The Andrew Marr Show

Apart from his interview of Theresa May this morning which Ms May handled rather well, Andrew Marr also interviewed Sir Jock Stirrup, the out going Chief of Defence Staff. Andrew Marr asked rather political questions which I would have thought a Chief of Defence Staff would have had to refuse to answer being above, or is it below, politics. Why was Andrew Marr asking those questions and why was Sir Jock answering them albeit diplomatically at times. Sir Jock for example confirmed the £38bn hole in the defence budget but did say it included a £10bn wish list. Sir Jock also revealed that the Defence Chiefs had themselves identified and proposed cuts to the Labour government but could get no decision. Finally Andrew Marr elicited from Sir Jock that over the last two years the Government had become properly focused on equipment and manning levels in Afghanistan. This led me to the conclusion that the whole point of the interview was to demonstrate that the Labour Government had not been so hopeless in running defence as the Coalition are saying. The BBC's view is not one shared by many of its unwilling paymasters.