Any Questions comes to Chichester
Chichester found itself at the heart of a political crisis as Radio Four's Any Questions was broadcast live here in the midst of the MPs' expenses outrage.
To many there, it must have seemed like the dream date.
Here were avid Radio Four regulars - in what must be one of its heartlands - with the chance to be a part of one of the stations's institutions.
Not only that, but this promised to be a historic broadcast of topical discussion show Any Questions?, with Parliament in crisis and MPs hanging their heads in shame.
A Friday night to savour, indeed, at the end of a week in which revelations, retributions and resignations over the issue of MPs expenses had rocked the nation.
There was certainly more than a little frisson in the air in the canteen at the University of Chichester, hosting the live broadcast, where people gathered before the show, talking animatedly about the extraordinary events, chewing pens and furiously scribbling down questions they hoped would be picked to present to the panel.
A few had opted for different topics. Birdham GP Graham Edwards was concerned about binge drinking, and Chichester District Councillor Bob Hayes had a poser about Barack Obama and military courts.
But the majority were there for the hot issue of the week, the year, the decade and maybe even the century.
And the anticipation - and frustration - before the show was palpable.
Brazilian-born Jacy Richards said she was 'incandescent'. Along with her husband Ron (76), she had lost everything - businesses and her home - at the end of the Thatcher years, had helped vote in Tony Blair, only to become 'completely disappointed and disenchanted' after the Iraq war. And now this.
Then there was the gallows humour going round. Of Shadow Leader of the House of Commons Alan Duncan, due to be a panellist but meeting with his constituents instead after reports that he had spent 4,000 on gardening matters, one woman said: "I would like to ask - is he on gardening leave, or should he be?!" Quite.
The humour continued in the auditorium with excellent BBC warm up man Peter Griffiths welcoming all to an edition of 'I'm an MP, Get Me Out of Here!'. Corny, but it broke the ice, and eased the tension.
He told us to clap, cheer, boo, hiss and to treat the show like 'political hustings of old'.
"You can look at the whites of their eyes as they give you answers to your very intelligent questions," he said.
Their eyes were smiling, and if there were beads of sweat on foreheads they had been hurriedly swept away, as the four, brave it seemed in the face of such national hostility, panellists took their pews alongside veteran presenter Jonathan Dimbleby, now in his 22th year of presenting the show.
Here was former Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer, in red tie, Duncan's last minute replacement Jeremy Hunt, Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, in sombre suit, Lib Dem MP Susan Kramer, in bright bright top, and MEP and leader of the UK Indepedence Party Nigel Farage, in jaunty purple shirt and stripey tie combo.
The famous radio pips pipped, the news headlines were read out and then it was on with the show.
Ten questions - Bob Hayes's among them - had been selected, including a light-hearted warm-up one on the Eurovision Song Contest which had Lord Falconer reminiscing about Boombangabang.
The serious stuff swiftly followed though and the former Lord Chancellor immediately, and impressively, set the tone in a full 'hands-up we have wronged' contriteness.
His vocabulary was powerful ('cataclystic'), his delivery measured and his message strong - the system was rotten and trust had gone. No more 'honest mistakes, no more 'I put my hands up, guv'.
"That doesn't wash any more. There are really no excuses," he said to much clapping and calls of 'hear, hear'.
Cheering followed various statements from each of the panellists (Nigel Farage's view that the Speaker had become a 'national embarassment', Susan Kramer's call for a general election, Jeremy Hunt's questioning of whether MPs should be called 'honorable' anymore).
And questions debated followed a logical thread - should MPs be prosecuted, should the Speaker of the House Michael Martin go, how would trust be won back, and would minority parties like the BNP now get in through the back door?
Jonathan Dimbleby, looking relaxed, chewing the arm of his glasses from time to time, was a master in the art of chipping in at just the right time, and pinning down the guests.
Time ran out for Bob Hayes, whose question went unanswered. And Jacy Richards would have like more Brazilian-style barracking from a restrained rather than raucous audience.
But it all made for a fascinating, no-thrills, bit of theatre, skillfully wound up on the dot of the hour, with goodbyes from Chichester and the University of Chichester.
Dimbleby's view
Veteran broadcaster Jonathan Dimbleby has been presenting Any Questions? since 1987.
And he said after the Chichester broadcast that MPs expenses was the most serious issue in his 22 years. It was no less than 'democracy on trial'.
"I knew that the programme would be dominated by this, and quite rightly, as it is such an important issue and
here we have a very useful forum open to us".
The Iraq war, the question of Europe in the 90s, and fox hunting, had all been hot topics for Any Questions? but this was something else.
"I talked to at least 50 MPs in Westminster this week and I have never seen such grey faces, gallows humour and such despair. The complete horror at what they had got themselves into, and no sense of how to get themselves out of it. I really sensed their feelings of alarm."
Jonathan travels all over the UK with the weekly show, and loves revisiting Sussex which has childhood memories for him.
"We lived in Fernhurst, and my family had a beach hut at West Wittering. We would play I Spy in the car on the way down, seeing who could spot the Chichester Cathedral spire first and calling the game 'Chi Spy!'
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Weather for Chichester
Tuesday 29 May 2012
Today
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Temperature: 12 C to 22 C
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Temperature: 13 C to 19 C
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