1 00:00:10,000 --> 00:00:14,830 She said, "I hear you're thinking of resigning. I order you not to." 2 00:00:14,830 --> 00:00:17,880 I said, "Prime Minister. To me, it is a matter of honour." 3 00:00:17,880 --> 00:00:22,240 ALL: Bring back Greg! Bring back Greg! 4 00:00:22,240 --> 00:00:25,858 I didn't sleep much and I suppose I decided then that I would go. 5 00:00:27,720 --> 00:00:30,632 If you have lost the support of the board, you can't really stay. 6 00:00:32,500 --> 00:00:37,140 If I had resigned, it would have been a cowardly resignation, 7 00:00:37,140 --> 00:00:39,110 because I'd done nothing wrong. 8 00:00:39,110 --> 00:00:41,550 Home Secretary, are you going to resign? 9 00:00:41,550 --> 00:00:42,860 I stepped out of the car 10 00:00:42,860 --> 00:00:44,830 and I think the only thing I said to him was, 11 00:00:44,830 --> 00:00:46,190 "I'm going to have to resign." 12 00:00:46,190 --> 00:00:48,070 Bastard! 13 00:00:48,070 --> 00:00:49,940 You murderer! 14 00:00:49,940 --> 00:00:54,020 You see a pile of dead children's bodies in your mind 15 00:00:54,020 --> 00:00:57,210 because these people wouldn't stop operating on them, 16 00:00:57,210 --> 00:01:01,715 One of us had to resign and they weren't going to. 17 00:01:07,710 --> 00:01:11,460 Resigning is about honour and dishonour. 18 00:01:11,460 --> 00:01:15,630 Matters of principle and taste and decency. 19 00:01:15,630 --> 00:01:21,540 Being caught out and taking responsibility. 20 00:01:21,540 --> 00:01:25,430 But are there universal truths about resigning? 21 00:01:25,430 --> 00:01:29,650 Can the experience of those who have taken that giant step and resigned 22 00:01:29,650 --> 00:01:32,323 teach us some important lessons? 23 00:01:38,790 --> 00:01:43,150 The catalyst that turns thought about resigning into action 24 00:01:43,150 --> 00:01:45,490 is usually a crisis. 25 00:01:45,490 --> 00:01:49,010 Major Norman and his section where out-numbered ten to one. 26 00:01:49,010 --> 00:01:51,490 They were ten yards away from us within about ten minutes. 27 00:01:51,490 --> 00:01:53,650 We all came to terms very quickly with the fact that we were 28 00:01:53,650 --> 00:01:56,510 probably going to die in the next half an hour. 29 00:01:56,510 --> 00:02:01,150 In 1982, Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands. 30 00:02:01,150 --> 00:02:05,325 Foreign Office Minister Richard Luce was facing HIS crisis. 31 00:02:07,240 --> 00:02:09,070 Things deteriorated very, very fast indeed. 32 00:02:09,070 --> 00:02:11,270 At that point, I made sure that 33 00:02:11,270 --> 00:02:12,960 I was equipped with my stick. 34 00:02:12,960 --> 00:02:15,020 I always like a stick when there's a crisis. 35 00:02:15,020 --> 00:02:16,710 So I was walking around with a stick and everyone said, 36 00:02:16,710 --> 00:02:17,830 "There must be some problem." 37 00:02:17,830 --> 00:02:22,800 In Port Stanley, the Governor was surrounded by Argentine soldiers. 38 00:02:22,800 --> 00:02:23,790 Will you talk to them, sir? 39 00:02:23,790 --> 00:02:27,260 I'll talk to them but I'm not walking out. 40 00:02:27,260 --> 00:02:30,770 I'm not surrendering to the bloody Argies, Patrick. Certainly not. 41 00:02:30,770 --> 00:02:34,940 Richard Luce was already considering resigning. 42 00:02:34,940 --> 00:02:36,870 The invasion took place on that Friday morning 43 00:02:36,870 --> 00:02:39,070 and my first instinct was to say, 44 00:02:39,070 --> 00:02:42,450 "Well, I'm the minister of state with day-to-day responsibility. 45 00:02:42,450 --> 00:02:43,439 "I should go." 46 00:02:44,790 --> 00:02:48,965 But not everyone would think the crisis merits resignation. 47 00:02:54,210 --> 00:02:57,452 Another crisis. another matter of life and death. 48 00:02:59,460 --> 00:03:02,410 Bristol Royal Infirmary in the 1990s. 49 00:03:02,410 --> 00:03:06,490 Too many children were dying after heart operations. 50 00:03:06,490 --> 00:03:11,700 The mortician pointed to a series of small bodies on slabs 51 00:03:11,700 --> 00:03:16,480 in the mortuary and said, "When is somebody going to do something about 52 00:03:16,480 --> 00:03:18,680 "these children dying after cardiac surgery?" 53 00:03:18,680 --> 00:03:23,650 On his own initiative, Consultant Anaesthetist Dr Stephen Bolsin 54 00:03:23,650 --> 00:03:26,370 collected evidence pointing to problems 55 00:03:26,370 --> 00:03:30,870 with the competence of two surgeons. 56 00:03:30,870 --> 00:03:32,180 The problem was dreadful. 57 00:03:32,180 --> 00:03:37,480 We discovered, at the end of Mr Dhasmana's series of operations, 58 00:03:37,480 --> 00:03:40,620 that 9 out of 13 tiny babies had died. 59 00:03:41,650 --> 00:03:44,700 The acceptable mortality was way under 10% 60 00:03:44,700 --> 00:03:48,784 and the mortality in Bristol was way over 60%. 61 00:03:50,040 --> 00:03:55,760 My feeling was that was because people were too arrogant to 62 00:03:55,760 --> 00:04:00,400 actually stop doing the operations and that the institution was 63 00:04:00,400 --> 00:04:03,920 completely indifferent to the outcomes. 64 00:04:03,920 --> 00:04:05,790 Bolsin would go on to take action. 65 00:04:05,790 --> 00:04:08,930 'It was this doctor's decision to blow the whistle, which turned 66 00:04:08,930 --> 00:04:10,579 'the public spotlight on Bristol. ' 67 00:04:11,930 --> 00:04:15,070 But first, he had to resign. 68 00:04:18,210 --> 00:04:22,430 In the year 2000, Richard Desmond took over Express Newspapers. 69 00:04:22,430 --> 00:04:25,950 My politics? Well, I suppose I'm a socialist really. 70 00:04:25,950 --> 00:04:30,120 But in the years that followed, it was concern about the politics 71 00:04:30,120 --> 00:04:34,570 of his papers that led to a crisis for one of his journalists. 72 00:04:34,570 --> 00:04:37,430 You may have read some of my other earth-shattering exclusives. 73 00:04:37,430 --> 00:04:41,320 "Michael Jackson To Attend Jade Goody's Funeral." 74 00:04:41,320 --> 00:04:42,820 He didn't. 75 00:04:42,820 --> 00:04:46,810 "Robbie Williams Pops Pill At Heroes Concert." 76 00:04:46,810 --> 00:04:48,070 He didn't either. 77 00:04:48,070 --> 00:04:51,400 Daily Star journalist Richard Peppiatt 78 00:04:51,400 --> 00:04:54,730 says he was sick of making up stories. 79 00:04:54,730 --> 00:04:57,030 This is his resignation letter. 80 00:04:57,030 --> 00:05:01,150 "Matt Lucas On Suicide Watch." He wasn't. 81 00:05:01,150 --> 00:05:04,860 "Jordan Turns To Buddha." 82 00:05:04,860 --> 00:05:06,920 She might have, but I doubt it. 83 00:05:06,920 --> 00:05:08,330 ALL: E-D-L! 84 00:05:08,330 --> 00:05:13,150 But Peppiatt's final straw was his concern over the paper's reporting 85 00:05:13,150 --> 00:05:14,790 of the English Defence League. 86 00:05:14,790 --> 00:05:17,750 People of Britain, to come and fight for your country! 87 00:05:17,750 --> 00:05:22,250 The Daily Star seemed to be openly courting the English Defence League. 88 00:05:22,250 --> 00:05:23,660 They were writing quite positive articles about them. 89 00:05:24,730 --> 00:05:29,000 All the sort of terminology that had always existed around them. 90 00:05:29,000 --> 00:05:31,300 Right-wing thugs, extremists, 91 00:05:31,300 --> 00:05:35,140 was directly told to be removed. 92 00:05:35,140 --> 00:05:37,390 We were just to refer to them as the EDL, 93 00:05:37,390 --> 00:05:41,800 as if you were talking about the Lib Dems or the Tories. 94 00:05:41,800 --> 00:05:45,224 And to me, that was a real wake-up call. 95 00:05:46,580 --> 00:05:49,208 Richard Peppiatt's was a personal crisis. 96 00:05:50,470 --> 00:05:54,920 But in 2004, the BBC was plunged into a corporate crisis 97 00:05:54,920 --> 00:05:56,280 over its journalism. 98 00:05:56,280 --> 00:06:00,260 Until the BBC acknowledge that is a lie I will keep banging on 99 00:06:00,260 --> 00:06:04,200 and they better issue an apology pretty quick. 100 00:06:04,200 --> 00:06:05,980 It was condemned by the Hutton report into the death 101 00:06:05,980 --> 00:06:07,810 of Dr David Kelly. 102 00:06:07,810 --> 00:06:10,580 On the eve of a crucial governors' meeting, 103 00:06:10,580 --> 00:06:16,580 its Director General, Greg Dyke, believed he'd survive the furore. 104 00:06:16,580 --> 00:06:18,780 I never had any intention of resigning. 105 00:06:18,780 --> 00:06:19,810 I didn't think it would be necessary. 106 00:06:19,810 --> 00:06:22,390 There was a deal done the night before 107 00:06:22,390 --> 00:06:26,420 and Gavin Davis, the Chairman, said he was going to go. 108 00:06:26,420 --> 00:06:29,000 I talked to Pauline Neville-Jones, 109 00:06:29,000 --> 00:06:31,630 who's one of the other governors, and said, 110 00:06:31,630 --> 00:06:35,980 "Well, does it help if I offer to resign?" And she said, "Yeah. 111 00:06:35,980 --> 00:06:37,020 We couldn't let both of you go." 112 00:06:37,020 --> 00:06:39,740 "Gavin's going to go anyway. 113 00:06:39,740 --> 00:06:42,174 "Why don't you offer to resign and we'll keep you?" 114 00:06:44,000 --> 00:06:47,800 The governors denied there was any deal with Dyke. 115 00:06:47,800 --> 00:06:52,530 Director General was a job he never expected to get in the first place. 116 00:06:52,530 --> 00:06:54,780 I'm not sure the BBC and I are made for each other, really. 117 00:06:54,780 --> 00:06:56,890 You know, there's one or two interesting jobs at the BBC, 118 00:06:56,890 --> 00:06:58,200 but I'm not sure they'd offer them to me. 119 00:06:58,200 --> 00:06:59,240 Like DG? 120 00:06:59,240 --> 00:07:02,100 Well, I think Saddam Hussein has more chance of being offered 121 00:07:02,100 --> 00:07:03,740 it than I have, really. 122 00:07:03,740 --> 00:07:09,030 Dyke would have to decide whether to fight for his dream job. 123 00:07:14,750 --> 00:07:18,270 Today, British gays and lesbians who choose to serve in the ranks are 124 00:07:18,270 --> 00:07:22,115 constantly defending a second front - to keep their sexuality secret. 125 00:07:24,690 --> 00:07:29,280 I was forced to lie, to myself and to other people, on a daily basis. 126 00:07:29,280 --> 00:07:35,050 The crisis for military policewoman Caroline Meagher was intensely private. 127 00:07:35,050 --> 00:07:39,220 In the 1980s, she had to investigate gay and lesbian soldiers, 128 00:07:39,220 --> 00:07:42,360 who were banned from serving in the armed forces. 129 00:07:42,360 --> 00:07:45,550 She was told to be suspicious of sporty women with short hair, 130 00:07:45,550 --> 00:07:48,970 and men who walked funny and spent too long in front of the mirror. 131 00:07:48,970 --> 00:07:51,500 I could see, sometimes, 132 00:07:51,500 --> 00:07:55,070 the women looking at me with a question in their eyes 133 00:07:55,070 --> 00:07:59,710 and I would see that question and feel ashamed. 134 00:07:59,710 --> 00:08:02,330 Ashamed, I have to say. 135 00:08:02,330 --> 00:08:05,990 It's because Caroline is a lesbian herself. 136 00:08:05,990 --> 00:08:07,210 I just felt such a raging 137 00:08:07,210 --> 00:08:13,210 and overwhelming sense of helplessness, impotence, rage at 138 00:08:13,210 --> 00:08:18,830 the unfairness of it, the injustice, rage at being involved myself. 139 00:08:18,830 --> 00:08:24,974 Having to be a hypocrite. It just felt monumental. 140 00:08:30,130 --> 00:08:32,052 I just think it's ridiculous, what they're claiming for. 141 00:08:35,150 --> 00:08:37,300 It just seems a very unfair way of spending taxpayers' money, really. 142 00:08:37,300 --> 00:08:42,930 In 2009, Parliament was engulfed in a scandal over MPs' expenses. 143 00:08:42,930 --> 00:08:44,192 It seems to be just taking the mick, really. 144 00:08:46,210 --> 00:08:49,630 One incident was about to bring Home Secretary Jacqui Smith's 145 00:08:49,630 --> 00:08:52,120 crisis to a head. 146 00:08:52,120 --> 00:08:54,270 My advisor rang me up and said there's going to be a story in 147 00:08:54,270 --> 00:08:59,660 the Sunday Express about you having claimed porn films on your expenses. 148 00:08:59,660 --> 00:09:03,130 Smith was on her way to a constituency meeting. 149 00:09:03,130 --> 00:09:06,270 She asked her husband, Richard, if he knew what had happened. 150 00:09:06,270 --> 00:09:11,010 We worked out that a receipt for broadband had included on it 151 00:09:11,010 --> 00:09:12,830 Pay Per View films. 152 00:09:12,830 --> 00:09:14,710 And two of them had been porn films. 153 00:09:14,710 --> 00:09:18,410 Richard accepted they were ones he'd watched when I hadn't been there. 154 00:09:18,410 --> 00:09:23,660 I stepped out of the car and said to him, "I'm going to have to resign." 155 00:09:23,660 --> 00:09:27,180 I'm really sorry for any embarrassment I have caused Jacqui. 156 00:09:27,180 --> 00:09:28,160 Quite obviously, 157 00:09:28,160 --> 00:09:31,870 a claim should never have been made for these films. 158 00:09:31,870 --> 00:09:33,792 An apology won't be enough. 159 00:09:36,790 --> 00:09:39,550 When I saw it, I was appalled. 160 00:09:39,550 --> 00:09:42,371 I was really shocked at what we were being asked to do. 161 00:09:43,490 --> 00:09:48,462 Early 2003 at GCHQ, the Government communications headquarters. 162 00:09:50,380 --> 00:09:53,430 Katharine Gun had a crisis of conscience. 163 00:09:53,430 --> 00:09:57,130 She'd received an e-mail from the US government asking staff 164 00:09:57,130 --> 00:10:00,410 to bug UN Security Council delegates. 165 00:10:00,410 --> 00:10:05,150 It was to gather information, which they could use to persuade 166 00:10:05,150 --> 00:10:10,630 them or blackmail them or bribe them into voting for a resolution 167 00:10:10,630 --> 00:10:15,270 that would authorise an invasion of Iraq. 168 00:10:15,270 --> 00:10:18,569 I felt that e-mail required action. 169 00:10:19,920 --> 00:10:21,930 So the crisis can take many forms, 170 00:10:21,930 --> 00:10:27,095 but it always points towards making that decision. 171 00:10:35,810 --> 00:10:39,180 Mr Heath's future. Should he go? 172 00:10:39,180 --> 00:10:44,340 The decision to resign is usually made in the worst of circumstances. 173 00:10:44,340 --> 00:10:47,060 When pressure is at its most intense. 174 00:10:47,060 --> 00:10:49,590 He's hopeless. He ain't with the times. 175 00:10:49,590 --> 00:10:52,960 He's pompous - I know best, leave everything to me. 176 00:10:52,960 --> 00:10:56,850 Prime Minister Ted Heath was under huge pressure 177 00:10:56,850 --> 00:10:59,670 after fighting an inconclusive election in February 1974. 178 00:10:59,670 --> 00:11:04,357 We only see politicians on the goggle box. He hasn't got the flair. 179 00:11:06,040 --> 00:11:08,907 Ted Heath resigned within days. 180 00:11:11,900 --> 00:11:17,150 Jacqui Smith was under pressure after the expenses revelations. 181 00:11:17,150 --> 00:11:18,930 The Home Secretary is to face a parliamentary investigation... 182 00:11:18,930 --> 00:11:23,860 Jacqui Smith returning to the shared London house... 183 00:11:23,860 --> 00:11:28,030 I'd wake up after only a few hours and just fret about everything. 184 00:11:28,030 --> 00:11:30,140 What I was doing to everybody else, 185 00:11:30,140 --> 00:11:32,860 and what it meant to my family and those that cared about me 186 00:11:32,860 --> 00:11:38,010 and how I'd get on and if I could do it at all. 187 00:11:38,010 --> 00:11:40,786 All of those things swilling around in your mind. 188 00:11:42,280 --> 00:11:49,680 You feel such stress and I'm not an easily-stressed person, 189 00:11:49,680 --> 00:11:53,430 I'm not an easily depressed person but it begins 190 00:11:53,430 --> 00:11:58,830 to wear you down when you have to be forever putting a brave face on it. 191 00:11:58,830 --> 00:12:03,381 The pressure helped make up Jacqui Smith's mind. 192 00:12:05,486 --> 00:12:08,066 I said to the governors, who also discussed 193 00:12:08,066 --> 00:12:11,716 whether they should go, I do need your confidence. 194 00:12:11,716 --> 00:12:15,800 An hour or so later I discovered they'd decided to suggest I leave. 195 00:12:15,800 --> 00:12:18,710 Greg Dyke's gamble backfired. 196 00:12:18,710 --> 00:12:22,134 The BBC's Governors accepted his offer of resignation. 197 00:12:23,490 --> 00:12:30,290 I got home on my own. I didn't get in until two o'clock in the morning. 198 00:12:30,290 --> 00:12:32,860 Now he had to decide whether to stand by the offer to resign 199 00:12:32,860 --> 00:12:36,190 he never wanted to be taken seriously in the first place. 200 00:12:36,190 --> 00:12:41,218 I remember I didn't sleep much. And I suppose I decided then I'd go. 201 00:12:43,220 --> 00:12:46,550 That if you've lost the support of the board, you can't really stay. 202 00:12:46,550 --> 00:12:48,940 It's not worth it, too much aggro. 203 00:12:48,940 --> 00:12:54,100 At six o'clock, now it's the BBC's Director-General who goes. 204 00:12:54,100 --> 00:12:56,910 Greg Dyke resigns after the Hutton Report, 205 00:12:56,910 --> 00:12:59,300 he wants the BBC's future protected. 206 00:12:59,300 --> 00:13:03,990 With the departure of Gavin and myself 207 00:13:03,990 --> 00:13:06,190 and the apology I issued on behalf of the BBC yesterday, 208 00:13:06,190 --> 00:13:10,830 I hope a line can now be drawn under this whole episode. 209 00:13:10,830 --> 00:13:13,790 I was sacked by a bunch of gutless governors. 210 00:13:13,790 --> 00:13:15,620 I think they lost their nerve. 211 00:13:15,620 --> 00:13:18,240 I couldn't quite work out what they'd apologised for. 212 00:13:18,240 --> 00:13:23,160 They believed, because of my relationship with the Government, 213 00:13:23,160 --> 00:13:24,800 that if I stayed on as Director-General, I wouldn't 214 00:13:24,800 --> 00:13:28,850 be able to negotiate a decent Charter renewal. 215 00:13:30,430 --> 00:13:33,380 My argument to that is that wasn't their job that day. 216 00:13:33,380 --> 00:13:38,260 Their job was to defend the journalistic integrity of the BBC. 217 00:13:38,260 --> 00:13:43,650 Be fair, but don't let anyone pressurise you. 218 00:13:43,650 --> 00:13:48,100 What do we want? Return the Dyke! When do we want it? Now! 219 00:13:48,100 --> 00:13:52,230 Greg Dyke's own staff tried to get his decision reversed. 220 00:13:52,230 --> 00:13:55,410 I don't want to go but if you screw up, you have to go. 221 00:13:55,410 --> 00:14:00,810 Dyke would go on to regret his decision. 222 00:14:00,810 --> 00:14:06,520 At Bristol Royal Infirmary, the pressure on Stephen Bolsin 223 00:14:06,520 --> 00:14:07,270 was mounting. 224 00:14:07,270 --> 00:14:10,700 He was given a warning by the hospital. 225 00:14:10,700 --> 00:14:15,520 If I continued to raise concerns then my career in Bristol 226 00:14:15,520 --> 00:14:16,930 would be threatened. 227 00:14:16,930 --> 00:14:18,950 And that was a very serious threat. 228 00:14:18,950 --> 00:14:23,960 The stress lead me to become depressed in my job because I 229 00:14:23,960 --> 00:14:29,450 couldn't impact the continuing and incessant deaths of these children. 230 00:14:29,450 --> 00:14:35,350 I think it lead to tensions between Maggie, my wife and myself because 231 00:14:35,350 --> 00:14:40,287 she was saying you've grown into someone who isn't the man I married. 232 00:14:41,310 --> 00:14:44,689 Have you declared war on the BBC? Go away! 233 00:14:47,870 --> 00:14:52,650 Despite being cleared by the Hutton Inquiry, Alastair Campbell was 234 00:14:52,650 --> 00:14:56,070 also feeling the pressure to resign, but closer to home. 235 00:14:56,070 --> 00:15:00,480 I was doing a job that Fiona, my partner, had not wanted me to do 236 00:15:00,480 --> 00:15:02,820 in the first place, doing it in a situation where 237 00:15:02,820 --> 00:15:06,950 the major issue was Iraq and the policy that she totally opposed. 238 00:15:06,950 --> 00:15:09,810 You spend all day defending the policy. 239 00:15:09,810 --> 00:15:10,840 You go home and you thought, 240 00:15:10,840 --> 00:15:13,000 "Oh, God, I've got to have the bloody argument again!" 241 00:15:13,000 --> 00:15:18,810 Campbell wanted to resign, but Tony Blair asked him to stay on. 242 00:15:18,810 --> 00:15:23,780 The pressure began to build. Towards the end it, got very, very difficult. 243 00:15:23,780 --> 00:15:27,430 You know, but I was definitely reaching a point where I thought, 244 00:15:27,430 --> 00:15:29,680 "If I'm not careful, I push this too far, 245 00:15:29,680 --> 00:15:34,890 "push it much further, you know, I end up without a family." 246 00:15:34,890 --> 00:15:40,320 The only time I nearly lost it was when we had demonstrations 247 00:15:40,320 --> 00:15:45,480 outside the house and I remember once my daughter, who was about nine, 248 00:15:45,480 --> 00:15:48,570 coming back from school with friends and people giving her 249 00:15:48,570 --> 00:15:55,890 pictures of kids who had been gassed by Saddam at Halabja and saying, 250 00:15:55,890 --> 00:15:58,750 "Can you ask your dad why he is doing this?" 251 00:15:58,750 --> 00:16:08,170 Now, that was the only time when I sort of thought I might just go out and lamp somebody, but I didn't. 252 00:16:08,170 --> 00:16:09,900 That would have been a resignation issue? 253 00:16:09,900 --> 00:16:13,940 It might have been, it might not have been. John Prescott got away with it! 254 00:16:13,940 --> 00:16:15,862 HE LAUGHS 255 00:16:18,620 --> 00:16:22,330 At GCHQ, Katharine Gun agonised over the secret e-mail 256 00:16:22,330 --> 00:16:25,330 and eventually passed it to a journalist. 257 00:16:25,330 --> 00:16:29,830 On a visit to her newsagent's, she was shocked. 258 00:16:29,830 --> 00:16:35,080 There it was, splashed across the front pages, "Dirty tricks." 259 00:16:35,080 --> 00:16:39,300 Well, I was just trembling as soon as I picked it up, I was trembling. 260 00:16:39,300 --> 00:16:45,810 It was only as an investigation was launched that Katharine realised she couldn't stay in her job. 261 00:16:45,810 --> 00:16:52,190 By the Wednesday, I just couldn't keep it in any longer and I felt 262 00:16:52,190 --> 00:16:58,470 I couldn't lead a duplicitous existence and I told my line manager. 263 00:16:58,470 --> 00:17:02,310 I was very innocent, I suppose, perhaps I should have made it 264 00:17:02,310 --> 00:17:09,810 a really loud, personal, in-your-face kind of announcement. 265 00:17:09,810 --> 00:17:12,165 I don't know. I really don't. 266 00:17:15,440 --> 00:17:19,520 Would it have been that expensive in hardware and money to have 267 00:17:19,520 --> 00:17:21,440 sent a couple of frigates and a submarine? 268 00:17:21,440 --> 00:17:25,660 Well, you don't really want to take that action 269 00:17:25,660 --> 00:17:29,780 unless you feel that it is a real possibility that something serious will happen. 270 00:17:29,780 --> 00:17:34,285 Now, as it turned out, we were wrong in that sense. It did happen. 271 00:17:35,740 --> 00:17:38,310 Richard Luce was under fire from all sides. 272 00:17:38,310 --> 00:17:45,060 But on the day the Argentines invaded, his mother rang with a brilliant solution. 273 00:17:45,060 --> 00:17:48,630 She called about ten times, so I took the call and she said, 274 00:17:48,630 --> 00:17:50,740 "Darling, I have got the answer for you." 275 00:17:50,740 --> 00:17:52,380 I said, "Well, what's that?" 276 00:17:52,380 --> 00:17:55,380 She said, "Arrange a football match between Argentina 277 00:17:55,380 --> 00:17:57,390 "and Britain and that will end the war." 278 00:17:57,390 --> 00:17:59,881 "It's a bit late, there's been an invasion!" 279 00:18:04,050 --> 00:18:08,780 Voters can exert their own pressure on politicians who they want to go. 280 00:18:08,780 --> 00:18:13,420 Health Minister Edwina Currie was forced to resign in 1988, 281 00:18:13,420 --> 00:18:19,330 over the salmonella in eggs crisis. Some of her constituents were her greatest critics. 282 00:18:19,330 --> 00:18:22,330 I think she's done the right thing. By resigning? Yes. 283 00:18:22,330 --> 00:18:26,080 Great. Why? Why? Because we don't like her round here. 284 00:18:26,080 --> 00:18:28,890 She just opens her mouth too much, doesn't she? 285 00:18:31,940 --> 00:18:36,530 Sometimes the pressure to go can come from an outsider, with an axe to grind. 286 00:18:36,530 --> 00:18:41,080 Jeffrey Archer was forced to resign as Mayor of London candidate 287 00:18:41,080 --> 00:18:44,320 by a man who didn't want Archer in a position of power. 288 00:18:44,320 --> 00:18:47,780 How much are you earning? Never mind. That's my business. 289 00:18:47,780 --> 00:18:51,440 That's your business. The publicist, Max Clifford. 290 00:18:51,440 --> 00:18:56,320 He made sure a client's revelations about Archer committing perjury 291 00:18:56,320 --> 00:18:59,930 in a libel trial forced Archer's resignation. 292 00:18:59,930 --> 00:19:04,660 The main concern I had was you don't want Jeffrey Archer in a position of power. 293 00:19:04,660 --> 00:19:07,140 Today, in the centre of the media circus, 294 00:19:07,140 --> 00:19:08,880 the man who lied for Lord Archer. 295 00:19:08,880 --> 00:19:14,550 Clifford took to the airwaves with his client, Ted Francis, to get the desired result. 296 00:19:14,550 --> 00:19:19,430 I disapproved of the idea of Jeffrey Archer becoming Mayor of London. I'm sure you feel the same. 297 00:19:19,430 --> 00:19:23,740 Ted Francis was a guy that gave Jeffrey Archer his alibi. 298 00:19:23,740 --> 00:19:26,880 So he came to me and the rest was history, 299 00:19:26,880 --> 00:19:30,580 but I got the result I wanted inasmuch as Jeffrey Archer 300 00:19:30,580 --> 00:19:34,152 wasn't going to be Mayor of London because of the scandal. 301 00:19:36,070 --> 00:19:41,690 So pressure can come from many directions and it is difficult to resist. 302 00:19:46,570 --> 00:19:50,790 Any minister must have the full confidence of his colleagues. 303 00:19:50,790 --> 00:19:56,080 I therefore asked to see the Prime Minister to tender my resignation. 304 00:19:56,080 --> 00:20:02,460 Honourable resignations are sometimes seen as an old-fashioned way of carrying the can. 305 00:20:02,460 --> 00:20:06,440 Leon Brittan is believed to have resigned as Trade and Industry Secretary 306 00:20:06,440 --> 00:20:10,430 to save Mrs Thatcher's skin over the leaking of a letter. 307 00:20:10,430 --> 00:20:14,080 I suppose he has to resign, but one can't help wondering 308 00:20:14,080 --> 00:20:16,430 if he isn't the scapegoat of the Prime Minister? 309 00:20:16,430 --> 00:20:20,230 Mrs Thatcher served for another four years. 310 00:20:26,600 --> 00:20:31,100 Few honourable resignations are as simple as they seem on the surface. 311 00:20:31,100 --> 00:20:33,300 To the South Atlantic. 312 00:20:33,300 --> 00:20:36,633 Quick... march! 313 00:20:38,090 --> 00:20:43,200 One of the most celebrated was over the Falklands crisis in 1982. 314 00:20:43,200 --> 00:20:46,200 Immediately after the Argentine invasion, 315 00:20:46,200 --> 00:20:50,410 Richard Luce sought out his boss, Lord Carrington. 316 00:20:50,410 --> 00:20:54,070 Before I spoke, he saw my face and said, "You're not going to resign." 317 00:20:54,070 --> 00:20:58,710 So I told him the reasons and he said, "No, now hang on. 318 00:20:58,710 --> 00:21:01,290 "I'm the Foreign Secretary, I carry the can. 319 00:21:01,290 --> 00:21:07,570 "You're my Minister of State. It is our duty to stay at our post." 320 00:21:07,570 --> 00:21:12,680 It took a pounding from Parliament and, perhaps crucially, the Press 321 00:21:12,680 --> 00:21:15,310 to finally make up Carrington's mind. 322 00:21:15,310 --> 00:21:19,430 I think time led him to pause and reflect and he had been told 323 00:21:19,430 --> 00:21:23,510 there would be a very nasty editorial in The Times on Monday, 324 00:21:23,510 --> 00:21:26,790 not that an editorial of a newspaper should dictate what we do. 325 00:21:26,790 --> 00:21:31,620 It did on the Monday morning talk about ministers of the Foreign Office 326 00:21:31,620 --> 00:21:35,090 being traitors, virtually being traitors to their country. 327 00:21:35,090 --> 00:21:41,370 I think that, apart from being deeply wounding, was something of a catalyst 328 00:21:41,370 --> 00:21:46,083 for him to say, "Well perhaps the Prime Minister needs a new Foreign Minister." 329 00:21:46,083 --> 00:21:49,043 But Margaret Thatcher intervened. 330 00:21:49,043 --> 00:21:52,553 She said, "I hear you're thinking of resigning, I order you not to." 331 00:21:52,553 --> 00:21:58,043 And I said to her, "Prime Minister, to me it is a matter of honour." 332 00:21:58,043 --> 00:22:01,793 And there was a surprising silence coming from Lady Thatcher 333 00:22:01,793 --> 00:22:04,043 and she said, "I can't quarrel with honour." 334 00:22:04,043 --> 00:22:10,553 It was a blow, but in a way, it's never a blow for politics 335 00:22:10,553 --> 00:22:14,443 if you have someone doing what he deems to be the honourable thing. 336 00:22:14,443 --> 00:22:18,103 We have seen a very great national humiliation. 337 00:22:18,103 --> 00:22:21,853 I felt myself, like Lord Carrington, that it would be right 338 00:22:21,853 --> 00:22:28,043 for the Prime Minister to have the chance to have new ministers at her disposal. 339 00:22:28,043 --> 00:22:31,043 So the Press and Parliament and a Prime Minister's belief 340 00:22:31,043 --> 00:22:34,843 in honour helped an honourable resignation get back on track. 341 00:22:37,093 --> 00:22:41,453 But doing the honourable thing isn't always so easy. 342 00:22:41,453 --> 00:22:43,553 The MPs' rule book is quite clear - 343 00:22:43,553 --> 00:22:47,073 your main home is where you spend more nights than any other. 344 00:22:47,073 --> 00:22:49,553 Jacqui Smith insists she spends most of her time 345 00:22:49,553 --> 00:22:53,273 at this southeast London house behind me, belonging to her sister. 346 00:22:55,413 --> 00:23:01,933 Home Secretary Jacqui Smith was pilloried for clinging to office after the expenses revelations. 347 00:23:01,933 --> 00:23:07,183 In fact, she wanted to go, but the decision wasn't hers alone. 348 00:23:07,183 --> 00:23:12,903 It was the Friday before the G20 and my adviser said to me, 349 00:23:12,903 --> 00:23:16,133 I think he's right, "The last thing the Prime Minister wants 350 00:23:16,133 --> 00:23:19,323 "to happen this weekend is for the Home Secretary to resign." 351 00:23:19,323 --> 00:23:24,343 Smith waited a few days and met the Prime Minister, Gordon Brown. 352 00:23:24,343 --> 00:23:28,043 He said to me, "If you resign about this, you know, you'll always 353 00:23:28,043 --> 00:23:31,133 "be remembered as resigning because of expenses." 354 00:23:31,133 --> 00:23:34,133 And I said, "Well, I know that to a certain extent, 355 00:23:34,133 --> 00:23:36,533 "but I can't do the job that you asked me to do." 356 00:23:36,533 --> 00:23:41,593 Eventually, he realised that I had made up my mind 357 00:23:41,593 --> 00:23:42,813 and I was going to go 358 00:23:42,813 --> 00:23:47,923 and then he persuaded me not to go until the reshuffle. 359 00:23:47,923 --> 00:23:51,343 I didn't feel like crying. I felt a big relief. 360 00:23:51,343 --> 00:23:56,263 I felt a big weight lifted from me. 361 00:23:56,263 --> 00:24:03,623 The interests of a Prime Minister derailed an honourable resignation, not a desperation to stay on. 362 00:24:03,623 --> 00:24:07,844 Honour and political interest are often uneasy bedfellows. 363 00:24:12,903 --> 00:24:16,143 Resignations are a product of their times. 364 00:24:16,143 --> 00:24:19,513 The issue, the crisis, can be seen as a barometer 365 00:24:19,513 --> 00:24:23,503 of what society deems to be acceptable behaviour. 366 00:24:23,503 --> 00:24:26,873 Marriage prospects are good. The proportion would be much higher 367 00:24:26,873 --> 00:24:31,003 except for the regulation requiring all pregnant service women to resign. 368 00:24:33,903 --> 00:24:36,763 It was only in the last decade of the 20th century that the MoD 369 00:24:36,763 --> 00:24:40,473 stopped discriminating against women. 370 00:24:40,473 --> 00:24:44,973 But homosexuality, that was another matter. 371 00:24:44,973 --> 00:24:48,623 I think most red-blooded males, and I count myself among them, 372 00:24:48,623 --> 00:24:53,033 are repelled by the physical genital activities of these people. 373 00:24:53,033 --> 00:24:56,503 Faced with a new posting to Northern Ireland, 374 00:24:56,503 --> 00:25:00,623 and the task of carrying out more investigations of gays in the Army, 375 00:25:00,623 --> 00:25:03,253 Caroline Meagher handed in her resignation. 376 00:25:03,253 --> 00:25:07,513 I felt a relief, I suppose it had been at the back of my mind for ages 377 00:25:07,513 --> 00:25:10,613 and I actually felt quite liberated. I felt very hopeful. 378 00:25:10,613 --> 00:25:13,423 But before she could work out her notice, 379 00:25:13,423 --> 00:25:19,753 the Military Police arrived to investigate her own private life. 380 00:25:19,753 --> 00:25:24,253 They were very sarcastic and delighted in saying, "It's you that we've come for." 381 00:25:24,253 --> 00:25:28,283 And they went more or less straightaway to a photo 382 00:25:28,283 --> 00:25:33,623 and removing the back of the photo, removed letters. 383 00:25:33,623 --> 00:25:37,233 There was a stuffed toy there and they unzipped the toy 384 00:25:37,233 --> 00:25:43,893 and reached in, and lo and behold, there was another cache of letters appeared and I knew then, 385 00:25:43,893 --> 00:25:50,453 just my heart fell and I thought they have certainly planted evidence here. 386 00:25:50,453 --> 00:25:53,643 Some of the letters I had not received. 387 00:25:53,643 --> 00:25:56,733 So they had been intercepted. 388 00:25:56,733 --> 00:26:03,623 It is just not in the military where gays and lesbians felt hounded. 389 00:26:03,623 --> 00:26:08,873 A 37-year-old computer programmer died after collapsing on the floor 390 00:26:08,873 --> 00:26:13,193 of a gay disco called Heaven. He contracted AIDS. 391 00:26:13,193 --> 00:26:17,173 The AIDS virus provoked widespread fear. 392 00:26:17,173 --> 00:26:18,913 Merely to be gay can cost your job. 393 00:26:18,913 --> 00:26:23,643 Even a bishop said he found it difficult to shake hands with an AIDS sufferer. 394 00:26:23,643 --> 00:26:28,753 I think three parts of them want burning and I do mean that. They want burning. 395 00:26:28,753 --> 00:26:33,633 Like thousands of others, Jonathan Grimshaw knew there was little effective treatment, 396 00:26:33,633 --> 00:26:36,913 a terrible prognosis, and a lot of prejudice. 397 00:26:36,913 --> 00:26:42,633 It's a terrifying prospect. If I was to be living at home, 398 00:26:42,633 --> 00:26:45,163 I know that my flatmate could not cope. 399 00:26:45,163 --> 00:26:46,753 I'm not sure that services 400 00:26:46,753 --> 00:26:49,993 would be available from the local authority to look after me. 401 00:26:49,993 --> 00:26:52,523 So, I mean, I don't know what's going to happen. 402 00:26:52,523 --> 00:26:58,103 To be told something like that is just utterly devastating, 403 00:26:58,103 --> 00:27:02,923 because it meant that it was a death sentence, really. 404 00:27:02,923 --> 00:27:07,663 Friends of mine were being hounded out of their jobs. 405 00:27:07,663 --> 00:27:11,923 Beset on all sides by this moral panic and believing he had little time left, 406 00:27:11,923 --> 00:27:15,773 Jonathan decided to resign from his job in TV. 407 00:27:15,773 --> 00:27:20,273 If you're told that you have a terminal illness, 408 00:27:20,273 --> 00:27:23,783 you find that people have a sort of surge of energy and they think, 409 00:27:23,783 --> 00:27:26,413 "I don't want to kind of die insignificantly". 410 00:27:26,413 --> 00:27:28,893 But I was so angry, 411 00:27:28,893 --> 00:27:31,993 and so fired up, 412 00:27:31,993 --> 00:27:35,273 and so determined to achieve 413 00:27:35,273 --> 00:27:38,783 everything I wanted to achieve in, I don't know how many years I had, 414 00:27:38,783 --> 00:27:45,633 two years, three years, four years, that I absolutely threw myself into, 415 00:27:45,633 --> 00:27:50,133 you know, really sort of committed campaigning work. 416 00:27:50,133 --> 00:27:56,504 Resignation led Jonathan to co-found Body Positive - a support group for HIV sufferers. 417 00:28:00,253 --> 00:28:04,753 Sex has been at the heart of many political resignations. 418 00:28:04,753 --> 00:28:08,643 War Secretary Jack Profumo's resignation in 1963, 419 00:28:08,643 --> 00:28:15,543 followed his dalliance with a call girl who also slept with a Soviet naval attache. 420 00:28:15,543 --> 00:28:21,113 Ten years later, Defence Minister Lord Lambton was also caught with a prostitute. 421 00:28:21,113 --> 00:28:26,413 Why should a man of your social position and charm and personality have to go to whores for sex? 422 00:28:26,413 --> 00:28:29,183 I think that people sometimes like variety. 423 00:28:29,183 --> 00:28:34,109 I think it's as simple as that and I think this impulse is probably understood by almost everybody. 424 00:28:38,413 --> 00:28:40,243 Don't you? 425 00:28:40,243 --> 00:28:45,543 I think a great many people may understand it, Lord Lambton, I think that is so. 426 00:28:45,543 --> 00:28:48,493 If the call girl had said to me, 427 00:28:48,493 --> 00:28:51,913 "Please, suddenly, darling, tell me about the laser ray," 428 00:28:51,913 --> 00:28:59,983 or something or, "What do you think of the new Rolls-Royce engine for the MRCA?" 429 00:28:59,983 --> 00:29:05,233 I would have known that something was up. 430 00:29:05,233 --> 00:29:08,893 Despite his protestations, Lambton resigned. 431 00:29:08,893 --> 00:29:15,363 Mr Parkinson left his London home this morning, firmly declining to add to his statement. 432 00:29:15,363 --> 00:29:19,583 I will not, at any stage, say any more. 433 00:29:19,583 --> 00:29:25,013 Misdemeanours didn't have to involve paying for sex to provoke the end of ministerial life. 434 00:29:25,013 --> 00:29:26,893 Affairs could be fatal too. 435 00:29:26,893 --> 00:29:29,233 Will it affect your political future? 436 00:29:29,233 --> 00:29:32,513 I have no further comment. I have no idea. 437 00:29:32,513 --> 00:29:35,803 Cecil Parkinson resigned as Trade and Industry Secretary 438 00:29:35,803 --> 00:29:41,753 in 1983 after revelations about an affair and a pregnancy. 439 00:29:41,753 --> 00:29:45,873 A decade later, affairs and perhaps more crucially, 440 00:29:45,873 --> 00:29:49,813 the hypocrisy they uncovered, was still an issue. 441 00:29:49,813 --> 00:29:54,123 The only thing I want to say is how grateful I am for the support 442 00:29:54,123 --> 00:29:57,783 and encouragement and how sad I am to leave the Government today. 443 00:29:57,783 --> 00:30:04,343 Environment Minister, Tim Yeo, fell foul of the Tories' Back to Basics policy. 444 00:30:04,343 --> 00:30:10,343 His extra-martial affair and resulting child led once again to resignation. 445 00:30:10,343 --> 00:30:14,283 But by 1997, things were changing. 446 00:30:14,283 --> 00:30:17,843 I can confirm that I'm leaving my wife. I want to make it clear 447 00:30:17,843 --> 00:30:20,893 that the responsibility for this is entirely mine. 448 00:30:20,893 --> 00:30:24,133 A newspaper discovered that Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, 449 00:30:24,133 --> 00:30:28,163 was having an affair with a member of his staff. 450 00:30:28,163 --> 00:30:31,493 This idea that I phoned him up and said you know, 451 00:30:31,493 --> 00:30:35,003 "Wife or mistress, you decide." It wasn't like that at all. 452 00:30:35,003 --> 00:30:39,833 I had almost this coded conversation where I was able to be clear to Robin, 453 00:30:39,833 --> 00:30:42,643 but he was not being terribly clear back. 454 00:30:42,643 --> 00:30:47,523 That's because Cook's wife, Margaret, was within earshot. 455 00:30:47,523 --> 00:30:48,923 We got cut off. 456 00:30:48,923 --> 00:30:52,913 He then obviously explained to Margaret what was going on 457 00:30:52,913 --> 00:30:55,353 and when he phoned back I remember him saying, 458 00:30:55,353 --> 00:30:59,663 "Look, you know, we're swimming in a sea of some emotional turbulence here." 459 00:30:59,663 --> 00:31:02,003 And I then said, "Look, I've talked to Tony, 460 00:31:02,003 --> 00:31:07,443 "and he does not see this as a resigning issue per se, 461 00:31:07,443 --> 00:31:11,383 "but, you know, you do need some sort of sense of clarity about this." 462 00:31:11,383 --> 00:31:15,553 And it was he who came back in the morning and said he'd decided to end his marriage. 463 00:31:15,553 --> 00:31:21,083 Clarity meant Cook's marriage, not his career, was over. 464 00:31:21,083 --> 00:31:26,146 Politicians, it seems, have learned to avoid the trap of preaching about family values. 465 00:31:30,083 --> 00:31:33,643 And by the time we reach 21st century Britain, 466 00:31:33,643 --> 00:31:38,193 married men can pay for sex and hang on to their jobs. 467 00:31:38,193 --> 00:31:44,803 Max Mosley led the FIA, the governing body for world motor sport, for 16 years. 468 00:31:44,803 --> 00:31:49,683 A newspaper sting revealed he'd been having sadomasochistic sex with prostitutes. 469 00:31:49,683 --> 00:31:51,933 There were the usual calls for resignation. 470 00:31:51,933 --> 00:31:54,933 You represent over 50 million members. Correct. 471 00:31:54,933 --> 00:32:14,855 You would consider pulling all those out of the FA because of Mr Mosley's actions? 472 00:43:23,737 --> 00:43:28,047 I haven't thought about that for ages. 473 00:43:28,047 --> 00:43:30,537 Yeah, he was in tears. 474 00:43:30,537 --> 00:43:32,220 And he, you know, said... 475 00:43:35,407 --> 00:43:41,597 .. I don't suppose he ever expected to see me on that side of the partition. 476 00:43:41,597 --> 00:43:45,717 Erm... In a way, you know, it is in the situation 477 00:43:45,717 --> 00:43:48,867 when someone else is crying, you end up being the strong one, 478 00:43:48,867 --> 00:43:52,097 so I was not crying and I was saying, "It's going to be all right. 479 00:43:52,097 --> 00:43:54,167 "Everything's going to be all right." 480 00:43:56,077 --> 00:43:59,077 The princess has made the battle against AIDS 481 00:43:59,077 --> 00:44:03,487 and the provision of help for those already suffering, one of her most dedicated causes. 482 00:44:03,487 --> 00:44:09,297 Developments in medication meant an HIV diagnosis was no longer a death sentence. 483 00:44:09,297 --> 00:44:12,867 Jonathan Grimshaw, who resigned expecting he had very few years 484 00:44:12,867 --> 00:44:15,907 left to live, discovered a whole new future. 485 00:44:15,907 --> 00:44:21,207 But like many who abandon good careers, he paid a price. 486 00:44:21,207 --> 00:44:23,737 Most of us at that time were pretty young. 487 00:44:23,737 --> 00:44:28,847 We hadn't had time in our jobs to build up a big pension pot 488 00:44:28,847 --> 00:44:32,737 and when I look at my peers, people the same age, 489 00:44:32,737 --> 00:44:35,877 the same sort of education as I had, 490 00:44:35,877 --> 00:44:38,737 and a lot of them are doing great. 491 00:44:38,737 --> 00:44:41,737 Very good salaries and... 492 00:44:41,737 --> 00:44:48,157 You know, I do feel... I do feel sort of cheated out of a life 493 00:44:48,157 --> 00:44:51,397 because of HIV, but you know, 494 00:44:51,397 --> 00:44:56,323 I mean strictly speaking, you know, I shouldn't be here. 495 00:45:06,587 --> 00:45:12,307 The cost of not being able to resign on her own terms was serious for Caroline Meagher. 496 00:45:12,307 --> 00:45:16,337 Instead of accepting my resignation, 497 00:45:16,337 --> 00:45:21,537 I was subjected to humiliating interviews 498 00:45:21,537 --> 00:45:25,147 where I was followed to the bathroom and watched 499 00:45:25,147 --> 00:45:30,677 whilst I went to the toilet, invasive bullying questions. 500 00:45:30,677 --> 00:45:34,617 I lost all of my so-called friends. 501 00:45:34,617 --> 00:45:40,533 In the last five years, 260 homosexual men and women have been discharged. 502 00:45:41,737 --> 00:45:46,237 Caroline was herself discharged from the Army for unnatural conduct, 503 00:45:46,237 --> 00:45:48,347 contrary to military discipline. 504 00:45:48,347 --> 00:45:54,117 She was convicted of fraud for claiming travel expenses to visit her girlfriend. 505 00:45:54,117 --> 00:45:58,527 I felt cheated out of my resignation that I wasn't being allowed to 506 00:45:58,527 --> 00:46:05,837 just mark time quietly and leave with some shred of dignity 507 00:46:05,837 --> 00:46:07,757 and some pride in my career. 508 00:46:07,757 --> 00:46:12,307 Had I resigned I would have, in all probability, joined the police. 509 00:46:12,307 --> 00:46:15,167 I would probably have two big fat pensions 510 00:46:15,167 --> 00:46:17,837 and probably a very different standard of living. 511 00:46:17,837 --> 00:46:22,427 I was left with virtually nothing. I was unemployed for a long while. 512 00:46:22,427 --> 00:46:25,057 I was struggling on every level 513 00:46:25,057 --> 00:46:29,517 and I feel, in a way, that that taught me an awful lot about myself. 514 00:46:30,497 --> 00:46:36,447 In 2000, the ban on homosexuals in the military was finally lifted. 515 00:46:36,447 --> 00:46:39,644 It came a decade too late for Caroline. 516 00:46:41,507 --> 00:46:46,287 Not everyone paid a financial price. 517 00:46:46,287 --> 00:46:50,227 Greg Dyke's private wealth probably made it easier for him to go. 518 00:46:50,227 --> 00:46:52,857 One of the issues, I made money. It's interesting, 519 00:46:52,857 --> 00:46:55,527 the only two people who left the BBC at that time, 520 00:46:55,527 --> 00:46:59,327 given the numbers that had been involved in Hutton, were myself 521 00:46:59,327 --> 00:47:04,147 and Gavin Davies, who were the only two who didn't have a mortgage. 522 00:47:04,147 --> 00:47:06,637 But whether it is financial or emotional, 523 00:47:06,637 --> 00:47:10,255 resignation always racks up a cost. 524 00:47:15,867 --> 00:47:21,362 I intend to join those tomorrow night who vote against military action. 525 00:47:23,647 --> 00:47:27,967 It is a truism to say all resignations have consequences. 526 00:47:27,967 --> 00:47:32,227 The point is, nobody knows what the consequences will be. 527 00:47:32,227 --> 00:47:34,807 It is for that reason, and that reason alone, 528 00:47:34,807 --> 00:47:38,697 and with a heavy heart, that I resign from the Government. 529 00:47:38,697 --> 00:47:41,367 Hear, hear! 530 00:47:41,367 --> 00:47:46,395 For Robin Cook, it was the surprise of the first standing ovation in the history of the Commons. 531 00:47:50,797 --> 00:47:56,367 For Richard Luce, reaction to his resignation demonstrated a strength of democracy. 532 00:47:56,367 --> 00:48:01,057 I went in rather nervously to Parliament, having resigned, 533 00:48:01,057 --> 00:48:03,077 and wondering what people were feeling, 534 00:48:03,077 --> 00:48:06,727 but members of Parliament from all parties came up privately and said, 535 00:48:06,727 --> 00:48:11,887 "Thank you for doing that and there, but for the grace of God, go I." 536 00:48:11,887 --> 00:48:14,977 I thought that was gratifying and it made me feel 537 00:48:14,977 --> 00:48:18,267 that principled resignation as a matter of honour 538 00:48:18,267 --> 00:48:20,607 is a good thing for our democratic system. 539 00:48:20,607 --> 00:48:22,723 You murdering bastard! 540 00:48:25,017 --> 00:48:31,107 Stephen Bolsin's revelations, backed by his resignation, helped change the Health Service. 541 00:48:31,107 --> 00:48:32,887 Bastard! 542 00:48:32,887 --> 00:48:34,857 You murderer! 543 00:48:34,857 --> 00:48:41,657 Surgeon, James Wisheart, and hospital Chief Executive, John Roylance, were struck off. 544 00:48:41,657 --> 00:48:46,247 Surgeon, Janardan Dhasmana, was found guilty of serious professional 545 00:48:46,247 --> 00:48:51,217 misconduct and not allowed to operate on children for three years. 546 00:48:51,217 --> 00:48:54,127 We are victims of a gross injustice. 547 00:48:54,127 --> 00:48:58,018 The injustice that our children were taken from us. 548 00:48:59,097 --> 00:49:03,307 It sparked the biggest ever public inquiry into the workings 549 00:49:03,307 --> 00:49:07,997 of the Health Service and overhauled monitoring of hospital deaths. 550 00:49:07,997 --> 00:49:12,217 I've got no doubt that clinical governance 551 00:49:12,217 --> 00:49:15,737 has changed the Health Service and made it much, much safer. 552 00:49:15,737 --> 00:49:21,077 I suspect that the events in Bristol and my resignation 553 00:49:21,077 --> 00:49:24,217 and publicising of them has saved thousands of lives, 554 00:49:24,217 --> 00:49:28,529 if not tens of thousands of lives, in a relatively short period of time. 555 00:49:32,327 --> 00:49:36,687 I'm obviously delighted and just gobsmacked. 556 00:49:36,687 --> 00:49:40,857 I'm speechless, quite frankly. Would you do it again? 557 00:49:40,857 --> 00:49:43,207 I have no regrets, I would do it, again, yes. 558 00:49:43,207 --> 00:49:47,517 A year after her arrest at GCHQ, the Government dropped all charges 559 00:49:47,517 --> 00:49:52,717 against Katharine Gun and proved to Katharine that she was right. 560 00:49:52,717 --> 00:49:55,387 It was fantastic. I was at Liberty at the time, 561 00:49:55,387 --> 00:49:59,567 I was in London. We got the news, 562 00:49:59,567 --> 00:50:03,357 and we were just jumping around hugging each other. 563 00:50:03,357 --> 00:50:08,187 There was a sort of 24-hour media circus, 564 00:50:08,187 --> 00:50:13,215 at Liberty headquarters. I was talking to Jeremy Paxman. 565 00:50:15,127 --> 00:50:18,647 It was all really surreal, looking back on it now. 566 00:50:18,647 --> 00:50:22,067 Who are you to make a judgement on whether it is legal or illegal, 567 00:50:22,067 --> 00:50:23,847 moral or immoral? 568 00:50:23,847 --> 00:50:28,957 My conscience compelled me to reveal it to the public 569 00:50:28,957 --> 00:50:35,467 and I think the reaction that I've seen and also the fact 570 00:50:35,467 --> 00:50:37,257 that they've dropped the charges 571 00:50:37,257 --> 00:50:40,347 is pretty much vindicating what I did. 572 00:50:40,347 --> 00:50:44,427 Jacqui Smith eventually lost her seat, 573 00:50:44,427 --> 00:50:46,873 but her marriage was strengthened. 574 00:50:49,117 --> 00:50:53,287 Some people say, "Why forgive your husband and not make him sleep on the sofa?" 575 00:50:53,287 --> 00:50:55,867 If he watches porn films, we can argue about that, 576 00:50:55,867 --> 00:51:00,687 but if he makes a silly mistake on a claim form and I'm silly enough 577 00:51:00,687 --> 00:51:05,567 to sign it, that shouldn't undermine everything that he has contributed 578 00:51:05,567 --> 00:51:10,537 to my career and everything that we've got together as a relationship. 579 00:51:10,537 --> 00:51:14,567 Richard Peppiatt's letter was finally published 580 00:51:14,567 --> 00:51:19,067 in The Guardian and struck a blow for journalistic ethics. 581 00:51:19,067 --> 00:51:22,297 I went from having about ten followers on Twitter, 582 00:51:22,297 --> 00:51:27,407 because I had just joined it, to 2,000 in about six hours. 583 00:51:27,407 --> 00:51:31,297 And people e-mailing me from, you know, all over the world, 584 00:51:31,297 --> 00:51:33,927 sort of saying, "Bloody hell, well done, you know. 585 00:51:33,927 --> 00:51:35,987 "You've done a really good thing here." 586 00:51:35,987 --> 00:51:38,947 A lot of journalists I knew and journalists I didn't know 587 00:51:38,947 --> 00:51:43,817 on Fleet Street who got in touch to say, "Congratulations, you have 588 00:51:43,817 --> 00:51:48,597 "been very brave to do that. Thank God someone's finally speaking out." 589 00:51:48,597 --> 00:51:52,957 The Daily Star says it has never endorsed the EDL. 590 00:51:52,957 --> 00:51:58,767 Peppiatt couldn't resign, he'd only been a casual reporter for two years. 591 00:51:58,767 --> 00:52:02,007 He was unhappy at not getting a staff post. 592 00:52:02,007 --> 00:52:05,625 And he had been warned about offering to make up quotes. 593 00:52:11,617 --> 00:52:15,267 There are still nurses within the Health Service who, 594 00:52:15,267 --> 00:52:18,367 as it were, disapprove of people with AIDS. 595 00:52:18,367 --> 00:52:22,117 Jonathan Grimshaw found fulfilment 596 00:52:22,117 --> 00:52:25,735 and a commitment to helping others with HIV. 597 00:52:26,807 --> 00:52:29,237 Ten years after my diagnosis, 598 00:52:29,237 --> 00:52:33,227 I achieved everything I wanted to achieve. 599 00:52:33,227 --> 00:52:38,057 HIV gave me the reason to do something which I thought was important with my life. 600 00:52:38,057 --> 00:52:42,597 For me, spending the time well, meant, I suppose, doing something 601 00:52:42,597 --> 00:52:46,487 to help people who are going through 602 00:52:46,487 --> 00:52:50,757 this awful trauma and social rejection 603 00:52:50,757 --> 00:52:56,252 and not being cared for when they had this terrible disease. 604 00:52:57,277 --> 00:53:01,867 Even when it takes place in the worst of circumstances, 605 00:53:01,867 --> 00:53:06,509 a resignation can still be an uplifting experience. 606 00:53:10,357 --> 00:53:15,090 Once the resignation has passed, there is time to pause for reflection. 607 00:53:17,287 --> 00:53:21,417 I really hope that Greg will be able to move on from this, 608 00:53:21,417 --> 00:53:24,227 and that's important, not just for him, 609 00:53:24,227 --> 00:53:26,757 but it's important also for the BBC. 610 00:53:26,757 --> 00:53:28,967 About 18 months, two years later, 611 00:53:28,967 --> 00:53:32,147 it was still sort of dominating my life, really. 612 00:53:32,147 --> 00:53:34,027 This was a traumatic event. 613 00:53:34,027 --> 00:53:39,317 So for two years, I looked around what else I should do with my life. 614 00:53:39,317 --> 00:53:42,697 But if you've just had that sort of bust-up with the Government, 615 00:53:42,697 --> 00:53:45,837 you don't get offered a lot of work... 616 00:53:46,867 --> 00:53:49,447 .. because Blair was still the Prime Minister. 617 00:53:49,447 --> 00:53:52,637 And one day my daughter, who was about 20 at the time, 618 00:53:52,637 --> 00:53:55,827 just looked at me and said, "Look, just get over it." 619 00:53:55,827 --> 00:53:58,728 And I thought, "She's right. You just have to get over it." 620 00:54:00,787 --> 00:54:04,687 My son, one Sunday afternoon, looked up at me as we were playing 621 00:54:04,687 --> 00:54:09,277 with a tennis ball in the sun and he said to me very innocently, 622 00:54:09,277 --> 00:54:13,357 "Daddy, why do you smile so much more in Australia?" 623 00:54:13,357 --> 00:54:17,717 It was really a very moving moment for me, that I realised that 624 00:54:17,717 --> 00:54:20,857 the kids had noticed, but they just hadn't commented on it. 625 00:54:21,887 --> 00:54:27,747 The depressing thing for me probably is that I will be remembered 626 00:54:27,747 --> 00:54:32,527 for being put in a position where I had to resign because of the expenses scandal. 627 00:54:32,527 --> 00:54:35,857 I'm sad about that, but one of the things I have certainly learnt 628 00:54:35,857 --> 00:54:39,187 over the last two years is, you know who you are, 629 00:54:39,187 --> 00:54:41,997 regardless of what other people say about you. 630 00:54:41,997 --> 00:54:44,247 I knew that in resigning as I did, 631 00:54:44,247 --> 00:54:47,157 it wouldn't just be The Daily Star I'd never work at, 632 00:54:47,157 --> 00:54:50,907 it would be any tabloid, they'd all turn their backs on me. 633 00:54:50,907 --> 00:54:53,577 You have broken the code of omerta. 634 00:54:53,577 --> 00:54:56,857 But I can get up in the morning and look at myself in the mirror 635 00:54:56,857 --> 00:55:03,137 and smile and know that that day I can go about my business 636 00:55:03,137 --> 00:55:07,917 in a manner that I don't feel is detracting from the world. 637 00:55:07,917 --> 00:55:10,499 I'm trying to put something into it. 638 00:55:11,527 --> 00:55:15,887 I didn't have a bloody clue what I was going to do. 639 00:55:15,887 --> 00:55:21,327 I had a very bad bout of depression, which I think was literally a depression. 640 00:55:21,327 --> 00:55:25,547 It was depressurising and because of the way my mind works, 641 00:55:25,547 --> 00:55:28,917 that sometimes does take me into a pretty dark place. 642 00:55:28,917 --> 00:55:33,937 I had a very bad bout of depression, but I got over that. 643 00:55:33,937 --> 00:55:36,657 I then started to do different things 644 00:55:36,657 --> 00:55:39,751 and definitely ended up in a better place. 645 00:55:42,187 --> 00:55:46,027 If there are things out there that really should come out, 646 00:55:46,027 --> 00:55:47,437 hey, why not? 647 00:55:47,437 --> 00:55:50,487 'I am able to talk about it without developing the shakes 648 00:55:50,487 --> 00:55:53,437 'and the trembles, so I have moved on from it. 649 00:55:53,437 --> 00:55:57,237 'My life has changed dramatically since then. ' 650 00:55:57,237 --> 00:56:01,217 I don't have a secure job. I don't have a secure income. 651 00:56:01,217 --> 00:56:09,137 But there have been other remarkable opportunities and experiences 652 00:56:09,137 --> 00:56:12,664 that I've had that I wouldn't have had if I had stayed there. 653 00:56:16,737 --> 00:56:21,607 I remember thinking, "Oh my goodness, I'm no longer a minister. 654 00:56:21,607 --> 00:56:23,247 "I haven't got an official car." 655 00:56:23,247 --> 00:56:27,327 I said to my wife, "How am I going to get to Parliament? What am I going to do?" 656 00:56:27,327 --> 00:56:30,524 She said, "There's something called the Tube, try that!" 657 00:56:32,627 --> 00:56:35,157 I hadn't realised that there were new doors 658 00:56:35,157 --> 00:56:38,297 which didn't open automatically, you had to press a button. 659 00:56:38,297 --> 00:56:39,847 And the doors didn't open, 660 00:56:39,847 --> 00:56:43,925 and I started to get very angry, "What a disgraceful Tube this is." 661 00:56:43,925 --> 00:56:48,565 And a man behind me said, "All you do is press that button," and the door opened. 662 00:56:48,565 --> 00:56:53,821 And it just shows, the world changes and you can be quite cushioned. 663 00:56:54,805 --> 00:56:58,925 And there are still some sweet moments to savour 664 00:56:58,925 --> 00:57:04,275 when those who have overseen your downfall face the axe themselves. 665 00:57:04,275 --> 00:57:07,835 I always remember Jack Charlton saying he had a little black book 666 00:57:07,835 --> 00:57:09,945 and he had a few names in there. 667 00:57:09,945 --> 00:57:13,785 Everybody, I think, has got a few names in a little black book. 668 00:57:13,785 --> 00:57:17,165 Amongst the names in my little black book would be Blair, 669 00:57:17,165 --> 00:57:20,395 it would be Campbell, the Cabinet Ministers around them. 670 00:57:20,395 --> 00:57:25,275 There were a couple of people on the board who I made it very clear at the time that I didn't like. 671 00:57:25,275 --> 00:57:29,065 Baroness Hogg, and she happened to be married to the guy who got done 672 00:57:29,065 --> 00:57:33,105 for claiming cleaning the moat on his expenses. 673 00:57:33,105 --> 00:57:36,757 And I looked up that day and thought, "There is a God after all." 674 00:57:42,755 --> 00:57:47,495 In the last 50 years, much has changed. 675 00:57:47,495 --> 00:57:51,945 Society is more tolerant, but quicker to call for heads to roll. 676 00:57:51,945 --> 00:57:56,445 The honourable resignation may be less common in politics, 677 00:57:56,445 --> 00:57:58,225 but it's still to be found. 678 00:57:58,225 --> 00:58:01,465 In other walks of life, it has flourished. 679 00:58:01,465 --> 00:58:04,225 And perhaps there are some universal truths 680 00:58:04,225 --> 00:58:07,745 which have remained unchanged. 681 00:58:07,745 --> 00:58:14,969 Resigning is personal. It is painful and it is important. 682 00:58:16,745 --> 00:58:20,635 You have got loss of lives, always in the back of your mind. 683 00:58:20,635 --> 00:58:27,055 Lord Franks' committee said the Government could not have done anything to stop that invasion, 684 00:58:27,055 --> 00:58:31,333 but it is nevertheless very painful to think what it led to. 685 00:58:34,365 --> 00:58:38,445 I don't think I would do anything differently, 686 00:58:38,445 --> 00:58:41,965 but I think that if I knew then 687 00:58:41,965 --> 00:58:44,545 what I know now, 688 00:58:44,545 --> 00:58:47,309 I wouldn't have applied for the job in Bristol. 689 00:58:50,495 --> 00:58:53,495 When I tell people I was sacked from the Army for being gay, 690 00:58:53,495 --> 00:58:57,670 they laugh and go, "No, really? Really? Did that happen?" 691 00:59:01,085 --> 00:59:03,665 Never, since the moment I hit that button, 692 00:59:03,665 --> 00:59:07,328 have I doubted that what I did was the right thing. 693 00:59:10,415 --> 00:59:16,045 My advice to anybody who is facing resignation is, don't resign, wait, 694 00:59:16,045 --> 00:59:18,343 because it looks different in the morning.