woodstock 99 or the Unbox Festival? Now, Fatboy Slim, that's a code name for Boris, right?

That was also Woodstock 99, the Festival of Brexit thus far. Mercifully spared such incidents of stolen trucks driving into places because all the trucks are taking part in a Damien Hirst art installation piece on the M20 entitled The Impossibility of Movement in the Mind of Someone Stuck. And which festival? Theresa May has been a big driving force. That was definitely Woodstock 99.

Very surprising. Well, that is both, actually. She did commission the Unbox Festival and at Woodstock 99 performed an unscheduled collaboration with American thrash metal group Megadeth. A mash-up of Megadeth's hit single Symphony of Destruction and May's hardcore grunge punk classic Wheatfields of the Neverwhere.

Moving on now to another story that doesn't reveal the nation in its most glorious light. I've changed two words in this paraphrase of the words of celebrity chef Jamie Oliver this week. You have to tell me what words I've changed and what Oliver did actually suggest. So here is the change sentence. As a nation, we should be feeding more puppies to more sharks. What two words didn't he say and what did he actually say? Who wants to take first?

Lucy? As a rule, we should be feeding more puppies to fewer sharks. Some of those sharks are going really hungry for puppy flesh. I love that he corrected

the grammar there too. Any other suggestions? Pointing for the grammar. As a circus, we should be feeding more PMs to more sharks? Close. You can't have sharks in a circus. That is a logistical nightmare, isn't it?

Is it that Jamie Oliver's saying we should give more children free school lunch? Yes. They're not puppies to sharks, free school meals to children. Isn't free school meals three words? I mean, it's quite hyphenated. It bends out quickly, so... No-one likes a pedant, Alan.

It's not strictly true to say that absolutely no-one likes a pedant. Jamie Oliver said, the best minds in economics will tell you that if you output healthier kids, you're going to have a more productive, more profitable country and better GDP, which is a new weapon, isn't it, for parents in the great intergenerational vegetable wars? Eat your greens, darling,

or the IMF are going to downgrade our forecast. Also, none of us get to output our kids until they're in their 50s now, do we? Right, at the end of that round, the scores are 8 to Team Watts and 10 to Team Squat. The scores are eight to Team Watts and ten to Team Squat. We're going to have a technology round now. Before we proceed with this round on artificial intelligence,

you have to all tell me which of the following phrases have the words traffic lights in them. Tree, road, traffic lights, bench, bit of traffic lights, zebra crossing, bus stop, traffic lights. Does, like, the stick of the traffic light count? We always have that debate. Is it just the light light or is it the, you know, the bit you push the button on, is that...? The shaft. The shaft, Jess, thank you.

What lifeless, vaguely human-looking thing trotted out the answers that had been told to trot out in the House of Lords this week? Yes, there was a robot called Ada, and she did the most relatable thing a robot has ever done, which was she fell asleep in the House of Lords. So she's an artist, she's like a virtual or an AI artist robot. And of course she's a pretty lady,

because all the robots have to be pretty ladies. I'd like to see a really big, burly, bloke robot. Massive, hairy, Greek man of an AI. I mean, she's got cameras in her eyes. Nothing creepy about that at all. Why are we getting our AI to do art? Are we trying to make ourselves obsolete? That's the bit that blows my mind.

Why are we creating robot artists? Leave something for humans, maybe. Future jobs for anyone, ever. So what you're saying is you'd have been happier if she'd been there legislating in the House of Lords. At the moment, yeah. She's the only one out of anyone here or in the country who does understand economics.

The man, the operator, put sunglasses on her when he was rebooting it because he said, her face does some slightly disturbing things. Men and robots, you shouldn't be allowed anything, you boys. You really shouldn't. Wait till you see You shouldn't be allowed anything, you boys. You really shouldn't.

Wait till you see the robot talking about pork markets. You won't believe it. It is odd, though, that they've actually made a physical robot to discuss that stuff like the art, because you're right, I agree with you, artificial intelligence is absolutely cratering commercial artists as a career, but you don't need an actual physical robot for it. You just enter half a dozen verbal prompts into your screen and the art comes up. It feels like they're kind

of bamboozling the House of Lords with this, oh, look, it's a kind of clunky lady who falls asleep and reads typos out like Joe Biden, you know, without understanding what it's reading. Moving on now, Simon and Jess can take this question. It's a two-part question. Part A, if you had grown a brain in a laboratory, what would be the correct thing to make it do? And part B, what did the scientists who have grown a brain in a laboratory actually make it do? Well, they, and I was quite intrigued in this,

they made it play Pong, which is the earliest recognisable computer game, a very simple sort of tennis-based type thing. I mean, I don't understand, obviously, all the kind of organic molecular biology going on, but they said it had 800,000 neurons and this is like a basic human brain. The human brain has, untold, something like 100 billion neurons, but your gut is quite intelligent. Your gut has about 100 million neurons,

so it's at least 100 times cleverer than the dish brain. And indeed, my gut, you know, does pong. So there is a... There is an insight there which I've gained from this, which I've suddenly begun to understand. It is pretty worrying, it's pretty scary. I don't know what the purpose of it is going to be. Well, they could make it Chancellor.

It's pretty scary. I don't know what the purpose of it is going to be. Well, they could make it Chancellor. I mean, what would have been the correct thing to make this thing do rather than playing 1970s tennis simulators? Well, we'll leave that to Simon's gut. The gut is about as intelligent as some dogs, apparently. I mean, it really feels wasteful. I'm really frustrated at not being able to access this little bit of extra computing power.

I'm seriously starting to think that Simon is a robot. Yeah. I don't understand, though, at the moment, whether there is a natural limit to the size of a brain that can be grown in a lab. Have they just stopped at 800,000 for fear that it could become like a Frankenstein monster? That's the biggest Petri dish they've got.

They just, yeah. It'll get a Le Creuset casserole or something. Could we one day have a Eurovision song contest that is just 30 Petri dishes singing to each other telepathically? I would watch that. Sparkly Petri dishes. Yes, scientists...

Ukraine would still win. Yes, scientists... Ukraine would still win. Yes, scientists have created brain cells in a petri dish and made it play the 1970s simplified tennis video game Pong. Pong was developed in 1972, since when tennis has become more of a power-based game, lacking

the finesse of Pong. The first tennis robot came soon after, with the Beyond Bong. The first tennis robot came soon after with the Bjorn Borg. The same company that makes those baby carriers, of course. That was niche, but I like that a lot. That's pretty much a summary of my career. So the scores at the end of that round, 10 points all. Which means we're going to a tiebreaker which is a verbal rorschach test um i will say a phrase from this week's news you have to give me

your instantaneous reaction to it the one that is closest to the real meaning of the phrase wins the phrase is the essence of repugnant desire. You've got to react instantly. Simon? Yves Saint Laurent, opium. Jess? Foot fascist. Down trouser ring.

I'm obsessed with down trouser ring. Oh, the correct answer is Elon Musk's new fragrance. I was the closest. You were the closest. We'll give it to Simon. He's launched a new fragrance. It's strange he did not call it Elon Musk. Seems like an opportunity missed.

At the end of this Titanic match, our winners are Team Squat, Jess and Simon, with 13. Team What, Anand and Lucy, have 12. Thank you. Before we go, some breaking news is reaching us. The new celebrity TV show The Masked Surgeon has been suspended following the near-fatal appendectomy performed by Walrus on Judge Robert Winston.

Show producer Belstrade Noggins admitted we hadn't factored the logistics of Walrus' flippers and tusks. I'm 48 and this is my job. We hadn't factored the logistics of walrus's flippers and tusks into the operation. With hindsight, it would have been better if we'd chosen chainsaw for this task, perhaps teamed up with sewing machine.

All eyes had been turned on next week's show in which grapefruit and space hopper are due to team up to give celebrity guest Noel Edmonds an emergency tracheotomy. Thank you for listening to the News Quiz. I've been Andy Zaltzman. Goodbye. Taking part in the News Quiz were Annan Menon, Jessica Fosterkew, Lucy Porter and Simon Evans. In the chair was Andy Zaltzman,

and additional material was written by Alice Fraser, Mike Sheepard, Rebecca Bain and Cameron Loxdale. The producer was Sam Holmes, and it was a BBC Studios production. Are you fed up with the news? The top jobs in the new cabinet have all gone to horses in the apocalypse. And I loved it. The skewer. The skewer. The skewer.

The news chart and channels. Don't make her angry. I will crush the British people. You wouldn't like her when she's angry. There's nothing new about a Labour leader. Who the hell are you? Mistrust. She-Hulk.

Who is calling for more tax rises. It's everything you need to know. Like you've never heard it before. Thousands of lesbians are striking today in a dispute over pay. The three-day walkout could delay the processing of up to 60,000 gay women. The biggest story. With a twist. Surge in food prices.

Coming up. Washing up liquid. Three to five thousand pounds. A packet of custard creams. But where did you get them? They were in a box in my mother-in-law's cupboard. Sort of £300 to £400, something like that. Find your own house.

Crack team. Sound wizards. You're a wizard. Listen now on BBC Sounds.