"I couldn't wash his smell away" - Jimmy Savile's great niece

This interview is not pleasant listening, but it does give a sense of what it must have been like to have been been one of Jimmy Savile's victims - and how remarkably easy it was for him to get away with such flagrant abuse.

Blacking the names of Adam Boulton, Jeremy Paxman & the American judicial system

From time to time this blog features interviews in which the conduct of the interviewer or the interviewee (or both) are of special or unusual interest.

This week, Conrad Black sparred with Adam Boulton of Sky News and Jeremy Paxman of BBC Newsnight, both on the pretext of plugging his new book.

If you missed these two gems, here they both are:



In both cases, 'sparred' was the operative word. Few of those interviewed by Boulton have to ask him what his name is and Paxman doesn't often get accused of 'bourgeois priggishness'.



American readers may be specially impressed Lord Black's views on the US judicial system, which starts about 42 seconds in and features some interesting statistics:

"...99.5 % of prosecutions in the US are convicted. The whole system's a fraudulent fascistic conveyer belt to the corrupt prison system, that's what. Let me tell you something. 5% of the population of the world are Americans, 25% of the incarcerated people are and 50% of the lawyers are... six to twelve times as many incarcerated people as Britain, Canada, Australia, France, Germany or Japan. How do YOU explain that?"

10 OTHER UNUSUAL INTERVIEWS FROM MY ARCHIVES

• Politician answers a question: an exception that proves the rule
• A Labour leader with no interest in spin!
• A Tory leader's three evasive answers to the same question
• The day Mrs Thatcher apologised (twice) for what she'd said in an interview
• A prime minister who openly refused to answer Robin Day's questions
• 'Here today, gone tomorrow' politician walks out of interview with Robin Day
• The day Mandelson walked out of an interview rather than answer a question about Gordon Brown
• Mandelson gives two straight answers to tow of Paxman's questions
• Two more straight answers from Mandelson - about failed coups and the PM's rages
• Rare video clip of a politician giving 5 straight answers to 5 consecutive questions

Why did the BBC's Director General keep nodding in agreement with himself?

Watching George Entwistle giving evidence to the House of Commons select committee on culture media and sport reminded me of something my late sister-in-law used to do, the meaning of which we never managed to work out.

Sometimes, she would mark the end of what she'd just said with a rather emphatic "Hmmm!". The nearest we got was that it meant something like "that's it and I don't want to be asked anything else about it" - because we all took it as indicating something final about her comment on which she'd rather not have any more discussion thank you very much.

My followers on Twitter may have noticed that I became rather preoccupied (and seriously distracted) this morning with Mr Entwistle's obsession with nodding in agreement with what he'd just said (e.g. 28 and 1:06 seconds in the above). It wasn't just that he did it occasionally, but did it after almost every 'answer' to every question.

It may have been his way of telling the committee that he'd no more to say on that particular matter, but suggestions and/or enlightenment from readers would be very welcome.

This sequence also includes the only question of the morning that prompted raucous laughter from those in the room (about 1:10 seconds in). It prompted an embarrassed-looking grin from the Director General, and was enough to prompt one contributor to Twitter to describe it as 'humiliating'.

Speaking without notes: why watch Miliband or Cameron when you can watch Julia Gillard?

A speech is occasionally so stunning that it's worth watching all the way through for pure enjoyment and/or instruction.

So I'm grateful to Jim Kelleher (@UncleBooBoo on Twitter) for drawing my attention to this gem from Australian prime minister Julia Gillard - which he rightly describes as "an amazing smackdown" and "a  masterclass in speaking without notes."

Much more powerful and effective than recent attempts at 'notelessness' by British politicians and, as an added bonus, it's also a masterclass in the finely honed insult.

Are members of all our political parties getting older?

On Friday, we went to a dinner organised by our local Liberal Democrats, at which Simon Hughes M.P. was the guest speaker - and very good he was too.

But what's been worrying me ever since is the average age of the audience. Not quite as ancient as the average age of the congregation at our local church (C of E), perhaps, but not far off.

Last week, Labour Party Conference organisers showed off a rather youthful group of audience members behind Ed Mildband during his speech.

And the Conservative Party Conference, as seen on TV today, seems to be largely made up of people who are far younger than the average age of Conservative Party members. 

So my questions for today are:

1. Is the age of political activists in all parties on the increase? 
2. If so,  does it matter?