Piers Morgan Uncensored - Piers Morgan Uncensored: Grant Shapps, Kenny Goss & Neil deGrasse Tyson

Episode Date: June 22, 2022

On this episode of Piers Morgan Uncensored, Piers questions Secretary of State for Transport, Grant Shapps. Piers also speaks to Kenny Goss and asks: who was the real George Michael? Piers speaks to the man who knows how the Earth will end, American astrophysicist and planetary scientist Neil deGrasse Tyson. Watch Piers Morgan Uncensored at 8pm on TalkTV on Sky 526, Virgin Media 627, Freeview 237 and Freesat 217. Listen on DAB+ and app. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm Piers Morgan, Uncensor, coming up on tonight's program, The Real George Michael, as a new documentary on The Singer's Life is released. I speak exclusively to the great love of his life, Kenny Goss. And he's the man who knows not just how the world will end, he thinks he knows when it will end. Rockstar astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson will be here live in the studio. And as the rail strike cripples Britain, it's time to take on the government. I'll ask Transport Secretary Grant Shaps,

why he's not sorting out this mess at the negotiating table. Good evening. Welcome to Pierce Morgan Unsensored tonight. A lot of good stuff tonight. But we've also got our first appearance by one of the British government cabinet ministers, the Transport Secretary Grant Shaps. So quite timely because at the moment, I'm trending number two in the UK on Twitter because of my interview a few days ago with Mick Lynch, who's the RMT union boss,

who's brought Britain to a standstill with these rail strikes. And the reason it's trending is because people have, well, they've been outraged. as of course they would on the hard left. They've been outraged by me quizzing, Mr. Lynch, about what he put on his Facebook profile picture. Now, let's just remind you, if you didn't see it, of the exchange I have with him. Let me show you what I believe is your Facebook page.

I want you to confirm or deny if this is your Facebook page. It's a picture of the hood from Thunderbirds. Can you see the likeness? Well, I'm just wondering where the comparison goes, because he was obviously an evil criminal terrorist mastermind described as a world's most dangerous man who read utter carnage and havoc on the public. Is that the level you're pitching this at, Pierce?

I didn't put that picture on your profile page. Yeah, but you've chosen to spend two or three minutes of these in you. You're talking about any relevant? Because you seem so irritated by the comparison. Because you seem so irritated by the comparison to the food. I'm not irritated at all. I'm completely calm about it. You seem very irritated.

Well, I'm not. You're not? This is your non-irritated phase, is it? What point are you trying to prove, peers? I'm not trying to find me up. It's not succeeding. You put it on your Facebook page. I'm simply asking it's an odd choice for a union boss who's about to go on a series of strikes.

Well, on my Facebook page, I don't use it much, but on the Facebook page, the profile picture is me and the Dalai Lama, a man of peace. There's a difference, Mr. Lynch, between that and the hood, a man of vengeful, terrorist criminal activity that wrecks the planet. But let's be fair.

You do look like him. Anyway, that clip's gone viral. It's now had one and a half million views on the Twitter clip alone. It's had another million on TikTok. Our first million TikTok view. It's had millions more on our YouTube, Instagram, Facebook. So thank you to the hood for not getting irritated. It's very clear for MadExchange that he wasn't irritated by that.

So I hope that we haven't irritated him further. by the fact that now the entire country is watching it and sharing his lack of irritation. And to all those who are outraged, let me remind you when I launched this show, the whole premise was to annoy all the right people. And today I feel my work is nearly done because I've annoyed all the right people.

Well, with more strikes plan for tomorrow and Saturday and the threat of a further six months of mayhem, is it time the government got involved to sort this mess out? Earlier I spoke to Transport Secretary Grant Shaps, So I began by asking him, how he's feeling amid all this chaos? It's a busy time. As commuters try to get themselves into work, the world has changed, of course,

which the unions don't seem to have realised, and many people simply working from home where they can. Those who aren't are the people that the unions claim they want to represent, but it's people who need to get to work because their jobs require them to be physically there. Maybe hospital cleaners, for example, who the RMT says they want to help, they're actually harming those people the most.

And that's the great pity of what's going on. Let me just cut to the quick about what's going on here. A lot of people feel that, notwithstanding the fact that technically you're correct, network rail, it's their job, they're the employer, they should be negotiating with the unions. The country's in total chaos. There's no sign of this ending.

And when it comes to direct government intervention in our rail system, I mean, you couldn't have done more than you've done in the last two, three years during this pandemic. by piling 16 billion pounds worth of investment of our money into propping it up and saving jobs and so on, which is to your credit. But that shows you are prepared to directly intervene

in keeping our trains running during a pandemic, which prompts the question, well, why aren't you getting involved now? It doesn't seem to me to be credible to have done all this for so long and now to say, actually, not my job, gov. Yeah, look, I mean, this is a negotiation over terms and conditions and pay, which is between the union and the employer. It is the only place that that discussion can take place.

And it's a stunt that the RMT, Mitt Lynch, are now saying, oh, no, what we need are ministers in the room. That's a stunt because actually only last month, Nick Lynch was saying we would never negotiate with the government. Actually, he said we'd never negotiate with the Tory government, which might give something about his frame of mind about all this. There isn't actually anything helpful that I could do by being in the room, in fact, it would undermine those negotiations

because they're not just about pay, they're about a whole host of other things. What the unions need to do is get back in the room, stop flouncing out, and get on with talks. How do you square, though, this kind of new parsimonious view of capping, effectively, what you can pay people in the public sector, with this revelation today that the government is looking to scrap the cap on banker bonuses, and that's not been denied by the Prime Minister today at PM. So is that true? Have you told businesses that they, because we're now not in the European Union, they no longer have to abide by that rule that they couldn't have more than 100% bonus?

Well, look, for start, the government looks after the areas of the public sector, which are under its overall controls. You know, teachers, nurses, doctors, railways, those are the things that we can directly affect. What the private sector pays under different circumstances is their business. I hope you'll forgive me. I'm not an expert on city rules. but my understanding is that there are always discussions and considerations about, particularly now we're outside of the EU, where caps lie in all of this. But I will have to leave it to the Treasury and others who will be better informed.

But you would understand. I was going to say, they're not, of course, public workers. Right. But I understand my distinction, obviously. But clearly, if the UK government is telling people in the banking world, you can remove the cap on your bonuses. We're not in the European Union anymore. haven't got to abide by these caps.

Off you go, lads, fill your boots. That does jar very heavily with people right now who are struggling to feed their kids or queuing in food banks. Or indeed, you know, people like Mick Lynch on behalf of his members would say, well, this is completely outrageous. So I think it's a perfectly valid question

to ask any member of the cabinet, frankly, is to whether this is true. Have you guys given the nod to the banking world? You can give yourself what you're like as bonuses. That's a private sector. activity. What I'm dealing with here with the rail situation is the public sector. And I do just want to say, and I just, I'll make this point actually, because it is relevant. Don't run away with the idea that our railway workers, 100,000 of them are poorly paid.

The medium salary, the average salary, is 44,000. Rail drivers, this is not the drivers on strikers, I should point out, but rail drivers, median average salary, 59,000. A fifth of them earn over 70,000. There are railway drivers on over £100,000. This is not a badly paid sector. Nurses, for example, would earn perhaps 31,000. Careworth is 21,000. So the government has to balance how many... I'm not unsympathetic. Listen,

I had a big set to with Mitch last week. I'm not in total disagreement with what you're saying. I think if you're going to start shelling out a big pay rises, nursing staff should be top of the list. It would be my view. But I do think that this issue of the private sector and a word from the government

that you can all fill your boots with bonuses, it could not be worse timed for you when you're trying to have a position as a government that there's not enough money in the pot for the public sector. If the same government is going around removing any caps so that people in the banking community can enrich themselves, I think that's a very unfortunate juxtaposition.

And I would simply ask you, clearly your position seems to be you don't know the truth about this. But if that was the case, would you share my view that it would be outrageous? Well, actually, I was going to say there's a fairly straightforward principle. The government deals with the money that it taxes and raises and then spends on things like salaries. The government doesn't generally get involved in legislation about what, for example, a TV presenter could earn or could earn as a bonus. That's unusual.

Now, after the financial crash, governments around the world have been more involved in, in setting these private sector or limits on private sector bonuses, for example. It's not generally what governments get involved with. Okay, let me just finally on these strikes. Mick Lynch says he's met every transport minister, Tory transport minister in the last year. That presumably includes you. Well, he usually works with the railway ministers,

so there are a railways that he will have met. No, I haven't met with him, no. You've never met Mick Lynch? Not knowingly, no. Not knowingly. What do you think he's crept around your house when you're not looking? As far as I'm aware, I didn't want to mislead you that he was at an event I was at once or something like that.

But no, usually in government, it's the function. I mean, I've got to say, look, I understand all your reasons and rationale for not getting involved, as you say, in negotiation. But given what is going on in the country, it's the very last thing anybody in this country needs or wants right now, surely there's going to be a moment when it just makes sense you to pick the phone up to Mick Lynch and just have a conversation with it.

Ultimately, you are the transport secretary. That is right, but there is a rail. minister whose job it is specifically. Yeah, but you're his boss, right? With rail. But you're his boss? So how far do you take this? If there was a paid dispute, let me ask the question. If there's a paid dispute on your TV channel,

which I believe is ultimately owned by Rupert Murdoch, would you expect Rupert Murdoch to walk in and resolve that dispute? I'm sure he don't. I'm absolutely. I would absolutely expect him to, if put it this way, if the entire country had been brought to its knees by whatever was going on, absolutely. Mick Lynch has a Facebook profile picture of himself as the hood,

the evil criminal mastermind from Thunderbirds. And I did suggest to him, when we discussed this in a rather animated way on this show last week, that you were the kind of Virgil character from the Thunderbirds. You actually look a bit like Virgil. And I pointed out that in the end, Virgil does emerge triumphant. Well, I think we can take these comparisons too far. But I simply think you can't hold the world back

against things which have fundamentally changed. For example, it used to be the case if you wanted to go on the train, you'd have to go to a ticket office and pick up your ticket. Now only one in eight tickets are bought in that way, and yet we have exactly the same number of ticket offices, almost exactly the same as we had in the 90s, before the internet got going.

You had a situation where the only way to check a track to maintain it properly was to send people out and have them walk along the track. It's dangerous. I read accident reports often, frequently, from people who've died because they've been hit by trains as they try and maintain the track. And nowadays, a train can be fitted with sensors and cameras

and take 70,000 pictures per minute to check that track much more safely and more accurately than the human eye. But because the unions refuse to reform themselves, we end up with a railway stuck in the 1950s and 60s. That has to change. And he won't be able to hold out against that change because he just insists on

calling his union members out on strike. And the country can't live with that. Let me ask you quickly about Rwanda. We've got Prince Charles, you've got Boris Johnson going out there. Prince Charles, you know, it was briefed and not being denied, believes that the government's Rwanda policy

of sending people who try and come in illegally to this country to Rwanda is appalling. What is your response to that? I think what is incredibly inhumane is standing by and watching people drowning in our channel, watching people pay people smugglers and criminals, criminal gangs, to bring them to this country. And other than wringing our hands and saying this is terrible, simply not having a plan to deal with it.

And that is essentially, as far as I can tell, the position of everyone else, every other party, every political party in this country, apart from the Conservatives Party, you may not agree with the plan, but we have a plan. And that is to ensure that people are put off, that we stop the trade, the illegal trafficking people. I've got a big problem with the taxpayer shelling out £500,000 £500,000 of pot for empty planes on tarpacks who end up going to Spain rather than Rwanda. In which case let's tackle the law,

sorry, not the law, the legal establishment which will fight this endlessly. And by the way, to put that into comparison, we spend a billion pounds a year on dealing with the upshot of this asylum system not working. So I understand that it will cost money

to establish. a new route, but what about all the money it costs to maintain a system, which is fundamentally broken? For goodness say, people are dying in the channel. We must do something about it. I agree. If you keep being blocked, though, by the law, and the law is what it is, it's a law, so they're currently... Well, no, that's, I mean, you know, the job I do in this place behind me here is, is changed the law. Right, I understand. When the law isn't working, our job is to change it. My point is, if you literally can't get this plan to work, at what point do you abandon it and stop wasting taxpayer money?

Oh, look, I think we're only at the beginning. We're going to make the plan work. I mean, we are a determined government who do a lot of difficult things. We are prepared to take those decisions. How would you feel, though, how would you feel if I said to you, all right, Mr. Shattson, sorry,

but we're going to take your Ukrainian family and we're going to put them on a plane to Rwanda tomorrow? So, Mike, the Ukrainian family. Well, Ukrainian family that you're currently hosting. Yeah, the Ukrainian family that lives me. Could you have that conversation with it? Well, I was going to say, came here through a legal route.

I understand. I'm talking about the moral, the morality of it, really. Is it could you imagine having that conversation with them and saying, actually, you're not going to stay in safe Britain? You're going to go to Rwanda, which has a pretty poor record of human rights. That's no more relevant than saying, can I imagine my family being asked to go to Randa. I mean, this is, we're talking about here people who've been trafficked by criminal gangs across the channel, illegally, knowing.

that what they're doing is illegal and knowing that when they get here in the future, there's a good chance that you will end up being in Rwanda. And what will happen in the end, of course, once that policy is up and running, is that it will close down the criminal gangs. Let me ask you about what it's been like to have a Ukraine family living in your house.

We're delighted to have them with us. They're lovely people. Their country's under attack. And the way I feel about what's going on in Ukraine is it's not just Putin attacking some country, you know, across in Eastern Europe. He's attacking all of our freedoms and all of our rights. And if we don't stop him there, he'll carry on west. We've seen this sort of thing in the world before.

So I think it's a small price to pay to have a family live with us in return for, you know, trying to help with that situation. Well, it's a great thing that you do for that family. And I'm sure it's hugely appreciated by them and by Ukraine. Thank you very much, Mr. Schatz. to be my first cabinet minister. Thanks. Well, Unsler, next is one of the most influential recording artists of all time

as a new film on his life hit screens today. Are we any closer to knowing the real George Michael? His former long-time partner, great love of his life, Kenny Goss, joins me exclusively after the break his first television interview in five years. Talk about the Bidsborg and Unsensis. Well, from the formation of Wham to his untimely death,

George Michael was an enigma, as well as a gigantic talent. But one person who knew the real George was his former long-time partner. Kenny Goss. I'll speak to Kenny in just a moment for his first television interview in five years. But first, there's a new, well, final work, I guess it is. It's a documentary about George Michael's life. It claims to give an insight to his very public career and his tumultuous private life. Let's take a look at a clip.

You have a right to walk away. The music industry takes away that right from every artist it signs. George had raised the bar to a whole new level. It was a revolutionary thing. And I want to leave songs. I believe I can leave songs that will mean something to other generations. George Michael, who was without a doubt, one of the most talented singer-songwriters of this country. In fact, the world has ever seen. And his death was obviously tragically early.

And we all miss George, no one, I guess, probably more than my next guest, who's Kenny Goss, who spent 15 years with George. Kenny, it's great to talk to you. Hey, how are you? We don't really know each other, but I knew George quite well. and had some great times with him. Well, I seems like I know you from, from, weren't you in the showbiz editor or something like that years ago? When you were, I'm a lot older than you, but you were, it must have been 20 years maybe.

Yeah, well, you've aged better than me. It seems like I know you. Yeah, I used to do, I actually ran, I ran some of the papers, but I used to, I used to see quite a lot of George. You ran the sun for a while in the news of the world, no? Yes, and also a daily mirror, yeah, yeah. Yeah. But I had some, I'm not dealing. You got a lot of awards at the day of America.

I was going to say about my sort of dealings with George. He was always incredibly candid. You know, I can remember some dinner parties where he was just, you know, outrageously funny but very revealing. I did some interviews with him. He was the same. He was a kind of heart on the sleeve kind of guy. And I'm just curious, this documentary film has a lot of people talking about him.

It doesn't have you. And I always felt that if everybody around George's life, you would have known him probably as well as anyone. I would definitely say he would say that as well. Absolutely. What you're very correct about is George was one of the most honest people I've ever met, and sometimes he almost used honesty as a weapon. And I mean weapon in, I'm going to tell you this, I need to tell you this, I've done something you need to know.

And so you always got the truth from him. Absolutely. By the way, the documentary, you are talking about the one that you and I did, correct? No, I'm actually talking about the new one, which is coming out now with all the big stars in it. You're talking about the Simon Napier Bell film, right? Oh, okay. I don't know a lot about that one. Right. I do know about it, but I haven't really watched it. I think I know what it says. But I wish it luck. I mean, I think the point that people have made about it is it's a bit of a, not a whitewashy,

of his life, but it may not be as real as it should be. And that the reality of George's life was that towards the end of his life, certainly the last decade or so, he was on a pretty downward spiral into a very difficult kind of lifestyle. He was pretty honest about it to me that even when he was with you, and you've been very candid about this as well, you know, it was a kind of open relationship. Of course. From his point of view, he had lots of...

I think from him, he was probably... And I'm not saying anything. I would say he probably was more open than me. But I loved him very much. He knew that. What do you think the biggest misconception about George was that the public may have had? I said the thing that I always tried to remind myself of,

and this really wasn't a misconception. I think most people knew this was I don't think he ever thought he had a good-looking moment in his life. I always tried to remind him or tell him, you know, you look really good today. You're a handsome man. It was very difficult for him. And it seems so, I think to many people, I know that's well known, but I think to many people,

they would think he would have a much higher sense of, hey, I'm a good-looking guy. And you know that, I'm sure. But that's something, I'll never forget. the first times that we've probably been together two weeks, or maybe three, he came home and he said, darling, what's good looking about me? And I said, why are you asking me that? And he told me, he said, someone said, you were better looking than me. And I said, darling, what was the question? And I asked him the question again, because I really had never had a guy asked me that question. And I said, there were so much.

many things I should have said, but I said your lips. And now, if it had been a girl or anybody that had more time, I'd have said everything that you're looking about you. Don't you get it? I mean, you know, he was, you know, always voted, most handsome in the world, all these different things. But what he did know was that he was a talented man and a good songwriter. I mean, he was, without a doubt. He was one of the greatest, the greatest talents, I think, musically, this country and the world has seen, certainly in my lifetime. I think that's the thing that always amazed me. I am probably the most unmusical person that he could have ever gotten with.

He always said, I had the same five CDs as my cars when we met. And I can honestly tell you, I can't remember the words to the songs he wrote about me. And it's a shame. Since he's passed away, I've actually started really. reading the lyrics. And actually, I started doing that before he passed away. And he said, oh my God. He said, I liked you better when you weren't reading them.

Because, you know, I would ask him almost childlike questions. Like, this room you say that I'm in. Where is this room? And this chair. He'd say, darling, it's symbolism. And I said, okay, I said, but are we going to see each other? I said, you're an atheist. You know, the questions like that were very childlike, but it made me think.

And I did understand what symbolism was, but I said, I'm always an angel in all the songs. And I said, are you my angel? And I said, you called me a drunken angel, darling. I said, I said, you know, if you know how angels work, they don't go, they don't, drunken angels don't get many assignments. You know I mean, Kenny, you had 15 years with George And it was a great love of Fed

Well, thank God you said that Because it was 15 years Yeah And he said something once And it was I've said, darling, why did you say We weren't together two and a half years And you know, he had already started

Kind of, you know Not being necessarily as present As we'd gotten used to as he had been And his answer was just simply, Darling, I don't know, I just did it. And I said, okay, how are you? Yeah. And towards the end, is it right to say that,

I mean, would you have been worried about the state that George was in with all the drugs and the lifestyle? I was worried about him all the time. Yeah. Yes, yes. I mean, but please don't say that the wrong way. It's, if you love someone, you're worried about him. You know, it's, uh, that time when I said that, you know, flush his drugs down the toilet,

that's just because I was worried about it. I'm so cautious now about everything I say. And it's, you know, it's a tough way to live. Uh, because, you know, I mean, you know, I was quite pleased for, uh, 14 years being long suffering. I didn't really like Because if you Google my name It often says long-suffering partner Kenny Golf Or long-suffering Texas

And And But you know I really did try to always be there for him And he knew that You know He I know he chose me to please his mother

I mean he told me that You know He had this view that my mother his mother and I was very much alike. And in a lot of ways we were, I would say I'm probably, not probably, I'm much more a guy that plays by rules. And she was kind of the same way. I mean, I'm also not judgmental at all. But, you know, if a speed is a certain, you're supposed to drive at this speed, I drive at that speed. If you're supposed to, you know,

And he really played by his own rules. Kenny, when you heard that... When you heard that he died at such a horribly young age, obviously you would have been massively shocked. But what were your emotions about it all, given that you'd spit up from him, but you'd stay close? We'd stay close. But, you know, we'd all expected him to die.

I had spent so much time when we lived together being worried about him. And honestly, you know, he hated the fact that I worried about him so much. He what's the line he says in the song? He says, I could see it in your eye. When you looked at me that way,

it tears me in two. And it really did. I just didn't know what to do. And Kenny, what's your... I had two really close for him. When you look back on your relationship all your time with George, what's your favorite memory?

If I could relive a moment you had with him. There's so many that... And what I always do notice is that there was a lot longer time that I was incredibly happy with him than I was worried with it. Like I might watch an interview with you and go, wow, he looks good then.

Or Parkinson. And he was, and he always said such wonderfully kind things about me. It's, and that, you know, that makes me feel good because, you know, he always said that I saved

his life. I think that's, you know, a bit much, but I really did try and he often got upset with me because I don't think I ever called him and didn't say, darling, please.

A lot of people love you. Yeah. I don't think he ever knew just how much he was loved. He was an amazing character. I love George. I thought he was fantastically entertaining. Brilliantly talented. English people forgave him for everything. We did. We did. They did. You know why, Kenny?

He had a fantastically British sense of humor and it got him out of every scrape he ever got into. It was the humor got him out of every scrape. He was absolutely hilarious. Kenny, I've got to leave it there. I would say the funny bits. I'm sorry, we've got to. Yeah, I've got to get you.

Kenny, it's great to talk to you. I'd always want to have a chat with you. I love George. It sure is. I wish I had more time to talk to you. I just want to say he was one of the most wonderful men in the world. Yeah. And I want people to remember that.

I'm so glad that a true, honest documentaries out. It's such a relief. Well, I think there'll be a lot of talk about George and a lot of stuff about both these films that have come out. But I appreciate you joining me tonight, Kenny. And, you know, it'll be good to actually remember what a genius he was apart from everything else. All the best.

Yeah. Thank you. Have a great day. Take care. Bye-bye. George Michael, what a talent he was. Well, unscensored next, he's the man he knows how the world will aim. But that's not what keeps superstar Astrovis.

Neil deGrasse Tyson up at night. So what on earth does? I'll talk to him. The rock star astrophysicist himself, live in my studio. What a trait this was going to be. Well, welcome back to Pizzball and I said, I am very excited now. I don't get excited by too many guests. But I've always wanted to sit down with this guy

because he's probably the number one astrophysicist in the world, a rock star of space. Even as we've been sitting here, he's been telling me what's on my own screen behind me, because to me it looks like just a big mate. but he knows. And he is Neil deGrasse Tyson. Thank you for coming.

You happen to be in the country. I just happen to be in the neighborhood. I just happen to lure you to my studio. I'm so happy about it. It just happened to be in the hood, as we'd say. Before we go any further, what is this thing behind we put here for you? Okay, so this is these stars that are coming through, that's just special effects. But in the background is an actual image of the Milky Way galaxy.

Really? And coming up right now is the galactic center behind us. And the center there is, it lurks a supermassive black hole, dining on any stars that wander too close. Look, you have a gigantically large brain for this kind of stuff, right? You accept that. It's the same size as everybody else's brain. I just prioritise what I care about differently from others.

Well, I think what you're brilliant to do. This is terrific book which you come to the moment, but you're brilliantly crystallizing the really important questions in life, one of which is, how long have we got here? Yeah, well, there are some ideas about that because we still don't know enough about the forces that will end at all. Oh, sorry. We might have 100 years on Earth at the rate we're going.

Really? No, sorry. There's Earth issues that require geopolitical solutions. Self-harm. Okay, correct. And then there's the universe, the death of the sun, the collision of the Milky Way galaxy with the Andromeda Galaxy, and possibly the Big Rip.

How would the Sun die? Oh, like any star, it will run out of fuel in its core, and it starts changing. It starts bloating and getting so large. that it will engulf the orbit of Mercury and Venus and come very close to Earth. So imagine looking on the horizon and sunrise is half the sky.

Okay, that would be terrifying. Is this even starting to happen? No, not yet. No, we have another several billion years. So if you're going to prioritize... Well, that's a right. That's a dropped intro, isn't it? You could have said that to start with.

What's you worried about? Yeah, let that one go. All right. But there's another one, the big rip, that if the expansion of the universe accelerates at a continued rate and it goes unchecked, the universe will be expanding

in 22 billion years. It'll expanding faster than the fabric of spacetime can keep up with it. And it'll just rip. And I'm terrified by this. A 22 billion years. Why are you terrified? You're not going to be here.

Nobody you know is going to be here. I just, it's okay to be scared of things. that you won't wait. Can we stop it happening, the big rip? We can't stop climate change, apparently. Are you worried about the big rip? We're going to stop the big rip of the universe? The big rip would be it. We're pretty incompetent. And on so many levels, I would not hold that whole high hope. What about another threat to civilization here? I had the last interview with Professor Stephen Hawking, which was a memorable experience. I put his study in Cambridge University. And I asked him about the threat from AI, artificial intelligence. This is what

he said, is artificial intelligence going to be the end of us? And if it's not, how do we best work with it? There is a greater danger from artificial intelligence if we allow it to become separately. Now, I'm really more and more about the potential for AI to self-design. Is it going to happen, do you think? There's no reason to think that that won't happen. The question is, what minute will that occur? because the moment it becomes self-aware and it can learn on its own. It will learn exponentially. What did he mean, Professor Hawking, by self-designing?

Well, just consider. How long do you go to school to learn how to read, write, and do arithmetic? Or lately it just looks like people just read or write, but no arithmetic. How long does that, you're in school for years and years and years? A computer that is self-aware and has access to all the knowledge of the Internet,

It can build on whatever foundation it had in the previous moment to accelerate that learning. So it can acquire all knowledge and all wisdom in a matter of minutes. Are we empowering this? Should we stop? Should we hit the buffers on this? There are people, experts who definitely feel that way. I'm not as apocalyptic about it. I think AI is not, we're not going to build the one machine that controls everything.

But right now, if you were told someone 20 years ago, I drive a car that can steer itself, and tell me where grandma's house is to avoid traffic in real time, they would say, that's AI. Okay? In the days of the Jetsons, they imagined robots as humanoid objects walking around doing tasks. They weren't thinking that the car was the robot, that the telescope was the robot, that your coffee machine is the robot. They weren't thinking that.

They had a robot operate the coffee machine. The robot drove your car. So if we infuse AI in all the areas, of our lives that serve our needs, then I don't see AI becoming centralized in a way that then takes over. Some people think that Elon Musk is AI. You know Elon. I'm not authorized to come.

You knew him when he's only worth $100 billion. Yeah, yeah, I knew him when. He had a great line. He says, you know how to make a small fortune in space? Start with a big fortune. That was a good line. But now he made a big fortune. I mean, he's doing lots of very interesting things in space.

But one of the issues up there is that the space is getting quite cluttered with stuff. including Elon's. I mean, what's the answer to this? It's not clear. And just today, one of the reasons why I'm in London is to attend a space sustainability summit. Look at those two words together, space sustainability. We see these trails of satellites going across the sky. They call them constellations of satellites, and that pisses me off. Because a constellation are stars that don't move across your sky. They took our word and called naming their satellites after this.

So there are thousands of satellites in the sky creating these streaks. How dangerous is that? Well, first, it's ugly to those who want to just bask in the majesty of the night sky. Plus, it makes further space commerce hard because space gets crowded. And some satellites have been actively destroyed. China did it first. We did it second. Russia did it third.

And, okay, I didn't destroy your satellite. I destroyed one of my own, but you saw it. Okay. Have you been to space? No, no. Would you like to? Okay, so, you know, the folks like... Jeff Bezos.

Yeah, all these guys. William Shatner. William Shatner. So if this is a schoolroom globe, you know how high up they went? The thickness of two dimes. They're nothing. And I'm an astrophysicist. You're going to say that's a bad?

Where do you want to go? Go to Moon, Mars, beyond. Give me a destination that's not boldly going where hundreds have gone before. That's not a... Professor Hawking told me if he knew he had his last... on Earth, it was all about to end, AI or otherwise, he said he would want to be with his family playing Wagner and drinking champagne. What would you do? Wow. Okay. Literally, I said to you right now, all right, you're right. The world is about to end and it's happening in six hours. What are you

going to do? I would say, what can I do with my intellect and those of others to prevent the world from ending in six hours? But assuming you couldn't do anything. No, no, I don't assume that. No, excuse me. Okay? You have these photos of people. escaping cities that are about to be leveled by a hurricane. What are you going to do? And no one is saying, why don't we tap the psychotic energy of the hurricane, use that energy to drive the power needs of the city,

and then the hurricane goes away. You know who thinks that way? STEM professionals, science, technology, engineering and math. Professor Hawking, he had this obsession about working out what the black hole was, right? What is your obsession? What's your weird thing you would love to crack? It's never been solved.

I want to know, our equations tell us if you go into a black hole, the time works out so that the future history of the universe you just came from plays out to infinity, and another spacetime opens up in front of you. So I want a mapping of all the new space times that the black holes are providing. So you're all basically obsessed with the same thing, black holes? Well, who wouldn't be? I find them a little bit black. We're obsessed with black holes the way kids are obsessed with T-Rex.

Every kid knows the T-Rex, right? I think it's because it's the threat that it can eat you, that has, earned its respect. Neil, this book, Welcome to the Universe, absolutely fantastically fascinating. Thank you. You are a remarkably fascinating guy. This image is like the original textbook

that spawned a series of books. This latest one is the universe in 3D. There are glasses that are part of it, and the objects in the universe pop, and they transform from just a picture of a planet to a world as a planet. We even show the constellations, and you realize constellations spread in three dimensions.

It's not just a thing. I can talk to you for hours. Sadly, we run out of the world. the time. The universe is big. It is. And what a pleasure. Please come back again.

Next time you're here, we'd love to have you back. Great to finally talk to you properly. Well, on says to next. The Prince of Wales has arrived in Rwanda. We've got his work cut out to save the Commonwealth. Will it crumble under King Charles? Tonight's peers pack, Esther Cracker and Julie Bindle,

we'll debate that a few minutes. Welcome back. Prince Charles, who will set under his stool to save the Commonwealth during a trip to Rwanda, assisting that members are better and stronger together. Got his word cut out, though, with many countries, poised to potentially become full republics when the prince becomes king,

having maintained their links to the royal family in some cases, out of respect to the queen. Australia and Jamaica are among those countries in March to potentially one day want to cut their ties. So will the Commonwealth crumble when Charles does become the monarch? I'm joined by tonight's peers back, talk to the contributor Esther Cracker and author Julie Bindwell. Welcome to both of you.

So Julie, I know you're a massive fan of the royals, but you don't really believe in it, right? You don't think we should have a monarchy. de facto, the Commonwealth falls, does it? I'm a Republican. I respect that the Queen works extremely hard and she didn't really have much choice in her role. So I'm not rabid.

But no, I think that the Commonwealth should die when she dies. And I think that for many countries, and countries I've visited, Kenya, Uganda and others, for them, it's only really the elite that think that the Commonwealth is worthy of any attention. And whereas other people, especially those that live in poverty and hardship, they think that ties with NATO,

in the UN are probably far better, we're far better serve them than the Commonwealth. I've been in Australia recently where they've had, you know, there's a bit of republicanism in the air, but I definitely got the feeling they're quite a way away from wanting to sever their link. But a lot of it is pegged to the Queen. Tremendous respect for this unique world figure, really.

No one's quite sure what's going to happen when she is sadly no longer with us. We're not sure when that will be, obviously. But there is a lot of sort of precariousness around the monarchy and the Commonwealth, all of it. What do you think? I think it's quite a pity that, you know, the Commonwealth has now just become synonymous with the Queen as opposed to the royal family. And, you know, I actually dispute the idea that it's just, you know, amongst the countries that you were mentioning, it's just an elitist idea.

Actually, if you think about the Commonwealth and the potential of the Commonwealth, it gives a lot of these countries a lot of visibility. So if you imagine you're a small African country in the middle of nowhere, you know, petitioning the UN to help solve a political dispute or anything like that doesn't really get the attention of these large organizations. But you can have direct access to countries like India, Canada, the UK. And they are actually far more useful in solving these sorts of issues than, you know, bigger organizations. I agree with you for small countries that normally would not get the attention of the UN or a seat at the table. I mean, obviously, we haven't seen the realization of that yet. But there's so much potential with this organization post-Brexit to actually deepen its ties with the Commonwealth. I think one of the issues I have with people that talk down on the Commonwealth is really understanding Britain's place post-Brexit and in the 21st century as it is now.

It's not, you know, Britain that came out of the Second World War, the British Empire, all of that. everything is evolved and the royal family will evolve with that, but we also have to understand the Commonwealth's role in that. There's so many opportunities to expand Britain's, you know, touch around the world and the values that Britain holds so dear that I think it's so sad. I did feel with the Platinum Jubilee, it was a uniquely British occasion. And when you travel the world like I've done a lot, you know, there's a lot of people envious of what we have here, this royal family, this pomp and pageantry.

You know, people say, what's the point of it? I said, well, actually, that's the point of it. It's something uniquely British. It pays for itself through tourism most of the time. I'm sure that's true, though, but it is pretty true. I think it pays some businesses through tourism. I don't think it goes directly to the people, whereas from the people, our tax goes directly to the royal family.

Didn't you feel a little twinge of patriotic further? You saw all the flags waving and the roils out there. I don't have an issue. I don't have an issue with patriotism. I think that we should be proud of the things that we're good at doing and that we should be proud of the things that we should be proud of the things that we should be proud of. But I don't think we have to see that through the lens of a privileged family that is it's obscene when you think about the homelessness and people using food banks. And you see the vast wealth and privilege of a family that we're supposed to doff our caps to.

But they're much more than that. Well, they do an awful lot of work for charities up and down the country. They do a huge number of public engages, things which would bore me rigid. They're doing them every day all day. The royal family is a lot more than just a privileged family. I completely agree with you. Yes, they are a privileged family, but there are a lot more than that. And I think a lot more is at stake than just saying, let's get rid of this privileged family. Let's get rid of the Commonwealth and all of these things.

I feel like, you know, it's not just countries that were in the British Empire that part of the Commonwealth. There's Rwanda, obviously, I think it's Mozambique. Of course. I've got to jump in here. Very quick test. Apparently, there's a flamingo test where if you can balance on your leg for 10 seconds or more, you've got a longer life ahead of you.

I'm going to spare you, because you've already said, you don't want to do it. Yes, get up here. Okay. Let's do this, right? Up you go, on one foot. We've got 20 seconds.

I'm in heels. I'm going to go. Esther, go. Okay. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Said, you were wobbling. I am rock solid. I'm going to live forever.

You, Esther Cracko, have got problems. And you, Julie, very sensible. That's it. So my lovely panel, thank you very much. Whatever you're up to, keep it uncensored. And good night.