Kirsty Wark on irritating Margaret Thatcher and that Prince Andrew interview

Published

10 months ago

September 27, 2024

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Kirsty Wark says she preferred A Very British Scandal to Scoop, as while one was a “rollicking drama” the other failed to give “enough people their place”.

Employed by the BBC for nearly 50 years, Wark presented Newsnight from 1993 to 2024, stepping down this summer after more than three decades at the helm.

Speaking at the fourth live show of Sky News’ Electoral Dysfunction tour in Glasgow, the BAFTA-winning journalist also dished the dirt on one former BBC colleague she said was not the best “team player”.

Kicking off with one of the BBC’s most notorious interviews, Wark said Emily Maitlis got chosen to interview Prince Andrew as she was chief presenter of Newsnight at the time.

The interview – which aired in November 2019 – was swiftly branded “disastrous” and “excruciating” for the royal, as he was questioned about his relationship with convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

When asked by Sky News’ political editor Beth Rigby which of the two recent TV productions based on the interview – Scoop and A Very Royal Scandal – she preferred, Wark plumped for A Very British Scandal.

Released earlier this month, Maitlis was an executive producer on the Prime Video miniseries.

Wark said: “They’re both dramas, and neither is an absolute, you know it’s not about the truth.

“One gives more weight to some people and the other one gives more weight to other people, but by and large, the idea of it being a team endeavour is much more embedded in the second, the Royal Scandal, than it is in the first.

“The first was a rollicking drama, but I don’t actually think that enough people were given their place.”

Scoop, which streamed on Netflix, focused on the story from the angle of Newsnight guest booker Sam McAlister who persuaded Prince Andrew to appear on the show.

Wark said that at the time Prince Andrew had “thought he’d done a really good interview”, and after the chat had offered to show Maitlis around Buckingham Place.

‘I was the one who suggested his train travels!’

Speaking about some of her own interviews over the years, Wark told Rigby, along with co-hosts Labour peer Harriet Harman and Conservative peer Ruth Davidson, about two high-profile interviewees she had rubbed up the wrong way.

She sat down with former prime minister Margaret Thatcher at the height of the poll tax riots.

Wark said she was “preternaturally calm” and had prepared meticulously going on: “Nobody knew except my husband that I was pregnant. And I thought, well, I’m not going to let [Mrs Thatcher] upset me. I’ll be very calm and controlled.”

After the interview – which Wark said nearly got cancelled at the last minute – Thatcher told Wark she had “interrupted me more than I’ve ever been interrupted”, to which Wark said she thought “game on”.

Remembering another interviewee who did not appreciate her journalistic tenacity, Wark said a sit-down with the former Conservative MP Michael Portillo did not end well.

Wark said the ex-chief secretary to the Treasury had “riled her” by saying “stop hectoring me”.

She admitted she had interviewed him after she “returned to work too soon” following the death of her father and godmother.

Wark joked: “The only broadcasting complaint I ever had upheld was with Michael Portillo. And actually, it’s outrageous because I was the one who suggested them for the train travels!”

The former Conservative MP has presented 15 series of Great British Railway Journeys for BBC Two over the last 15 years.

A former BBC colleague who wasn’t ‘a team player’

She also revealed that when her former BBC colleague Robert Peston had come along to do a few shifts on Newsnight, he had refused to follow the show’s precedent of brainstorming ideas together, and wearing an earpiece so others could pitch in on an interview.

After letting Peston shadow her the day before, she came into work to discover he was going solo for his own interview, adding with heavy irony that he was “a real team player”. Peston is now political editor at ITV News.

In other TV news, Wark admitted she had been “asked so many times” to do Strictly Come Dancing but had so far refused due to work commitments and illness.

She did not reveal if she would consider it in the future.

A keen cook, Wark has appeared on celebrity versions of MasterChef and The Great British Bake Off.

Missed Thursday’s show? Don’t worry, the full programme will be published here on Friday morning.

You can also listen back to our previous three episodes, recorded in London, Salford and Liverpool.

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Heidi Alexander says ‘fairness’ will be government’s ‘guiding principle’ when it comes to taxes at next budget

Published

12 hours ago

July 13, 2025

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Heidi Alexander says 'fairness' will be government's 'guiding principle' when it comes to taxes at next budget

Another hint that tax rises are coming in this autumn’s budget has been given by a senior minister.

Speaking to Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander was asked if Sir Keir Starmer and the rest of the cabinet had discussed hiking taxes in the wake of the government’s failed welfare reforms, which were shot down by their own MPs.

Trevor Phillips asked specifically if tax rises were discussed among the cabinet last week – including on an away day on Friday.

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Tax increases were not discussed “directly”, Ms Alexander said, but ministers were “cognisant” of the challenges facing them.

Asked what this means, Ms Alexander added: “I think your viewers would be surprised if we didn’t recognise that at the budget, the chancellor will need to look at the OBR forecast that is given to her and will make decisions in line with the fiscal rules that she has set out.

“We made a commitment in our manifesto not to be putting up taxes on people on modest incomes, working people. We have stuck to that.”

Ms Alexander said she wouldn’t comment directly on taxes and the budget at this point, adding: “So, the chancellor will set her budget. I’m not going to sit in a TV studio today and speculate on what the contents of that budget might be.

“When it comes to taxation, fairness is going to be our guiding principle.”

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Afterwards, shadow home secretary Chris Philp told Phillips: “That sounds to me like a barely disguised reference to tax rises coming in the autumn.”

He then went on to repeat the Conservative attack lines that Labour are “crashing the economy”.

Mr Philp then attacked the prime minister as “weak” for being unable to get his welfare reforms through the Commons.

Discussions about potential tax rises have come to the fore after the government had to gut its welfare reforms.

Sir Keir had wanted to change Personal Independence Payments (PIP), but a large Labour rebellion forced him to axe the changes.

With the savings from these proposed changes – around £5bn – already worked into the government’s sums, they will now need to find the money somewhere else.

The general belief is that this will take the form of tax rises, rather than spending cuts, with more money needed for military spending commitments, as well as other areas of priority for the government, such as the NHS.