Clacton by-election: what you need to know

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0:37Hello and welcome to Coffeehouse Shots, the Spectator's daily politics podcast. I'm Oscar Edmondson and I'm joined today by Noah Hoffman and very special guest Lucy Fisher, the Whitehall editor at the Financial Times and host of its Political Fix podcast. Now I've got Nigel Farage's Potemkin by-election in Clacton on Thursday, so we thought we'd do a little look ahead with everything that you need to know. Noah, just to start with, I thought it might be worth taking listeners through exactly how we got here. How did we get here? Well, I think this does trace back to the£5 million gift donation, insert whatever word you like based on your political views here, that has haunted Nigel Farage for a long time.

1:19And that is because he just has not been able to come up with an acceptable answer to the question of why he was given this money. The answer changed so many times and Farage got increasingly flustered and frustrated that he was being pressed on this issue. Now, I'm afraid if you come into politics, if you want to be a politician, it is absolutely fair game for both the press and the public to request very, very basic transparency. And frankly, reform just hasn't been completely transparent on this issue. And when pushed on it, they become very sort of tetchy. They don't want to speak about it.

1:56But ultimately, you're a politician. It is fair for the public to ask why a crypto billionaire, Thai British crypto billionaire is giving you this much money because it is such an eye watering amount that to any normal person, myself included, is very, very hard to wrap your head around. And of course, if you're in politics and you were given this money, even if it was before you became an MP, naturally people are going to ask, what's the quid pro quo? And that's what reform has been unable to answer. Now, off the back of those questions, Nigel Farage decided to get ahead of a sleaze investigation by the common sleaze watchdog into this donation or gift, however you want to frame it.

2:35by standing down, triggering a by-election. What he didn't foresee was that all the other mainstream parties said, we're not taking part in this. This is a gimmick. We would only compete in a by-election called off the back of the result of this sleaze investigation. So we're now in a situation where Farage is competing against a bin. It's a fantastic phrase to get to say on a podcast that Nigel Farage is competing against a bin. and I'm sure we will labour that point during the course of this podcast. But Lucy, you've been spending some time in Clacton over the last week or so. What are you hearing from people on the doorsteps?

3:12Are they talking about this£5 million gift? Are they as up in arms as Nigel Farage himself is? Well, in a word, no. And that was one of the striking things I found when I went down to Clacton. And I must say, this isn't scientific. Don't write in. I'm not claiming that this is a proper method for adjudicating sentiment. But my Vox Pops last week were commensurate with both the polling by Servation that suggests that Nigel Farage is on track for a very comfortable win. They found in a poll last month that he is in line to get 73 % of the vote, with Count Binface potentially getting 20%. And also the bookmakers who are forecasting an easy victory for Farage on Thursday.

3:55The people I spoke to who are fans of Farage simply didn't care about the donation, which I thought was striking. And a lot of people echoed Farage's own language about it. A lot of people said, it's not my business, which I thought was interesting that if a politician says enough times, this is a private matter, it's not to do with anyone else, that at least some voters or those who are already amenable to him seem to have swallowed that. Others, depressingly for us as journalists, were saying, it's fake news. I just don't believe the reporting I've seen around it or the criticism. When I tried to probe a little deeper, people didn't want to get into what exactly they thought was fake.

4:33They just thought this is an establishment sort of narrative against Farage. I'm not paying attention to it. And thirdly, the messaging I picked up from his supporters was this sense that they're all in it. People thought, well, yeah, fine, he might have got this donation or this personal gift. But, you know, who's going to turn down money? And frankly, all politicians are getting this kind of financial support from external benefactors, which, of course, we know certainly isn't the case. But it was interesting to my mind that people thought that, had that, what is a misconception. And also people weren't really drawing attention or hadn't ingested just how huge an amount, five million pounds is in the context of British politics, where we're used to much smaller sums of money changing hands, even donations to parties.

5:24tend to be smaller or lower millions than that. So he has then succeeded in making this effectively a referendum on Nigel Farage, rather than anything to do with any kind of local issues, etc. Well, I'd also point out among his supporters, there were two other key themes I noticed. One is quite a lot of people said he had been visible. You know, there was one woman who said, oh, you know, he came here to Walton and drew attention to the state of the pier steps and the councils now stepped in. That shows he's making a difference. another woman said you know he came here and said he'd help fill the shelves of our food bank that's been struggling and you know his team did do that and the other narrative uh that was common was people calling him nigel it's very much that boris phenomenon of people feeling like they know him and even though he's a person who was first you know a pretty wealthy stockbroker from a privileged background you know he went to public school and has spent three decades in the front line of British politics, which I don't think anyone could characterise as a normal way to sort of spend your life or career, people view him as being very authentic and grounded.

6:29They were using phrases like, he's one of us, he's a man of the people, he's an ordinary guy. So he's achieved quite a feat in styling himself in that way that voters feel that level of affection for him, the man. Yeah. I mean, Lucy talks there now about the size of the victory that we're expecting this week for Nigel Farage. But I do wonder, is there any sort of conceivable turn of events where he does, he gets a bounce out of this? Because on the one hand, we're expecting the conclusion of the investigation into him could trigger another by-election. Also, even if he does achieve, you know, 75 % of the vote, that's still 25 % in a largely uncontested field that has gone to other candidates, one of whom is a bin.

7:11Yeah, so the big question is, how far can the views and his popularity in Clacton be reflected across the rest of the UK? How much is Clacton a unique constituency versus everywhere else? So interestingly, we had a poll out from YouGov today that put Labour ahead of reform. The Tories still behind, but Labour under Andy Burnham on 24%, reform on 22%. Now, of course, Burnham is benefiting from this Burnham bounce. But the question is just how sustainable that is and whether Farage can make a comeback from the sort of fallout of this five million pound donation which evidently in Clacton has not landed in the same way that it has landed perhaps in some other quarters.

8:02Interestingly Burnham's bounce is very much off the back of people returning to Labour from the Greens and the Lib Dems rather than reform so that is quite interesting but we we need to see whether Farage can revive his popularity among the wider public and not just in Clacton and the jury is out on that. Can I can I jump in because I think you're so right Noah to distinguish between Clacton this Essex seat on the eastern seaboard of the UK which seems to have a sort of special reverence for Farage and of course before him, you know, voted in Douglas Carswell when he resigned from the Conservatives, defected to UKIP, and he won that by-election.

8:45And then unusually, he held the seat for UKIP at the general election, when often seats tend to fall back to form. So I think there is this question of why in Clactam Farage is so beloved at a time when his national ratings are falling, because the YouGov tracker shows that from a pretty low base already of minus 35 at the end of last year, Farage's net favourability has plunged to minus 46 last month, which is commensurate with the nadirs of both Boris Johnson and Keir Starmer at the worst points of their premiership. So this certainly isn't like a nationwide phenomenon of people not caring about some of the scrutiny and pressure that he's facing.

9:25Definitely. And at the same time, Burnham has trouble ahead. He wants to make some very sweeping radical changes to the likes of social care, to the likes of council house building. Now, where is he going to find the billions and billions of pounds to pay for that? Is he going to break the fiscal rules to borrow more? Is he going to raise taxes? And if he raised taxes, how well are the public, how kindly are the public going to take to that? We know that wealth taxes aren't necessarily a panacea that can raise the amount of money he would need if he wants to implement the radical changes that he's promised his followers and that he's promised the MPs who helped clear the pathway for him to effectively launch a coup against Keir Starmer and take the premiership.

10:08So there are big questions, big issues. Of course, we have the prisons crisis, which we will touch on shortly. But also, we had a 230-seater mega-dinghy make its way from France to Kent. The small boats crisis isn't going anywhere. And we know that among Labour voters, particularly the likes of the demographics that we see in his Makerfield constituency, and Burnham has spoken about this. This is a big issue in a lot of those sort of towns and rural areas, the so-called Red Wall, that Labour wants to win back from reform. That was part of the whole sort of Burnham aura that his followers said, look, this is the man who can take on Nigel Farage.

10:48if he's unable to deal with the small boats issue as uncomfortable as it is for a lot of Labour MPs who don't like to talk about illegal migration the Burnham bounce may not be as sustainable as he hopes so there's a lot to come on on those thorny issues as well. Yes well let's touch on the prison early release scheme because Andy Burnham has said that he's increasingly confident that he can adopt this early release scheme to exclude the killers of in particular PC Andrew Drew Harper and other serious offenders due to, you know, a lot of public concern, obviously. Lucy, these are the first big real tests for Andy Burnham.

11:25How do you think he's reacting to them so far? I think it's interesting. I think the handling of the prisoner early release scheme is not only the first major test for his time in office, but it does seem to hold clues about what we can expect from his premiership at large. because he's made multiple interventions now, starting with announcing the emergency review into this policy, which is around changes to sentencing to try and avert a prison's overcrowding crisis. Then he announced last week a series of restrictions that would mean around 1 ,000 of the 6 ,000 prisoners who are due to be released from October would remain in jail.

12:05He pinpointed rapists, serious sexual offenders and anyone convicted of grooming offences as being banned for consideration for early release. But those changes didn't cover the killers of PC Harper or two of them who are due to be eligible for this scheme. And that's been really high up in the headlines. Harper's widow has led the opposition to their release with a series of very emotive interviews. And so on Tuesday, Burnham has stepped in again to say, right, you know, I've not accepted no for an answer. I've told officials we've got to make this happen. I've told my justice secretary, you know, draw up options.

12:45he cited three areas of work going on now to try and improve or increase prison capacity elsewhere in order to keep some more people convicted of manslaughter in jail because the issue is he can't just single out these two individuals and say right they're staying behind bars but other people convicted of manslaughter can be released earlier so it's going to create an issue because there are potentially hundreds or more people in the same boat as this pair that he's got to deal with. But I think it's quite canny in a way, you know, while we often hear politicians try and eschew any suggestion that they bend with the wind or are buffeted by public sentiment, Burnham is really leaning into the idea that he is responding to the widespread public outcry.

13:30You know, we've had 900 ,000 people sign this petition saying that these two killers of PC Harper need to stay behind bars. And for me, there's a thread there with what's going on with his policies on the cost of living, you know, and this summer tour of the nations and regions that he started on Tuesday, in which he said he's in listening mode, he wants to hear from the public, he wants input from them for his 10-year plan for the country. He in turn wants to try and project to the public a sense of empathy, but also a sense that he is responding to the concerns of the public, and trying to make clear that it isn't the case that the system is broken, that governments can make meaningful changes to people's lives, whether it's alleviating pressure on household budgets, and can make changes in the face of bureaucrats saying no when it's very important moral or fairness issues that people feel very strongly about.

14:26Perfect. Well, thank you so much, Lucy. Thank you, Noah, and thank you very much for listening.

14:41Ever notice how every new AI tool asks you to explain your business to it all over again? Google Workspace with Gemini skips that. You get Google's AI built right into the premium versions of Gmail, Docs, Sheets, and more. No new tools, no extra logins. Just one subscription that gives you personalized AI right inside your actual workflow. Make work less work. Try Google Workspace with Gemini at goo.gle slash workspace with Gemini.