How do we get politicians to listen? Ask Us Anything

0:01You know what I love, Damo? Things that save me time. You don't have YouTube Premium, mate, so I just don't believe that. Granted, I'll give you that one. However, I've got one for you. A great time saver in personal finance is Money Week magazine. They spend a lot of time distilling the biggest stories in personal finance down into consumable chunks, so you don't have to scroll and scroll. They give practical tips on savings, investments, pensions, the UK economy, the global economy. It's like your five a day, but for finance. If you want to give Money Week a try, you can get six issues in print and the app absolutely free by visiting moneyweek.com forward slash money.

0:34After your trial, you'll save an extra£5 a quarter on the subscription, which is exclusive to Making Money listeners. And that's moneyweek.com forward slash money. But there's a link in the description if you just want to click that.

0:50Hello, everyone. Welcome to our short episodes where we look at some of your best questions. T, go for it. We've got Matt in the building. Matt, we don't actually, but Matt says, as a guy who is really into personal finance i have no debt apart my house apart from my house an emergency fund and both myself and my partner are pound cost averaging into our s and s isa me and my partner want to start a family but everything is so expensive especially adding a third person to the team facts as a dad parent yourselves could you talk about some money tips on getting ready to start a family love your content keep up the brilliant work yeah okay so The first thing is don't go crazy and buy everything brand new.

1:30There's a massive secondhand market within the parenting space where you can get basically brand new stuff for half the price. Because what everyone does is they have it, the kid grows out of it within four weeks and then they're like, oh, I spent a grand on this carry cart and now I've got to sell it. So buy everything secondhand. You know, I'm sure you found that. Definitely also get all your friends who are parents like Damo and tell them I'm having a kid and they will send you loads and loads of clothes. They almost sent me like a box of clothes like this big. And there's a period of time with kids where they don't cost much and you don't need to spend much.

2:02I see people for the first ever Christmas by spending thousands and the kid just plays with the box. Like just getting boxes and just enjoy that period when they're young where they don't cost much. That's yeah, that's a really big tip. My partner told me she's like, oh don't worry like for the first year and a bit. They don't do presents. They don't cost anything. They just, they drink milk. So like that's free because it comes from the boob. And then from the boob. Just one, just one. The boob. We've got a big boob just hanging in our living room and it just goes and sips on it. Off the teat.

2:35The giant boob, no. Yeah, they drink milk. Baby food is cheap. You can also feed them what you're eating after a certain while. But yeah, kids are fine. It's only when you get to nursery school and kindergarten and they get a bit older, they get expensive. So yeah, even toys out there, like you said, they play with the box. And you can't, we bought our son loads and loads of toys. He, apparently kids, they don't, they get confused when there's too much selection. So you should only really give them one toy at a time, but he's got like a room full of toys. So. And he likes pop-up books, right? Which are like pound, a few quid.

3:05Yeah. Whereas my son, who's 10, he comes to me the other day and he was like, oh, it's his birthday soon. I was like, what do you want? He was like, I'd like a MetaQuest 3 512 gigabyte. And I was like, what? I looked at it and it's like 800 pound. And I was just like, this guy is like, why do you want 512 gigabytes that's extra 200 pounds? It's like, because the average game is about four gigabytes and they're going to get bigger over time. So within the next 12 months, they're going to be like 40 gig and I want more than three games. So you need to future-proof it. And I was like, mate. He is definitely your son.

3:36He got me hustled here. He is definitely your son. He was like, he used the term future-proof. Yeah, exactly. And I was like, so yeah, by then Matt, you screwed basically. There ain't no more boob then. It's just bleeding you dry. So I think when you first have a kid, they are quite cheap. rely on parents and friends, and everyone's got a loft full of baby gear and then buy everything second hand. And also understand that you'll save money in other places because you won't be leaving the house. You're not gonna be spending 200 quid on a night out or anything like this anymore. Because when you do the next day, he wakes you up at 7am and you're like, oh my God, I'm trying to sleep.

4:09And he's just jumping and dad, dad, dad, dad. I'm like, I'm gonna throw up, leave me alone. Exactly. But then this smile wakes you up. You're like, oh, you're like, I'm not gonna spend 200 quid next time I go out. Yeah. You tend to go out less than you. You go out less and you go hang out with parents and you go hang out at play centers and things like this. So you spend less money on things that you used to spend money on and it kind of reframes and you just find out that they fit in nicely, don't they? They do. They give you some like peace and certain nights where you're like, oh, what should I do tonight?

4:35Oh, I'll just play with my kid. And I say, yeah. Where is it? Where did I put him?

4:46Next question. We have another Matt, Matt number two. how can we use social media platforms and influence to do what martin lewis has been doing for years i.e acting as a bridge between the public and the government we need more of it in order to educate influence and hold the government to account to do the right thing for the people who live here yeah so um i think one thing that's happening now is that people of influence influencers hate that term but you know youtubers they're getting so big that there'll be a point where politicians go holy crap these guys like they sway elections essentially.

5:19They already are in America. Yeah. Yeah, they already do it. Well, Gary's Economics, who came on, you know, agree with him or not. You can't deny that the guy gets a lot of attention and he's, as a result, will get political attention because if 300 ,000 people watch him speak every time, there's a lot of influence. And if a politician aligns with that, they get the clout, don't they? I think it will happen by virtue of people just becoming big online. You went to Downing Street, didn't you? Yeah, exactly. Feeling like in the last elections, Trump would call all these rappers to like try and sway the black community in America and like Kanye and all these people to be like, yeah, we support Trump, vote for Trump.

5:55Corbyn did Stormzy. Yeah. Yeah. And like, I'm just bait, you know, the page. Yeah. Yeah. Didn't work. But with Martin Lewis, I think it always makes me laugh where it's like, the conservatives have bought Martin Lewis in. It's like they bring in the big guns, the big guns, the financial journalist who made millions off the website. Like, you know a great guy i love him but it's it it shows that they try and leverage his like social proof of course he's he's a bloke and he he has at his core the best interests of people at heart but he's just a man the government should be able to figure things out without bringing in martin lewis who's like you know for them to go yes stop being idiots but i think this will happen more and more as we see more and more people with influence online and we just hope that those people are good and that they want to affect real change.

6:45I hope that we get to a point where people like myself are so loud and so big that we can just call out the politicians and they can't do anything about it because that will be great. Because, you know, I have no allegiance to them. I don't care. I went to 10 Downing Street. I got my picture. That's me done, mate. Do you know what I mean? Clout done. Yeah, got it. Check. Got it. They invited me back recently or emailed me and were like, oh yeah, do you want to come down or do this thing? And I was like, not really. Like, can't be bothered. Like what I mean by that is I don't wanna play that game of like I have to submit a video back to them and then they get to approve it and all of this stuff.

7:19It's not real content. It's content with conditions. I can just react from here or my studio or get someone on like Paul Johnson who is a really interesting voice. I think it's changing rapidly because media is no longer controlled by Rupert Murdoch and a handful of rich white guys who donate into political parties. is by idiots like me and you who just say what we want. And I think that can only be a good thing.

7:52This is not financial advice. Like we say a lot on the podcast, investments can fall and rise. In fact, it's almost a guarantee. Remember, past performance is no guarantee of future results. So your money is at risk with investing. Also, remember other fees may apply.

8:10We'll see you next time.