What You See is What You Get

by Sugar, Alan

  On top of this, I was contacted by Number 10 to say that I had to urgently fill out some forms to be put forward to the House of Lords Appointments Commission, a formality to ensure I was the right calibre of person to be a member. The forms had to be filled out quickly and returned, in order for the process to start. All this was going on amidst our planning discussions for the You’re Hired show. Michele Kurland and her team could see it was becoming an untenable situation for me and they agreed to leave me alone for half an hour or so to fill out the forms and let the dust settle a bit. It was impossible to concentrate on the show.

  Left on my own, the whole thing started to sink in – I was going to be appointed to the House of Lords! It began to dawn on me what an amazing honour this was. Rumour has it that when people are about to die, their whole life flashes before them. Well, thankfully I wasn’t dying, but I have to say there was a moment when I had one of these flashbacks. I remembered my mum on her deathbed saying, ‘Who do you think you are, Lord Beaver-brook?’ At that moment, I kind of choked up a little, thinking, ‘No, Mum, not Lord Beaverbrook – actually, it’s Lord Sugar.’ It was a very personal moment and I was glad I was alone. I became quite emotional thinking about how my mum and dad would have felt if they’d still been around.

  The story was all over the media. The phone had not stopped ringing and my public relations company, Frank PR, was inundated. I suggested they immediately come and meet me to talk about how to handle things. I hadn’t really been given a definitive brief on exactly what I was going to do as a government adviser. There was talk of me having an office in the DBIS and some staff allocated to me, but from there on, I had no idea what was expected of me.

  I’d already said to Gordon, ‘If you’ve got visions of me spending five days a week in a nine-to-five in Victoria Street, you’ve picked the wrong bloke.’ I wasn’t going to change my lifestyle. I deal with things on a 24/7 basis. It doesn’t matter where I am. I could be in Spain or America or up a mountain. I could be at home with my BlackBerry or at my office in Loughton. Wherever I might be, I make more decisions in a minute than some businessmen do in a week stuck at their desks. I can operate anywhere and I certainly wasn’t taking some desk job.

  As I wasn’t clear on what I’d be doing, it was quite difficult facing the media, who were asking me exactly that question. To be perfectly honest, I didn’t know at the time what ‘taking the whip’ was – I’d just accepted the position with whatever conditions were attached. I trusted that Gordon wouldn’t ask me to do something I wasn’t happy with. There simply hadn’t been time to articulate the finer points in our short meetings.

  As I walked out of Talkback’s offices, I was caught by Sky Television, who asked for an interview. We decided the street was not the right place to talk, so we went back into the building. Embarrassingly, the woman interviewer was asking me what my new job entailed and there was I thinking to myself, ‘I don’t actually know.’ I couldn’t really say that live on TV, so I waffled a bit: ‘I’m going to be looking after matters to do with small- to medium-sized businesses and trying to assist in the promotion of enterprise.’

  I made one mistake by saying, ‘I shall be going down to Victoria Street and seeing what all those people are doing there because I’ve never found civil servants or politicians to be any good at business.’ For me, at the time, it was a true statement, but as I found out afterwards, it was not the cleverest thing to say. It alienated the whole bloody building.

  I then went off to meet Simon Cowell in a restaurant in Bayswater, where we chatted about the TV business. I don’t know whether he was oblivious to what was going on as far as I was concerned, but I found it rather strange that he didn’t mention my being offered a peerage. Maybe he didn’t know or didn’t want to bring it up for some reason or other. He got a phone call from Philip Green at one point and said, ‘Hey, Phil, I’ve got Alan Sugar here – he’s actually funnier than you!’

  After a nice lunch, we went outside and compared cars. Simon had bought himself exactly the same stretched Rolls-Royce I had and our two drivers were exchanging specifications. His was the same colour as mine, but had a more glitzy interior, as one would expect.

  When I arrived back at the studio after lunch, Andrew Bloch and David Fraser from Frank PR told me there was a groundswell of feeling against the appointment coming through from the Conservative Party. They were making noises to the effect that I shouldn’t be allowed to be a government adviser and at the same time participate in a BBC television programme. We looked at each other as if to say, ‘What’s that got to do with the price of cocoa?’ I simply didn’t understand the logic behind their objections. Nevertheless, my two PR guys said this was the general thrust of the comments coming from the media. The same question kept being thrown at me, as well as at Number 10: ‘Now that Lord Sugar is going to be an adviser to the government, will you be asking him to give up his television programme?’

  My answer was, ‘It’s nonsense! What the hell have the two things got to do with each other?’

  I had to put my frustration on hold as we got on with preparations for You’re Hired! Despite trying to focus on this, I was constantly being interrupted by Andrew Bloch telling me he needed my attention. ‘I’ve had the Daily Mail on the phone. They’re going to press right now with some story that you’ve agreed to give up The Apprentice.’

  ‘Tell them it’s a load of rubbish. Tell them we’ll be making a statement at the end of the day.’

  ‘They say that’s not good enough – their deadline is five o’clock and we won’t be done till ten tonight.’

  ‘Andrew, what do you want me to do? I’m in the middle of preparing for the show. We can’t deal with this now. Just tell them to go away. Whatever they print, they print – we’ll have to deal with it tomorrow.’

  ‘Can’t you give me a steer on what I should say to them?’

  ‘Okay, I’m not giving up The Apprentice – that’s for sure. It’s not for their ears, but it wasn’t part of the discussions with Gordon Brown. So say, “It’s a load of rubbish” and tell them they’ve got their facts wrong.’

  ‘Fine, I’ll go away and tell them that. That’s all I wanted to know – sorry to have interrupted you.’

  Half an hour later, Andrew was back again. ‘I’m sorry, but there’s this fellow called Jeremy Hunt – apparently he’s the Shadow Culture Secretary, the Conservative bloke in charge of media matters. Now he’s blabbing to the media, telling them he’s going to protest to the BBC that your appointment cannot go ahead. He’s saying that either the BBC must sack you, or Gordon must rescind your appointment – one of the two. We’re being pestered nonstop by the media. What shall we tell them?’

  ‘Tell them Mr Hunt is talking a load of rubbish – it’s as simple as that. My participation in The Apprentice has nothing at all to do with any government work. Nothing I’ve said in the past five years in The Apprentice is political. I don’t go round broadcasting, “I’m supporting this party or I’m supporting that party or I endorse this person but not that person.” We’ve never mentioned anything political in the programme, so what the hell is this nutter talking about?’

  ‘Well, I can’t put it in those words, but I get the gist. That’s what I’ll go and tell them.’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘I’m really sorry to have interrupted you again.’

  In the dressing room allocated to me at the studio, I had the TV tuned to Sky News. Every single person and his brother and his dog was criticising my appointment. There was the ginger-haired lady on Sky TV, Kay Burley, standing on the green outside the Houses of Parliament, stopping exiting politicians and asking them what they thought of the appointment.

  Give a politician a microphone and they won’t stop blabbing. Naturally, she only chose to ask Conservatives or Liberals, so all you heard was indignation. ‘How can a man like him be appointed as an adviser to the government? He doesn’t know how to deal with people – look at how he talks to them in his television p
rogramme. What kind of person is he to be appointed in a role dealing with enterprise? It’s all wrong – there’s a conflict of interests with his BBC show’

  I was getting a load of flak on the TV, all based on the biggest load of rubbish I’d ever heard. I’m surprised they didn’t haul out Terry Venables to join in. Indeed, the whole thing was reminiscent of the day I’d fired Venables. But if I’d thought that had been bad, these goings-on made it look like an outing to Disney World.

  I couldn’t believe how it had escalated in such a short time, from half past ten that morning to now, six in the evening. The momentum was growing and growing – all over Alan Sugar. I mean, after all, what the bloody hell had I done? Nothing, other than accept a role as an adviser to the government. Maybe it was a slow news day and I was just unlucky to be the top story.

  When Ann turned up at the studio at seven o’clock, just before the recording started, she got a total shock when she saw me. ‘What’s the matter with you? You look terrible!’

  ‘Terrible? You have no idea what’s been going on today. I can’t believe it! Anyone would think I’ve just murdered someone or done something awful. Haven’t you been watching the TV?’

  ‘No, I haven’t seen anything. I’ve had a lot of people phoning me, telling me how happy they are you’ve been appointed to the House of Lords and all that stuff, but no one’s said anything else.’

  ‘It’s been madness, absolute madness. Watch this,’ I said as I switched on the TV. Sky News kept repeating the same old tired story, while the ticker tape at the bottom of the screen was showing people’s comments on my appointment. Ann realised why I was looking so bad.

  It’s hard for me to put into words how much pressure I was under that day. To be fair, my PR people, Andrew and David, were fending off most of the stuff, but they had to keep telling me about the latest developments and how we needed to deflate the swell of adverse publicity.

  It was hard, but I had to pull myself together and try to purge all this from my brain. It was time for me to go on stage and do my bit in the You’re Hired! programme. On top of all this, I knew I had to face the prospect of going to the after-show cocktail party, where hundreds of people would be asking me all kinds of questions, not only relating to The Apprentice, but also to that day’s big news.

  The show had started recording. The panel comprised Ruby Wax, Jonathan Ross and a couple of others. When I’d met them in the gallery, Jonathan congratulated me on my appointment and asked about it. I told him, ‘My head’s spinning, Jonathan. I’m sorry, mate, I’m not being rude, but I’ve got to concentrate on the show tonight. We’ve got to get this away and then, if you’ve got any time afterwards, we’ll have a chat. But right now, the room is spinning round.’

  ‘Fair enough, fair enough. Let’s get on with it.’

  Adrian Chiles, the show’s host, started off by asking me, ‘What do I call you? Is it Sir Alan or Lord Sugar?’

  I replied, ‘Well, one day it’ll most probably be Lord Sugar, but for now let’s carry on with Sir Alan.’ Jonathan cracked a few gags about my appointment, as one would expect, and overall the recording went very well.

  I don’t think I paid too much attention to Yasmina and Kate that night. It was a shame for them, but it was simply because I had so much buzzing around in my head. I don’t think they understood the ramifications of what was going on.

  After the recording, I mingled with the guests for a while, my thoughts still churning round. Margaret Mountford was there and I also had to announce that this was the last time she would be in The Apprentice, which, though it was sad news, thankfully took a bit of the attention away from me. I told her that I appreciated her participation over the years and explained to everyone that when I’d persuaded her to do the show originally, she’d thought it would be just for one season, yet I’d managed to convince her to do it five times. Now she was adamant that she wanted to get on with her PhD. I thanked her publicly for all her efforts and said we’d all miss her in the future. She got a well-deserved round of applause from the audience.

  At the after-show party, Margaret congratulated me on my appointment, as did Nick. I started to fill Nick in on some of the background of what had been going on and, as a PR man, he looked as concerned as I was. He could not believe what I was telling him and he too couldn’t understand this nonsense about a conflict of interests. I called together Andrew, David and Nick and, there at the party, we drafted out a one-paragraph statement to be sent out to all the media that night. It stated that my role as enterprise adviser was not to be confused with that of a minister. I would not be making any decisions, neither would I be promoting any government policies – I was just there to feed back information from the market to the government. I added that any thoughts of me giving up The Apprentice were absolutely unfounded. It was a kind of a ‘holding’ statement that we hoped would shut everybody down. We agreed we would make no further comment at all. Even at 11 p.m., the newspapers were still ringing up, demanding information.

  When I left that night, I slumped in the back of my car with my head still spinning. Ann knew not to talk. We drove home and went to bed.

  The next morning, Saturday, the phones were still ringing. Andrew and David told me that the media had gone absolutely berserk. Every single national newspaper had allocated front pages and double-page spreads to my appointment. In particular, the serious papers went to town. It was as if all the other ministerial appointments paled into insignificance – they were just focusing on me! They kept quoting Shadow Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt all the time. The media had hooked into this conflict of interests thing.

  It’s funny how it is with the media. It reminds me of the incident when Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand played that prank on Andrew Sachs – Manuel in Fawlty Towers. Yes, I guess their behaviour was a bit childish but, as often as not, something like that will simply pass by without attracting any attention. For some reason, this time the media got the bit between their teeth and blew it out of all proportion. Of course, mine was a completely different situation, but the media frenzy was exactly the same.

  I made the fatal error of reading the papers – it was diabolical! If I’d thought what I’d read about myself in the Venables days was bad, this was much, much worse. What the hell had I let myself in for? I had innocently accepted this position and was obviously very honoured at the prospect of being a lord, but I never imagined it was going to cause so much aggravation.

  Earlier in the week, I had taken the precaution of speaking to Jana Bennett, Director of BBC Vision, telling her about the discussions I was having with Gordon Brown. I ran the idea past her to see whether she could put me in touch with someone at the BBC who’d know whether this appointment would breach BBC policy. I also asked Alan Watts to read my BBC agreement, to get his view as to whether anything in it would prevent me from being a government adviser.

  In BBC contracts, quite rightly, there are clauses which state that no one participating in a television programme should be a government minister and neither should they be seen publicly to promote the policies of any political party. Alan read the contract and told me that, as my position was simply an adviser to the government, there would be nothing wrong in accepting it. I phoned Jana Bennett and told her this. She put me in touch with David Jordan, an expert in BBC policy, who discussed the matter with me briefly and also concluded that as long as I was not taking a ministerial role and would not be seen to be promoting any government policies, there was nothing to stop me accepting the appointment. With that in mind, I had accepted.

  Now I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. I was not going to give up the offer of being a government adviser and a member of the House of Lords; neither was I going to give up doing The Apprentice. Above all, I was not going to be intimidated by the newspapers. I was adamant that the media was not going to bully me into making decisions – I made that perfectly clear to Frank PR. They reiterated to the media that we would be standing by the short statement we’
d put out the night before and had no further comment to make.

  Not only did the Saturday papers have a field day, the Sundays also went to town. The thing reached such a crescendo that my PR people were contacted by the BBC to see whether I’d be prepared to appear on Andrew Marr’s Sunday morning show to talk about my new appointment. We agreed it would be a good thing to do. In hindsight, it wasn’t.

  Again, I hadn’t really been prepped on what my appointment entailed; neither had I fully understood the workings of the House of Lords. Someone like me, an ordinary person, doesn’t know the technicalities of being a Labour peer, or what taking the whip means, so I was somewhat off-guard.

  I turned up at the BBC Television Centre at Shepherd’s Bush. In the green room, I met Andrew Neil, who was also about to appear on the show, to review the Sunday papers. His welcome to me was, Ah, Sir Alan! I’ve heard of rats leaving the ship – now there’s a rat joining the ship!’

  As there’s no love lost between us and having had a bellyful of the crap in the papers, I was angered by his remark. ‘What are you banging on about, Andrew?’

  ‘Well, now you’re going to join the Labour Party. My God, rats joining the ship!’

  ‘Listen, mate, when it comes to talking about rats, you should be careful – you were once editor of the Sunday Times, so it’s a case of the pot calling the kettle black. Do me a favour – just watch your bloody mouth because I’m going on after you, and I can tell them a few stories about you too, okay?’

  I was very angry and he saw from my face that I was serious. He backed down and said, ‘I’m only joking, Alan, only joking. What’s the matter with you? Did you get out of the wrong side of bed this morning?’