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- [00:02]
Julie Norman
Every day, the world presents you with hundreds of headlines.
- [00:05]
Rose George
What do you believe? Who do you trust? The Financial Times cuts through complexity with clarity, accuracy and global perspective. Its journalism is guided by independence, not agendas. That's why leaders in business, policy and culture turn to one trusted source for facts, for insight, for what matters next.
- [00:28]
Julie Norman
Source FT Read more and subscribe@ft.com.
- [00:37]
Rose George
You'Re listening to Monocle Daily, first broadcast on 11 November 2025 on Monaco Radio Gaza.
- [00:44]
Andrew Muller
What is to be done about rebuilding and who is willing to do it? Do we need to start bracing ourselves for the necessity of putting Marjorie Taylor Greene on an American banknote? And is there a moral void more abysmal than the pub quiz cheat? I'm Andrew Mul. The Monocle Daily starts now. Hello and welcome to the Monocle Daily. Coming to you from our studios here at Midori House in London. I'm Andrew Muller. My guests Julie Norman and Yossi Meckelburg will discuss today's big stories. And we'll hear from the author Rose George about her new book, which may cause you to regard your next helping of fish stew differently. Stay tuned. All that and more coming up right here on the Monocle Daily. This is the Monocle Daily. I'm Andrew Muller and I am joined today by Julie Norman, Associate professor of Politics and International Relations at UCL & Co Author of the upcoming book the Dream and the Nightmare. And Yossi Meckelburg, senior Consulting Fellow at the Middle East North Africa program at Chatham House. Hello to you both.
- [01:59]
May Pundiak
Hello.
- [02:00]
Andrew Muller
You both have or are doing things which are going to be quite Germanic to the discussion shortly to ensue. Julie, as we have mentioned before once or twice and by golly, we are going to mention again, you have this book out.
- [02:14]
Julie Norman
Yes, the book is officially out, the Dream and the Nightmare, available in bookshops, online, wherever you get your books. And we had a really great book launch a couple weeks ago at Waterstones and again to me, this is a book if you're interested in what's happening in Gaza, trying to understand how things got to this point before and during the war. Want to hear voices from the place itself. This is the book to read so I hope people pick it up.
- [02:35]
Andrew Muller
So do I listeners. I have read it and everything recommended heartily you as well. Yossi are shortly to go to Barcelona. Lucky for some, in a bid to, well, further understanding of the situation as.
- [02:50]
Yossi Mekelberg
Many of my visits end doing exactly what I do in the Monocle Studio and talking about the Middle east. But it's a Kind of taking stock with the Barcelona Institute of International affairs about where we stand in the Middle east after, you know, this seven front war and to look, you know, strategically where the different parts can move in the next months and year.
- [03:14]
Andrew Muller
Well, we will start in Gaza where the ending of full scale hostilities was only ever going to be the very beginning of the end of Gaza's considerable woes. The ceasefire agreed a month ago has more or less held, give or take interruptions. Gazan authorities report that three people have been killed by Israeli action in the last 24 hours. But no clear plan has been advanced, much less agreed, for any rebuilding or reviving of Gaza. Concern is growing at the prospect of a default settlement under which Gaza is effectively partitioned between the outer half of it currently controlled by Israel, and the inner half ruled once again by Hamas. Neither of which options sounds like much fun for the 2.2 million people who live there. Yossi, is that a reasonable fear that what the status on the ground at the moment will be allowed to drift and that's just going to be how it stays.
- [04:08]
Yossi Mekelberg
It also is a worry that the interim becomes permanent, mainly because they can't move on.
- [04:14]
Andrew Muller
It would be the first time in the Middle east that that's happened.
- [04:17]
Yossi Mekelberg
Definitely not. And I remember warning, going back to the roadmap, to Bush roadmap, when they talk about different stages. And I was owned by a Palestinian negotiator and he says, we don't want the interim because we'll get the flag, maybe we'll get a national anthem, some sort of governance, but we'll never see a state. That's always a worry. No one believes in this, that the interim doesn't end eventually as the permanent state, it's even more in Gaza, we are talking about a tiny, tiny territory that already, if you look at the yellow line, the way they divided it, 52% is in the hands of Israel and the 2 million people, more than 2 million people live there under what control after such a devastating war, when we know we need the reconstruction of Gaza, we need more humanitarian aid, need to think beyond. But we always knew, because Trump plan is not a real plan in the strict way of the world that, you know, there are details, there are deadlines, how you move and how you do anything. It's almost a trick plan. Let's get through the first phase, get it out of this. So the hostages are back, which is great, many prisoners released, more humanitarian aid. But how you move to the next phase in which you establish the isf, you know, the peacekeeping or peace enforcement, how you actually ensure that Israel withdraws a governance, a new governance which is Palestinian. All of this, there are no details. And if they can't actually agree even of the mandate of the isf, we probably will end in this temporary line remains for a very long time.
- [06:09]
Andrew Muller
There's a couple of things there we will come back to, especially about the multinational force. But one of the many problems, Julie, with the the interim being allowed to become permanent is of course, that it's hard to imagine Israel will do any rebuilding in the bit of Gaza it holds. It's not all that easy to imagine Hamas having either the wherewithal or the willingness to do much rebuilding in the bit that they hold. Is the problem then, that until or unless somebody else, by which I think we must mean the United States cares enough to make something different happen, nothing different is going to happen.
- [06:42]
Julie Norman
Yeah, I mean, I would echo so much of what Yossi just said. We always knew that this next phase of moving from the initial hostage and prisoner release to this next phase was going to be the most difficult. And the reconstruction part was even more difficult from that. And major actor here is, of course, the US and how much pressure the US Continues to put on this process. And Trump obviously very much touted, very much celebrated that first phase. But for him to actually push things further is very much in question. But to your question, Andrew, the part that I think he is most interested in is the development aspect, the idea of having business interests there, having investments, some of these, you know, Trump visions of what Gaza could be. And so I do think there will be some private interest interest in the side controlled by Israel. And that is a very real possibility, is that that side will be quite actively developed while leaving the half where most Gazans live and where Hamas is still essentially in control, just, you know, completely without anything. And so I worry about that increase of bifurcation not only in the conflict situation, the political situation, but the sense of economic development as well.
- [07:50]
Andrew Muller
Yossi, the sums of money involved in that redevelopment, if there is going to be any, are going to be absolutely fantast. And nobody is going to spend money of that kind on an uncertain security environment. And that brings us back to this multinational security force. Are we yet any the wiser on what seem to me the two key questions about this? One, who on earth is going to want to send their troops into that mess? And two, even if we can find people who are willing to send their troops, who are the countries that Israel will agree to?
- [08:23]
Yossi Mekelberg
And even before that, what is the mandate of this force.
- [08:26]
Andrew Muller
Well, indeed.
- [08:27]
Yossi Mekelberg
So I think the mandate of this force also dictates who would like to be part of it. Because is it a peacekeeping operation that some want? Because peacekeeping operation assumes that there is peace, which is not the case. So it means that it monitors the lack of peace. So it monitors whoever violates the ceasefire and then whoever wants.
- [08:49]
Andrew Muller
Well, on the subject of Middle Eastern interims, this is what UNIFIL has been doing in Lebanon for what, 50 years now?
- [08:55]
Yossi Mekelberg
Yeah, correct. I mean, since 1978. So you might end in this if it's a peace enforcement under Chapter 7 of the. Or no Chapter 7, but still have some force, I mean, to enforce the peace there. It means some countries say, are you expecting us actually to start fighting, for instance, Hamas? Or if Israel violates it, are we going to try to take their weapons, which not many countries I see volunteer to be part of it. The advantage of peacekeeping is that there is peace, there is a peace agreement means both sides actually agreed that the war is over. We don't necessarily see it here. There is as much interest for both sides to resume it, not as countries or not as people, but as leadership. And this is the danger, especially when Israel is entering into election year and need to appeal to the base and say, oh, Hamas is still armed there. This is not the agreement that we want. What is the future of Hamas within the Palestinian political system? And this leads again, when talking about economic development, it's not only who will send a peacekeeping or peace enforcement operation, who is going to build. Because it's not that this has been done before. You know, you have so many rounds of hostilities between the Israelis and Palestinians in Gaza, destroying part of it. Not as bad as it's been in the last two years. Few billions pounds going into Gaza and the next war, it's destroyed. So this time everyone says no, we want a very different conversation.
- [10:40]
Andrew Muller
Well, we do want to talk a bit about some other possible solutions. We're going to just fix the Middle east, which shouldn't take us longer than 10 or 11 minutes. Earlier this week at Monocle Radio, we spoke to the directors of Land for All, a joint Israeli Palestinian initiative that offers an alternative version of the two state solution. We're going to hear now from one of their directors, May Pundiak, explaining their approach.
- [11:03]
May Pundiak
What we are offering is what we call two states, one homeland, two states, two sovereign independent states, Israel and Palestine with a clear border, 67 border. And on top of that, another added value, another added model of shared institutions to take care of the things that have to be taken care of, shared and jointly, without taking away from the sovereignty of the two states and the independent of the two states. So I would refer to, let's say France, Germany and the EU model as one inspiration of such an example that can lead us both to the independence and separation that we need, to the security and safety that we need. But understanding that there are multiple challenges, like several issues of security, like economy, like water, like Jerusalem, like even issues of infrastructure and climate that demand us to work in tight cooperation and then the realization that the interdependency at this point between Israelis and Palestinians demand us a political vision that would answer that need.
- [12:15]
Andrew Muller
May Pondiak there of land for all Julie Multiple challenges, she says, which is understating the case fairly audaciously. It's a nice idea, obviously. It's the nice idea that I think people who care about this region like. But is it really feasible at any point in the, well, near to medium term?
- [12:38]
Julie Norman
Well, look, I'd say almost any of the negotiated settlement solutions that we talk about for this conflict, none of them seem very realistic or feasible in the near term. And Yossi and I have both, you know, engaged a bit with this model. People often call this the confederation model. And it is a really intriguing one that I think is going to get more traction when we do get to that next phase of a negotiated, any kind of negotiation. Right now we're so Gaza focused, but things will move beyond that at some point. And I can say you, after spending a lot of time in the west bank this summer, the two state solution that we have all talked about and kind of rallied around for decades in the international community, it is just by the day getting increasingly, increasingly difficult to manifest that. And we've seen that obviously for years, but I would say over the last two years that feasibility has just dissipated exponentially. And so these new models, these ideas of the confederation that try and preserve that sense of self determination for both peoples, but deal a bit more pragmatically with how the region is actually laid out now and where people are living, I think is a really important one to engage with and start having more conversations about.
- [13:45]
Andrew Muller
Yossi, have the last couple of years of just horrendous violence in that part of the world fostered any new ideas? If everybody's kind of understood that that 1990s idea of a two state solution is pretty much a dead letter at this point. Is anyone floating any other big ideas?
- [14:03]
Yossi Mekelberg
I think the confederation and for full disclosure, I wrote a paper about it too. And I'm involved with another group that works on this, the Holy Land Confederation. So I think you look at the reality and it's not only what is the most desirable, but what is the alternative to this. And you look at the other options, especially as you said the last two years, we can go back to what is now and you know, and continue this conflict and bloodshed for a very long time. I don't think most reasonable people would like to see that. You can have a one state solution which is controlled by the settlers and by the very right wing in Israel, which meaning oppression of millions of Palestinians and the Israel State is not going to be Jewish and democratic. Or you can have a one state solution in the spirit of, of Hamas, which means the other way operation, or you can have a one state solution. Might sound like ideal that everyone has the same right and everyone and enjoy the same opportunities, but I don't think it's realistic. So we end back in the two state solution in one format. Not because it is the best solution that, you know, the best dream for people to live together in such territory, but because it's the most viable one. And as a result of having so many settlers in the west bank and the small and the geography as a small territory and they need economically to be viable. That's why some of us reached the conclusion that confederation is probably the way to move forward. There are a lot of obstacles there. But every other alternative to this so far proved to be other, not viable or disastrous.
- [15:58]
Andrew Muller
I mean, it's hard to imagine anything happening of that ilk. Julie, certainly with the current Israeli leadership and certainly while Hamas remain in charge in Gaza. But did you detect any talk more in Israel rather than on the west bank about the possibility of making some grand gesture, much as Israel did in Gaza about 20 years ago, and just saying, okay, we'll take the settlements out of Gaza. Could that be done with the West Bank?
- [16:27]
Julie Norman
I don't think there's, I don't think Israel is moving in that direction in any way, shape or form. I mean, the Israeli right obviously is totally expanding control over the west bank. And the most opposition you get to that is not expanding further. But the idea of withdrawing settlements right now is not something that I hear any party in Israel really talking seriously about.
- [16:49]
Andrew Muller
But as long as they don't do that, there's no, I mean, you can't establish what would amount to a meaningful Palestinian state with that many settlements on the West Bank.
- [16:59]
Julie Norman
Right. And that I think is why some of these other models have come to the fore. I mean, I think when people do still talk about the more traditional two state solution, there's an idea that the settlement blocks close to the Green Line, close to Jerusalem would probably be absorbed into Israel and there would be some kind of, you know, land exchange sort of thing for Palestinians. But the growth of the settlements has just been so extensive, it's deep into the west bank now. It's slated to go even deeper. And the ability to just do a simple land swap has really disappeared, I would say, since the last negotiations.
- [17:33]
Yossi Mekelberg
And maybe it's also the deradicalization in both societies because when we see, for instance, you know, people used to call it settler violence, it's terrorism. And we saw, for instance, the clubbing of a woman only this week. But it's only one incident out of many. Part of it, even for someone like me, support the confederation, is, you're absolutely right, the settlement close to the border can be absorbed into Israel, but you have hardcore ideological settlements at the heart of what's supposed to be a Palestinian state or should be at the end of the process, a Palestinian state. So they need to be de radicalized in some way. So it means you need also to know how you enforce law and order there. Even in a confederation that you have two state, there has to be also a body to enforce law and order. It's not an easy trick, but I was told by those who negotiated Oslo along the years is that it demands leadership. It all starts with having leadership that is committed and actually ready to take risks. And I don't see this leadership available right now.
- [18:44]
Andrew Muller
Well, on the subject of leadership, let us now turn to the United States, which appears to have reached that incredible but somehow inevitable point in the narrative at which Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, Republican of the Georgia 14th, appears, all things considered, a voice of reason. And she is, at least when judged on the basis of her public utterances, as mad as a frog in a sock. In recent times, however, MTG has floated an exciting new Persona which unmistakably resembles old school, mature, grown up, bipartisan states personship, even speaking graciously of retiring former Democrat House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whom MTG had previously described as mentally ill, a traitor, and at least akin to the Nazis. This reinvention is playing predictably badly with President Donald Trump, about whom MTG appears to be having second thoughts. Julie, she's running for president, isn't she?
- [19:40]
Julie Norman
Something's going on there, I will say. I mean, on policy positions, I think it's more just like she has stayed fairly consistent. I mean, she really does represent this idea of the populist America, this idea of isolationism, not getting involved overseas, not bending over for Israel, this idea of focusing on domestic keeping health, you know, health protections for Americans that has been.
- [20:04]
Andrew Muller
Protecting the nation from the predations of Jewish space lasers.
- [20:07]
Julie Norman
Oh, I mean, she is crazy. I definitely am not defending her. But just to say if you are someone who's really in that populist oak, she has represented that. And I think what is often misunderstood is that Trump really does not and he is not certainly known for his consistent policy positions, but that has certainly, I think, very much come across over these last six months that he moves where the wind is blowing him. She has pretty much stayed on that populist front. And that's more to me where that rift has been more than who she's endorsing or whatnot. But she, that's kind of her thing. And Trump is one that I think moves around it more than, than, than her at the moment.
- [20:46]
Andrew Muller
Yossi is there and I ask this question cautiously, a creditable analysis to her apparent break with President Trump. Is it possible that for Marjorie Taylor Greene, and again, going to what Julie was saying about her consistency, she has always been thoroughly consistent on matters pertaining to Jeffrey Epstein. It is absolutely clear that President Trump and those around him are doing everything they can to thwart any further release Epstein related material. They appear to be rolling the pitch for a pardon of his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, for example. Is it possible that for her this is just. No, this is too much. I cannot endorse this and I cannot forgive this, which, I mean, it's a low bar to clear being against child sex trafficking. But nonetheless, at least she stuck to it.
- [21:32]
Yossi Mekelberg
I think sometimes, Julie, correct me if I'm wrong, here in Europe, we are not used to this kind of politicians. No, they look to us kind of almost coming from a different planet.
- [21:44]
Andrew Muller
You know, this kind of would explain a lot.
- [21:47]
Yossi Mekelberg
You know, when I remember first coming across Maureen is when I saw a video of her shooting from a pickup truck. And I don't think you'll find many in the UK or in Europe doing this kind of stunt in order to be elected. It's a rarity. I think within the very, the oddity of what she represents for all of us, there is probably an inner core that is in her own world, is genuine. So when it sounds even very crazy, I mean, a lot of the things she's saying are crazy and offensive. There is an inner corridor for Instance, when she wants, like ensuring that everyone is going to have health care. That's what she believes that American should have. Or in the case of the ips, I mean, it's common sense. Why won't you release all the document unless you're worried that there is something there that is going to be very unpleasant and you were very good friends with the guy many years ago and you might have been on an island. I'm not suggesting it, that you should not have been in the first place. But in her traditional conservative American values, it fits what she says.
- [22:59]
Andrew Muller
Now, Julie Yossi says there are not many European politicians like Marjorie Taylor Greene, and that is certainly true. But there are European politicians who have come in from the far right and attempted to persuade, you know, position themselves as slightly more reasonable people with some success. One thinks of Marine Le Pen, who has twice got as far as the presidential runoff in France, Giorgia Maloney, who is now prime minister of Italy. Does Marjorie Taylor Greene, assuming she could point to France or Italy on a map, appear to be borrowing anything from either of them?
- [23:34]
Julie Norman
I think there can be a little of that because I think a lot of these politicians start as being the contrarian, as being the one to kind of speak back to the people in, but not necessarily thinking they're going to get into position of power. But then when they see that there is a large audience for their material, so to speak, you start playing that politics game more Savvily. But I would say in the U.S. i mean, Marjorie Taylor Greene, she knows U.S. politics well and I think she would know that if she's making a move for things, getting on the wrong side of Trump is not the way to move yourself up in the Republican Party right now. And I feel like she's got to know that. So she might be making some kind of, some kind of play there. But I think anyone who gets on the wrong side of Trump is going to be have a rough road ahead of them in the party the way it is at the moment.
- [24:16]
Andrew Muller
Well, for the moment at least. And just finally on this, Yossi, is it possible and again, I'm extending credit where it may be due to Marjorie Taylor Greene, which is not something I expected to do when I got up this morning. Is it possible that she has seen the beginning of the end for Trump? He is clearly, even by his recent standards, increasingly physically and psychological, psychologically frail. Even if he can find a legal loophole which enables him to run again in 2028, he may not be capable of doing it. Might she be Ahead of the curve in thinking this guy's done.
- [24:52]
Yossi Mekelberg
Someone will have to do it at one point or another. And maybe, as you say, she's early into this, into this race and, you know, I know if you say, can she be one day President? But in 2016, we said two things about Brexit would never happen and Trump would never happen.
- [25:11]
Andrew Muller
I said both of those things repeatedly and often.
- [25:14]
Yossi Mekelberg
I think there is a consensus on this one in this studio and we got it wrong. I mean, usually the one that saw their heads first in the ring are not the one to end as the winners. We saw it even here, Michael Hasentile, for instance, many, many years ago. But she might actually, maybe she sensed that something is changing. But there is something right in what you said. As difficult is for us to say that when she said, we have a president that came on the basis of ensuring that there is health care, better jobs and all that he wants is the Nobel Peace Prize and he's going and he feels more comfortable with foreign affairs. That's not the reason most. 77 million American that voted for Trump did so well.
- [26:04]
Andrew Muller
To Manchester now and to a monstrous transgression against the fundamentals of civilisation. An area hostelry has been obliged to forbid from its regular pub quiz a recurrently victorious team who have been rumbled cheating, apparently by means of whispering the questions into their smart watches and awaiting the response. The proprietor of the Barking Dog in Urmston caught the ne' er do well in the act after being alerted to their well near doing by an anonymous phone tip. Disappointingly, the conniving deviants at the heart of the scandal have only been told they may no longer participate in the quiz and are still welcome to drink at the pub, rather than, as might be hoped, bundled unceremoniously through a window into a horse trough. Julie, how appalled are you by this?
- [26:52]
Julie Norman
So appalled. As. Like a very. As a champion of the pub quiz. Cheating in the pub quiz is just. You just cannot do worse than that. I feel like wherever the dungeon is.
- [27:01]
Andrew Muller
In fairness, you can do worse than that. But your point stands, wherever the people.
- [27:06]
Julie Norman
Who are listening to music without the headphones on, the Tube, wherever dungeon we put them, send these people to, whatever punishment's available, we should dole them out.
- [27:16]
Andrew Muller
What's interesting to me about this, Yossi and I do absolutely share Julie's aghastness at this, there is no creature lower than the person who cheats at a pub quiz. I mean, honestly, that is when you find out how honourable people people really are. What is it that compels people to cheat for such pitiful stakes. Because to make it clear to non British listeners who may never have participated in a pub quiz, if you're lucky, you win your table, a round of drinks, like, no one's getting rich doing this.
- [27:46]
Yossi Mekelberg
So in a moment of confession, I never cheated in a pub quiz.
- [27:50]
Andrew Muller
I should hope not. Your situation.
- [27:51]
Yossi Mekelberg
No, no, no.
- [27:52]
Andrew Muller
God forbid, it would be the last time you sat in this.
- [27:55]
Yossi Mekelberg
But the confession that I never won a pop quiz, and there is an element of public humiliation in this, you sit there and you think, yeah, I know so many details. And then you say, good, I don't know as much as I think I know about. And I know some of this very obscure question about in pop and the rest of this. Or where are some of the service stations on the M60 that I remember that we couldn't. But cheating in that. I mean, there are people that really. I mean, they have nothing better to do in life and probably the highlight of their week is the pub quiz. Nothing better than that. So this keeps them going for the rest of the week, winning the pub quiz. Otherwise, I can't understand this because it is baffling, Julie.
- [28:43]
Andrew Muller
I mean, I enjoy a pub quiz, unlike Yossi. At the risk of sounding immodest, I've won a few.
- [28:50]
Yossi Mekelberg
Well done.
- [28:51]
Andrew Muller
But I cannot fathom what satisfaction you could possibly derive from winning one by asking your phone or your watch.
- [28:59]
Julie Norman
I mean, I would agree with you. I will say, like, people get so crazy competitive about the pub quizzes, though.
- [29:05]
Andrew Muller
Do they really? I never heard of or seen any such thing.
- [29:09]
Julie Norman
I'm just saying, like, there I can see, like, if you're just, like, if you're motivated to win and like, if you're a competitive person, it's like, what motivates anyone to cheat with all these other things that people cheat about. But it's like, yeah, if you're competitive and you want to win, the pub quiz is not lacking in that competitive spirit. And I feel like maybe they're being bought off by someone. What do we know?
- [29:27]
Andrew Muller
Do you still carry anywhere with. Because most people do, Lord knows. A sense of burning injustice at an incorrect ruling by a pub quiz master at some point.
- [29:36]
Julie Norman
Oh, yes.
- [29:37]
Andrew Muller
I mean, because they're the only people who are worse than the people who cheat at pub quizzes. The pub quiz master who doggedly sticks to a completely wrong answer.
- [29:44]
Julie Norman
No, that is true. And I feel like. I feel like I haven't had one here in a while, but I feel like my old pub master In Montreal, I had a few queries with.
- [29:51]
Andrew Muller
So there was carnage at my recent. The last one I attended, it was about Yossi. And I'll put the question to you, Yossi, and see what you come up with and hope you all share my table's fury at this. The question was, what is the largest animal predator native to the United Kingdom?
- [30:10]
Yossi Mekelberg
To the United Kingdom, yes.
- [30:11]
Andrew Muller
Yeah, human.
- [30:13]
Yossi Mekelberg
Must be some big cat or something.
- [30:15]
Andrew Muller
It's not the human. Clever Dick answered, if there's anybody even worse than the cheat or the obstreperous pub quiz master, this is why they cheat, it's the Clever Dick answerer. See, we said obviously correctly, we said the seal. Obviously it's the seal. And we were overruled by a pub quiz master who said it was the badger.
- [30:34]
Julie Norman
Badger.
- [30:35]
Andrew Muller
Badgers are surprisingly hefty, I will grant him that. The first time I ever saw one in the wild, I thought they were about the size of hedgehogs.
- [30:42]
Julie Norman
Aren't there like bears?
- [30:43]
Andrew Muller
There are no bears, but. But he overruled us. He didn't specify land mammal in any way. The seal does live partially on land and gives birth on land. So we were right and he was wrong. It did not actually cost us the quiz, else we might have burned.
- [30:57]
Yossi Mekelberg
But you don't feel bitter about it all these years later.
- [30:59]
Andrew Muller
This was only a few weeks ago. This is still burning quite bright. Julie Norman and Yossi Meckelberg, thank you both for joining us. Finally, on today's show, in the popular consciousness, fish inhabit a space not quite animal, vegetable or mineral. Even some vegetarians will make an exception for anything with fins. But the industry that brings fish from the sea to your table is at least as problematic as that which does similar for land creatures such as the badger and is certainly less regulated and more dangerous. All of which is the subject of a new book by Rose George, Every Last Fish, what Fish do for Us and what we do to them. I spoke to Rose earlier and began by asking about the impetus for the book, whether it was any kind kind of sequel to her acclaimed study of commercial shipping, deep sea and foreign, going.
- [31:49]
Rose George
Yes, you're right, it did kind of grow out of the shipping book. But that was my last book but one. So I gave myself a few years to do something completely different. But I think possibly the impetus was when I was doing the shipping book, which, as you and your listeners probably know, shipping is quite a secretive and difficult industry to penetrate. And I remember quite a few people told me, if you think shipping's bad, you should look at Fishing. So eventually I did and I thought I would go back to fishing and have had a few regrets along the way because they were right. It is a very tricky industry to get your head around. And as a prone to seasickness vegetarian, I possibly wasn't the most ideal person to go to sea fishing. But yeah, I did it and I learned a lot. I'm kind of glad I don't eat fish after all. After all I learned. But it was great. I got to do a shift in a fish and chip shop and learn to dive and meet fishermen who I really respect and admire even if I don't particularly like what they do. But yeah, it's been a definite experience.
- [32:55]
Andrew Muller
I did want to ask about how you went about overcoming those somewhat inbuilt obstacles to doing this because as you make clear, you don't eat fish, you don't much like fish or the ocean and you get chronically seasick. All of which would have been good reasons to maybe think of writing a book of about something else. But why did you decide that this was something you really wanted to persist with? Because as anybody who has written any kind of non fiction book will be aware, you've really got to be interested in your subject.
- [33:26]
Rose George
Yes, you're right. And how did I overcome it? Well, the answer to the seasickness question is I didn't. So I just got very used to throwing up over the side of trawlers. I never did get my sea legs. Being a vegetarian and watching fish being caught and then sliced open and that was, I mean, I'll be honest, it was difficult, but I knew that that was what was, that was what was going to be happening. And the need to understand the world I was writing about had to override my particular views on animals. And so I, you know, I just got on with it I suppose, because.
- [34:05]
Andrew Muller
The point your book makes, well, a point your book makes is that fishing is obviously an absolutely colossal industry and many, if not most of the earth's people are dependent, dependent on its produce at some level to actually literally live. And yet it is extremely shoddily regulated when it's regulated at all.
- [34:25]
Rose George
That's true, it is a colossal industry and it's worth billions and our seafood consumption is increasing. But on the other hand, I mean, in the UK for example, we think that the fishing industry has this enormous value and it almost has a kind of, of moral place in society. And it's, it's actually absolutely tiny in terms of what it brings to gdp. I mean, if the vacuum cleaner industry earns more than the fishing industry. And one of the big secrets of the global fishing industry is that it is massively subsidized by governments. That's really why, or one of the reasons why that the oceans are in such trouble and the ocean's populations are in such trouble. And 90% of fish stocks are either depleted or overexploited or in a sorry state in one way or another. 90%. Part of the reason is that governments subsidize these large fleets with these massive capacities to go further than they ever could before. So there's really no area of the ocean or no fish population that is now out of bounds. And because in fact, although our fishing efforts effort so in terms of how much we are fishing has increased, the amount of fish that we're catching has reduced because quite simply, there isn't as much to catch because the efforts are so ridiculous and because we are so greedy and these enormous boats are taking up so much of the ocean's inhabitants. But in fact, I mean, there are 4 million fishing vessels in the world and nearly half of them are tiny. Half of them probably don't even have an engine engine. So it's a small proportion of the fishing fleet that is wreaking the most damage to fish populations. And that is a lot of the time, particularly the ones that are called distant water fleets. So in particular, I'm thinking of the Chinese fleet is massively subsidized by governments. And there are quite a lot of people trying to change that and to reform that system.
- [36:23]
Andrew Muller
There is the almost contemptuous attitude to the populations of the oceans that you've mentioned, that there does seem to be this assumption that it's an. An infinite resource where, as your book makes clear, it very, very, very much isn't.
- [36:36]
Rose George
I think a lot of things carry on in plain sight and don't get the proper focus that they should. But to answer your question, I think fishes are treated the way they are treated. I'm not sure you did ask this, but I'm going to answer a question you didn't ask. So I think fishes, which I started to call port portable food units, I think that there's. They. They have to be seen as kind of inanimate creatures.
- [36:58]
Andrew Muller
You make the point that they are. They're often literally regarded as fruits of the ocean rather than fruits of the ocean.
- [37:04]
Rose George
Yeah, yeah. If you think of the French or even German, yeah, they come. Or even seafood. I mean, that's kind of vague, isn't it? But fruits of the fruits. And yeah, they're seen as, you know, as equivalent to a potato. And they're not. They're excited, extraordinary creatures. And they're clever. And even goldfish have long memories and they can recognize their friends and they shout at each other and they have fish choruses and some species of wrasse are cleverer than rats. And this was all an absolute revelation to me. And this is all quite new research. So we've moved on from the kind of just worrying about whether fish feel pain, because, I mean, the answer is, of course they do. They've got a nervous system. I think the reason that we in general have ignored this is because how could we let the fishing industry kill like 3 trillion fishes a year if we thought that they were all individuals or animals even? But we don't. I think there is a perception that an animal is a furry creature who lives on land. And we don't really think. We think of them as kind of. I think we think of fishes, as Samuel Coleridge called them, slimy things in the water. But they're not. And I'm really glad that lots of. There's a lot of science now looking at their abilities and their sentience. I don't think it's going to change much in the fishing industry because it's such a established industry. And I don't think there's going to be a Save the Fish campaign anytime soon, or Save the guppy or Save the goldfish.
- [38:34]
Andrew Muller
That was Rose George speaking to me earlier. Her new book is what Fish Do For Us and what We Do To Them. That is the subtitle. The title is Every Last Fish. And that's all for this edition of the Monocle Daily. Thanks to our panelists today, Julie Norman and Yossi Mekelberg. The show was produced by Chris Chermack and researched by Joanna Moser. Our sound engineer was Elliot Greenfield. I'm Andrew Muller here in London. The Daily is back at the same time tomorrow. Thanks for listening.