Emily Thornberry on the Corbyn era, being left out of government and Starmer’s first year

0:00This week on Outrage and Optimism, we look at the remarkable summer we've been having in Western Europe with heatwave after heatwave that has now translated into wildfires in France, in Spain and even in Scotland. There has been a conspiracy of silence in the media that is preventing us from seeing what is really happening. This week on Outrage and Optimism, we cut through to understand what's going on and how our society can and should change to deal with these issues.

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1:11This is Political Currency with Ed Balls and George Osborne.

1:26Welcome to Political Currency and a big welcome to Dame Emily Thornberry, who is in the studio here. And I think we are not actually in your constituency, but we are yards or maybe a few hundred yards from you. It feels like I'm in Thornberry country here. Yeah, but you're not. You're not. You're on the wrong side of the border. And actually, it's like there be dragons. I know my constituency really well. But if you're on the wrong side of the road, I don't know you. Oh, no. I mean, really, it's, you know, so I got a cab here and I wasn't paying attention. And I suddenly was dropped here and just did not know where I was.

2:04Felt completely disorienting. I think the border is only, you know, on the main street. I think it's like 100 yards away. Yeah. Anyway, so you're not welcoming me. I'm welcoming you to our studio. And you are taking the place of the great Ed Balls, who is, I think, inter-railing with his wife at the moment. Very good. I'll do my best. Thank you for coming in. I was sort of thinking, who would I like to talk to? And we don't know each other, but we were in Parliament for many years together. Yeah. And I always thought one of the things I like about you is that you enjoy politics. I come across quite a lot of politicians who are all sort of, oh, it's too hard and it's all very depressing and it's all too difficult.

2:49But you have always come across to me as someone who, you know, it's obviously the subject matter is often very serious, but you enjoy it. You enjoy the cut and thrust. You enjoy the kind of absurdity sometimes of politics. is that a fair thing you look like yeah I mean I do work really hard and I couldn't do it if I didn't enjoy it I mean it is really hard work right and I think if you don't enjoy it then it would just be a terrible grind but I like people and I really am interested in politics and I believe in politics I believe that it can make things better yeah so I want that's why I'm involved I want to make things better and there are there are terrible things that happen in the world where politics fails.

3:36And so I believe that we can find a way through these things. And we need to work on it. But yes, I do enjoy it. I absolutely love the honor of being the representative of Islington South. People are lovely to me. I get hugged in the street. I mean, I also get shouted at, but, you know, but I try to remember the people who hug me in the street. and it's a great honour to be their MP and to do everything I can to represent them on the national stage but I also am very excited at the moment with the Labour government finally after 14 years of the Tories and to be able to play my part in as I say in making the country better and in my role as chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee to make the Foreign office as good as it possibly can be.

4:26But you must be one of the now longer serving Labour MPs just because there's been such an influx of new MPs. It's been such a turnover. But you know people often say to me and I've been out of Parliament for eight years now, has life as an MP got harder or do you think just every generation of MPs thinks oh it was somehow easier in the past or they have a sort of rose-tinted view of what politics used to be like or do you in your experience as a as an MP has has it got is it a harder job than when you and I got elected it's definitely different I think life in parliament itself is easier we don't have things that are a bit more flexible in terms of the whipping arrangements I remember when I was first elected I had this big row with the leadership about introducing 90 days detention without any evidence and because you were you were elected at the sort of tail end of the Blair Brown that's right that's right yeah so 2005 I've been an MP for like six weeks and uh and seven seven happens and 13 people from Islington are killed in the bombs and and I do my best to try and pull my community together we have a big uh memorial meeting with all of the faiths represented with all the families there and you know we put out the Islington statement which was essentially saying, you know, I mean, I didn't quite use this language, but what I meant was these bastards aren't going to divide us.

5:55The reason they hate us is because we are an example to the world of how people can live together and actually get on. And we're not going to let them, you know, pull us apart. Anyway, so that was kind of the approach I'd taken. And then Tony Blair wanted to introduce 90 days detention. I mean, like, what happens if they picked up the wrong Mohammed outside of the sixth form college in Islington and stuck him in jail for three months. I mean, if he wasn't, you know, radicalized beforehand, he certainly would be by the time he came out. And so would all his classmates. I mean, it was disastrous policy.

6:24And so I was a really proud Labour MP. I just like, I couldn't believe I'd been elected. And, you know, it was fantastic. And then I had to go into full blown opposition to my very own government, which was awful. And presumably people said, you're never going to serve on the front. Of course, of course, of course. You're ruining your career. No, no, no, no. But, you know, I couldn't. I just couldn't. I've been a barrister for 20 years beforehand. I had done criminal defense work. I knew, you know, I knew about the pitfalls and I knew about, you know, you give police officers the power to arrest people without any evidence what was going to happen.

6:58And I couldn't allow it to happen. I had to do everything I could to stop it. But I did get into an awful lot of trouble. There were people who would not speak to me. They would not speak to me, not just for weeks, but for much longer. What, members of the government? Members of the parliament, other backbenchers who just didn't want to be seen, like contaminated by me. They kept me in a cupboard. I wasn't allowed to ever leave parliament. I used to be on a three line whip at all times, never to any, you know, that sort of thing. It came down really hard on me because they also hadn't been a rebellion that had actually been successful before.

7:32And there I was a six week MP involved. I was an opposition MP, I remember, at the time. um so if you say that first so that was hard so that first period as a government backbencher yeah you were basically bolshie uh obstructive uh rebel no no i wasn't absolutely not you know but that was the ironic thing actually i was a really loyal labor backbencher proud of my government but i disagreed on that right you know so now you're now you're a again a government backbencher 14 you know we've had the 14 years of the Tories in between and so 20 years I've been in parliament now and um how is it different now because you're maybe you're the if not the most senior labor backbencher pretty much the most senior well there are there are there are quite a few that are more senior than me but well no I mean I'm amongst I'm amongst you've done top jobs in the shadow cabinet right you're chair of one of the top select committees how do you what do you see your job now do you see as a government backbench was you critical friend what would be your yeah yeah i'm still i'm i'm labor through and through i'm i'm proud we've got a labor government i want it to do well i i wish it well i want to help and so it's really a question of how do you help as a backbencher as opposed to a frontbencher i think that you do have more i have more latitude to speak more freely.

9:00I can be more discursive. I can, you know, I mean, I've been I've been doing media today in which I've been able to talk at greater length and with with less self-consciousness than perhaps I might have done as a frontbencher. You have to always be careful when you're speaking on behalf of the government or behalf of your party to get it absolutely right. You know, I remember being on Question Time with Farage once And he's on Question Time the whole time. Well, yeah, except it seems I've been on Question Time, according to Question Time, as often, if not more often than him. But anyway, so the two of us are on Question Time.

9:37And he leans over and he says, oh, Emily, you're such a swat. Look at all those notes you've got. And I said, well, I'm speaking on behalf of the Labour Party. I can't just make it up as I go along, which obviously he can. If you're a one-man band, you can pick your own tunes. Exactly, exactly. And that, you know, so you can speak more freely. I can say much more what I believe. But I also do want to be supportive. And I want the government to be as good as it can be. And I want it to listen to some alternative voices sometimes. times and what's your i mean obviously you know i don't want to go over it all but you must have been disappointed not to be put in the government when it was elected a year ago i think some people i know when that doesn't happen to them or indeed they're fired from you know government they go right that is it right you know i am now the sworn enemy of the party leader um but i mean you had the same experience didn't you yeah you know i mean you'd been in a very senior job and then teresa may takes over you must have gone in thinking oh well i may not get that job but presumably i'll get something else yeah and i didn't get anything yeah i didn't not only not get my job but i didn't get offered anything at all nor did i no exactly so we understand each other it was a surprise and and i would say you maybe have taken it better than i did no no i mean Well, you know, so I found it very hard.

11:08I found it very hard. I was very upset. For a long time, I was very upset. But my approach has always been, I sound like a terrible girl guide, but I mean, my approach has always been make the best of what you've got. Make the best of now, because if you don't make the best of now, then who knows what will happen to you next? I do give advice to people who want to be MPs that you have to be happy to be an MP. All you want to do is be the Prime Minister. You're likely to be disappointed or you only want to be a government. I think you have to enjoy, as I think you do, Parliament and... Yes, and being a representative.

11:49And I think you do also... I mean, I've got more perspective now I've left, which I don't think I saw at the time. There are lots of ways to influence a government. I mean, arguably, this government has been as influenced by things happening outside the cabinet as things happening inside the cabinet on big decisions they've taken on Gaza or welfare reform or whatever it happens to be. Well, that's healthy. Yeah. What about, I want to ask you, I love sort of what ifs in politics. We've done a few on this show. But I don't think people really have noticed how close Jeremy Corbyn came to winning that 2017 election.

12:29I mean, it was against Theresa May. I mean, it was only a few seats. I mean, if she had not, if she'd lost five more seats or something like that, then there wouldn't have been a deal with the Ulster Unionists that would have given the Tories a majority. and Jeremy would have been the prime minister and you would have been in effect the, I don't know if you've been, you were going to be the first secretary of state and foreign secretary and so on. There's a bit to me that just wonders and I don't know whether you have thought about it. How would the British state have coped with Jeremy as prime minister?

13:01What would have happened? So I think the thing that people need to remember is that he is a collectivist. So actually he gave you much more leeway leeway than a lot of leaders do and and then would allow people to work collectively so so that was important and if i had stayed um in the role i was then which i think i was shadow foreign at that point um and and shadow first secretary so that i think that there would have been a lot of things that would have been different i think we would have had a second referendum on on whether we should leave the european union although jeremy himself was who cut a closet Brexit deal, wasn't he?

13:41I genuinely don't think that's right. I mean, the number of conversations I had on a one-to-one basis with Jeremy Corbyn about Europe, I don't even remember. I had more conversations with him about the Western Sahara. I mean, seriously, that was not his thing. His thing was poverty, it was housing, it was human rights, it was foreign affairs, but not Europe. Not interested, really not interested. I mean, maybe a residual, if you thought about it, oh, I don't think I like Europe, but not. The kind of 1970s, the Tony Ben view of it's a capitalist club. Yeah, but not that, but not even bought it up that large.

14:19I mean, like probably in his peripheral vision. So, yeah. So second referendum. So definitely. That's a big deal. I think there would have been a second referendum. I think there would have been a second referendum and we would have said, you know, is this what you want? Yeah. You know, this is the best deal we've been able to get. Is this what you want? It isn't, obviously, it isn't all the things that were promised before the referendum, because like, you know, everything was promised, you know, during the referendum. And clearly it was not possible to deliver those things. So to say to the public, you know, we need to be clear before we do this is a big step.

14:52Do you really want this? This is the best deal we can get. So what about, you know, you would have been the foreign secretary, MI6 reports to the foreign secretary, GCHQ reports to the foreign secretary. I mean, how would all those spy agencies have coped with Jeremy? I had quite a good relationship with them. I mean, I think, you know, I'd been in quite a lot. And I think that I'm seen as a trusted person. No, I'm sure they were hoping the buck would stop with you rather than with the Prime Minister. I mean, Jeremy had been in too. I'd arranged for a meeting with Jeremy too. Probably wasn't the first time they'd listened to Jeremy Corbyn.

15:32It was always a question about what files they had on him, whether he was allowed to see them. It would have been quite funny. It wouldn't have been. In my head, but maybe it's, you know, I'm kidding myself. You don't remember that wonderful Chris Mullen book, A Very British Coup, which was also then a great BBC drama. Would it have been, I mean, I just wonder whether the British establishment could have accepted him as Prime Minister, even though it was so close. They absolutely would have accepted you as Foreign Secretary. I've got absolutely no doubt. about that or indeed most of the people who are in that shadow cabinet um it's just the prime minister there's so there are you know the most sensitive sort of security level and military level these are prime ministerial decisions the relationship with the united states for example i just wonder but you think it basically would have worked out somehow i'm not saying it wouldn't have been difficult i'm not pretending that it wouldn't have been difficult i think there's But I think the reality is, you know, people listening to this to this program will know that that those in the back room are as important as those who do front of house.

16:39And so probably not enough attention is spent on who might have been in the back room and who Jeremy might have chosen to be his trusted advisors and who would have had the ear. I think that perhaps is more important than anything else. And I used to always, I used to have, I had a number of people know the number of arguments I had. Or they know about some of them. And I always used to say, advisors advise and the politicians decide I am not being told what to do. There's a certain Mr. Milne. There's certain, I mean, there was, you know, you could, okay, let's say this, right. This is, I think, a really good example.

17:19So after the Salisbury poisoning, I was supposed to be doing the response in Parliament. And so I wrote a speech. And that I emailed downstairs to the leader's office. All this is known because somebody in the leader's office leaked all these emails. So you can see. You can see the progression. What I would have said if I'd been able to do it. But then the Theresa May did it. So therefore Jeremy Corbyn did the answer. So I didn't. and so they redrafted my speech and you can see that it's not as strong as it was but it's still just about all right but not great and but that was as far as we got and then what actually happened the real damage was done by Seamus Milne briefing the press in the way that he did saying something way out there and not actually what Jeremy had said in his speech and certainly not what I would have said so I think you know that dynamic is a kind of quite a good illustration of the tensions.

18:17That would have played out in government. I think that's a really interesting contrast. But tell me if I got it wrong. You're not a Corbynista. You know, I put you much more to the sort of centre of the... I mean, I agree with a lot of the things that Jeremy said. You know, I mean, I agree with the emphasis that he puts on housing, on poverty, where he's Islington North, I'm Islington South. My experiences are very similar to his in terms of the needs of my constituents. You're much more mainstream Labour. Yeah, probably more mainstream. mainstream in the sort of Labour movement. Yeah, I mean, I believe I come from the heart of the Labour Party and always have.

18:51And so, you know, you took the decision, which, you know, some Labour MPs chose to not do, which is to serve in the shadow cabinet, as of course did Keir Starmer. And I guess you would have taken the view it's better to be inside the tent trying to shape things and make things better. And, you know, if I'm there, I can influence things. I mean, it's sort of, you know, and yet Jeremy Corbyn is now outside the tent. I mean, he was kicked out, but he's decided to set up his own party rather than to fight to be kind of readmitted to Labour. Why did you make your decision? And presumably there were some Labour MPs saying, Emily, how can you possibly serve?

19:35It was worse than that. It was worse than that. um i mean i i was given a place in the cabinet after the big rebellion post the referendum and uh and everybody was saying you know oh it's all jeremy corbyn's fault we refuse to serve in you know etc etc and i just thought it was wrong i thought that first of all i i would and and you And some of my best friends. And I would have terrible rows about it. And I would say, look, first of all, you're not going to shift him. The way the Labour Party is, if you want to be leader of the Labour Party and you're leader of the Labour Party, you stay being leader until you decide not to.

20:16And he's not going to change his mind. I think you misunderstand the nature of the man. He's been a backbencher on the Labour benches. He's pretty bloody minded. And if he makes up his mind to do something, you're not going to shift him. So he's going to be leader of the Labour Party. And the more you rebel and the more difficult people are, actually, the more support he's likely to get because people are the victim. And this is not the way to do it. The way to do it is to be is to make him the best leader he can be. It's your duty to make him the best leader. If you're a Labour MP, you should make the leader of the Labour Party the best leader he can be.

20:47That's my view. And if you really felt that you could make a difference by rebelling, then fine. And I'd say to people, why are you doing it? You know that you can't. They go, oh, because that's just so awful. I can't possibly. I go, well, get over yourself. It's your duty. Although wouldn't some people say that's, you know, a kind of a feature of the left and particularly, but it's very tribal. It's, you know, you're part of a movement with all that history. I always think the Conservative Party doesn't carry anything like that kind of baggage. I don't think it's baggage, you see. I think it's like, that's what I like.

21:21Yeah, but there would be people who say, you know, I'm Labour. I always vote Labour, But even if that's going to put in an office like a prime minister, I fundamentally disagree with. We don't fundamentally disagree with him. But there are things you just I mean, listen, if you're on the left, then you want to change. You want change. And you'll have slight difference of emphasis as to kind of what change you want. Of course, that's that's the nature of the left. The great the great advantage we have in this country is that we have a Labour Party. And that is a coalition where the coalition on the left.

21:50And so there will be people who will disagree. But what we have to do is in order for there to be a two-party system, in order for there to be first past the post, the Labour Party has to be a bit more tolerant of the Labour Party. You know, we are much better at fighting each other than we are fighting the Tories sometimes. And we have to get over ourselves. And we just need to be able to work out. You know, we agree with each other 85 % of the time and we can disagree vehemently on 15%. That's fine. But we need to have a bit of respect for each other and a bit of trust for each other. And, you know, that's what I think.

22:24And people hate me for it. Well, you say coalition on the left, but I think some people at the moment would say that the Labour Party is allowing a kind of fragmentation on the left because the Green Party is doing better. The Liberal Democrats have been picking up some of the sort of supportive people who don't like, for example, the fact that Keir Starmer is doing deals with Donald Trump. there is the potential we don't know yet of the kind of jeremy corbyn zara sultana party do you think the labor there there's a kind of critique you hear from some of my labor friends which is that you know downing street is obsessed with farage and the right and they're kind of neglecting the left and that's actually if the labor body could just hold together all the people who are center-left progressives that would be what you need to win an election yeah i think i'm more in that wing i mean i think i'm more of that belief um but is that because you're an islington mp if i had here uh i guess what we used to call the red wall mp you know if you had the mp for hartley pool or sedgefield they would say no no you can't ignore that farage reform you know streak in politics in there obviously you know it cost me my political career at the time of brexit what Labour's got to understand that in the seats it's won at this election uh recent election it the the threat is from Farage it's not from the Tories and it's not from the Liberal Democrats and whatever I think the threat to the Labour Party is a lack of confidence I think we need to be a bit more proud of ourselves and what it is that we stand for and I think that there's nothing wrong with speaking to the public and saying you may not agree with everything we're doing but look at all the things we are doing that you do agree with i think that's important and i think you also need to have the confidence to be able to listen and yes if necessary change what you're doing and say i'm changing my mind because i've heard this argument and this is a good one and yeah no i hear you i understand we just need to be able to do that i think that the problem that we have is giving the impression of being buffeted about well it's more than an impression i mean it has been buffeted about on the domestic front well because you can't announce like we're cutting these disability benefits or we're taking away the winter fuel announce and then a few months later say oh we've changed our yeah no i mean i know you can say oh it's good they're listening but but it is good listening yeah but generally better to get it right first it's better to get it right the first time it's better to get the right first time and the way to get it right the first time is to listen in the first place and uh and to think through what you're doing um so but i all i'm saying is that is that within what would be seen as a red wall seat, there will be all kinds of different people.

25:08You can't just assume that everybody is the same because that's really insulting. There's actually layer upon layer of different people. And what you can do is you can, I think, if you listen to start with, is pitch things in such a way that you are largely giving people what they want, but not completely. But there are certain elements, there are certain things as undercurrents that you just need to be mindful of and work out, well, do we have an answer to this? Do we have a confident answer to this? And it may not be everything that people want. It may not even be what they're demanding, but it is an answer.

25:40And if it delivers on what they want, but it's done in a slightly different way, there's nothing wrong with that. But you just need to stand your ground and be clear about it. So why do you think on the sort of domestic front, things have not gone as well as you might expect? I mean, the first year of this government, given it's got a huge majority, has not been anything like as smooth as the Blair's 20-year-old first year. or even the Cameron first year, and that was in a coalition. So on the foreign stage, and you're the chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, I would say Keir Starmer is doing pretty well, and he's handling Trump better than most foreign leaders and the like.

26:19And obviously it's got its moments when you have to sit there and listen to the president. But, you know, I think that's been pretty well handled in the relationship with Europe. But domestically, even the most loyal members of the cabinet would say, well, we haven't got it all right. And our message isn't quite clear. And people don't really know what the labor body stands for domestically. Is that fair? Why is it? So why is it? Well, I think at least part of it is because you guys left us with. They weren't my guys by the end. Well, whoever they were, that lot left us with the highest tax burden since World War II, the biggest debt ever, and public services that were on their knees.

27:05And public expenditure right up as well, actually. But the country always changes party when there's a mess. No, no, no. But I mean, seriously a mess. It's seriously a mess. And so to turn that around was really difficult. And then we had fought a very nervy election where we had got very pinned in in terms of what our range of responses could be. So, you know, we were on a very small territory. You mean you could have taken more risks to secure a mandate for change? Well, you know, I'm talking with hindsight here. But, yeah, I mean, obviously, I think it would have been much easier for us if we hadn't got ourselves pinned in.

27:48but we have we've got ourselves pinned in now in terms of where we can get money from um and and what it is you know we have a list of things that we want to do but there's so little money there's so little room for maneuver um so it's it's much more difficult i mean it really is hard then i think there is an additional problem which is we're not terribly good at explaining what the problem is really and but what we need to do is say look here is the problem but there is a solution and we do have a way through this and this is what it is and here's the way we're going to go you know so so okay so so with the courts i wish it's something i know well you cannot have someone going to trial in four years time because they won't ever plead guilty why would you even if you're completely banged to rights you're not going to plead guilty because chances are one of the witnesses will be dead or forgotten or you know whatever and you're 19 years old four years time is another lifetime so you'll always plead not guilty which clogs up the courts even more and then what happens to witnesses or to the public you cannot believe in the court system or in the criminal justice system if people aren't actually meeting justice in a in a you know justice delayed is justice denied and so we have inherited a court system that is just i mean it it's so different to my experience 20 years ago so hang on so what i'm saying is like that's how bad it is So we need to find a solution.

29:13So some of the things that are being suggested that we have as a solution are pretty scary. So we need to get rid of jury trial on a whole range of offences and have it tried by a judge and a couple of wingers instead in order to speed up, in order to get through the backlog. We should explain why we're having to do that. But also, if we have confidence that that plan will work, why don't we say we're going to do it for three years? We're going to introduce it for three years because we have a plan and it's going to work. And out the other side will be a justice system that you recognise as being good.

29:46And you think that could get through? Well, that's what we should. Because people like you with a long record of being concerned about people's human rights, you'd be prepared to say, OK, we'll temporarily get rid of juries to get rid of this backlog. Get rid of all juries, but get rid of juries in a whole range of different cases, but only if it's for a short term period. But, you know, if you believe in your plan, why would you worry about there being a sunset clause after three years? But that's something you could have announced. I mean, you, sorry, the Labour government could have announced on day one.

30:16It's a bit hard, you know, a year in and you're, I mean, I'm not saying that honeymoon is completely over, but there's still a kind of some space to announce new things. But a whole year has passed where some of these things could have been done. Well, just on that, I mean, I think that what's happened is that we've recently, there was a review done and the review came back. and so now the government is going to spend the summer and will come out with some announcements on what it is that it agrees with. So you need to spend a bit of time kind of in office looking at it and having a proper review done of just how bad things are and how bad they're likely to get.

30:50But I do think we should have, and I got up in the chamber and said, look, why don't you just say, why don't you sort out a plan, tell us it's going to work and then it only needs to be temporary. But isn't there maybe a problem for centre-left governments, not just in Britain, but around the world, of, you know, in these sort of monies tight, the bond market's breathing down the neck of the chancellor. You know, taxes, as you say, already get a historic high. So are you really going to look at the reaction when Rachel Reeves puts up employer national insurance and the like? you know it's not clear that another couple of billion pounds a year is going to make a huge difference to some of these public services they're all kind of creaking and then you've got this sort of angry population angry about immigration angry about kind of cultural issues and it's just quite the sort of Clinton Blair era of the confident center-left progressive world feels, you know, somewhat in the rearview mirror at the moment.

31:56Well, I'm not saying it isn't hard. Of course it's hard. But, you know, we're not giving up. Why should you give up? I mean, as I say, I've just given you a suggestion in relation to that. I mean, I'm now going to contradict myself because whilst taxation levels are very high, I think actually what we have seen over the last few years is the rich has got a lot richer. I think that we should be looking, and this is not my fault, but, you know, I do think that there may well be things that we can do. Well, some of them live in Islington South. Some of them live in Islington South. Very nice squares.

32:34Absolutely. Georgian terraces. No, no, no. And Islington South's a really good example, where the rich in Islington South get richer and the poor in Islington South get poorer. And there's nobody in the middle these days. Because they can't afford the houses. Because they can't afford the houses. Because they're not lucky enough to have been there for long enough or whatever it is. There's lots of people who are there just out of sheer luck. But most people are the richer getting richer and the poorer getting poorer. And so how do we square that? What do we do? So I think that we should be looking at things like capital gains tax.

33:04I don't understand why capital gains tax rates are so different than income tax. I mean, if you get things on capital gains tax, you obviously haven't grafted for it. It's just because you've been lucky enough to have money that you make money. That's actually a Nigel Lawson argument, believe it or not. Well, there we are. There you go. Me and Nigel Lawson, we're like one. i guess the argument would be you know you're seeing i mean there's a london mp you might pick up a bit of this of like wealthy people are leaving the capital you're like tomby that's happens no no i mean it's uh i don't know wealthy people leaving the capital middle middle ranking people leaving the cap people in middle income have been leaving the capital and having to commute in i mean how many i mean so it's like leave leaving for like oh i see going abroad well yeah but i mean i'm also more interested in you know the teachers who have to live such a long way out and in order to come in to teach in the islington schools that they don't do after school clubs because they've got to commute home again yeah so there are them too but there's also you know there will be wealthy people who are who can move around the world and who are constantly moving around the world and who may make a fuss about leaving britain because there may be an increase in tax but i suspect they will keep their homes and i suspect they will spend a lot of time here and they probably in a couple of years time will be spending the majority of their time here again because britain is britain we speak english the it's safe on the streets we have a fantastic cultural life we have great schools we you know it's the best place to be we have a you know we have a good uh uh we have good weather we have beautiful countryside why would you not want to live in britain i mean you do really i'm not sure about the weather but apart from the...

34:43Well, at least it isn't so hot. Okay. So you're just sort of saying, you know, there needs to be more self-confidence. It's a centre-left government. It should do what it was elected to do. It should do its thing. Yeah. And do you think it will? Do you think after the problems of the first half of this year with these big U-turns on the domestic front, it is beginning to kind of understand that? Or do you still think there's sort of... I don't know. I don't know. it needs to work at it and i know that that's what kira is supposed to be doing over the summer and you know i wish him all the best what are you going to be doing over the summer i'm going away for most of august um during the time when i was a barrister i used to always take august off we have this me and my husband have a pattern of working really hard and then we take august off don't work in august we're very french that way yeah um and and so i'm all in favor of I think that's...

35:38Yeah, and then we spend time with the kids. And so over the years, we've had all kinds of holidays. I mean, I'm wearing a jacket that I bought in Syria immediately before the war. It's a lovely jacket. But the point is, I went there with the family. I mean, I was in Aleppo on Easter Day, and we were listening to the bells ringing across Aleppo. And I said to the kids, you see, Christianity is an Eastern religion. I mean we had experiences like that because we would take all of August off and this would be the thing. You don't sip Chianti in Tuscany or whatever. I do sometimes. I do sometimes. But you do more exotic.

36:18Every other year we do a really exotic kind of adventure. And we take photographs and we collect things and we stick them all in scrapbooks. And they're the most treasured possessions of the family. And your children, although they're adults, they come with you. Yeah, well we'll pay for them if they want to come. And so they come. That's the key, isn't it? Yeah. And do you reflect on politics over the autumn? You know, if you get back to the autumn, you know, you're going to be thrown straight into it as chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee on Gaza recognition and, you know, who knows what. And the UN meetings.

36:55And the UN meetings in September. But you can pick that up when you get back. You don't spend a huge amount of time stewing on all that. I think it's one of those things where you do think about it. You try not to. But actually, it's a little bit like when you're completely relaxed. If you're in the bath, you can come up with some pretty good ideas. You know, on holiday, you don't mean to think about it, but you do. And sometimes just by having a bit of distance and relaxing a little, there are certain things that become clear. And what about the – what's your political ambition? You know, you were disappointed not to be on the front bench.

37:31I imagine if you were offered a front-bench role, you'd take it. Does that mean, I always think it's one of the kind of challenges of the UK's parliament as opposed to the American Congress. You can be the chair of a, if you were a senator and you were chair of the Foreign Relations Committee in the Senate, that is an unbelievably powerful position. And you wouldn't necessarily swap that out for a position in the government. Whereas here, maybe I'm not speaking about you personally, but people have always traded in those jobs for jobs in government. How do you think about that? I mean, it's not in your gift.

38:07No, it's not in my gift. I'm enjoying being chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee much more than I thought I would. I mean, I thought I'd enjoy it, but I really enjoy it. I have a great committee. There are like eight of them are new, completely new. Lucky them being on the Foreign Affairs Committee. You used to have to do your time before you... Yeah, no, exactly. But they've also got a wealth of experience, you know, really different type of personalities and experience. I've got John Whittingdale on the committee. I mean, how good is that? You know, somebody who's got experience of being chair of a committee himself.

38:41And he's very good. He doesn't normally tell me off in front of everybody else, but sometimes he does. But, you know, I'm able to talk to him about what I'm doing wrong and, you know, he gives me advice and so on. And we have disagreements, but it's fine, you know. but I mean my committee works really hard there is this classic thing isn't there with some committees where you see these MPs just reading out questions that somebody else has written and they don't even necessarily understand them whereas my committee they do their own work they write their own questions they are I mean they're great they're really great so it's a joy and I'm very proud of them and I think we're very influential because of that because we're on it and because we work together, you know, we get on.

39:27I would like the experience of being in government because I had this big row when I first arrived in Parliament and when we were in government, I was never in government. And I've been an MP for 20 years and I'm really sad I've never had the experience of being in government. But it really depends, I suppose. You know, it's not in my gift, you know, what I might be offered if I was ever offered anything. because I really like what I'm doing now. I'm a little bit of one of life's enthusiasts. Whatever I'm doing, I really enjoy. Sometimes the grass looks greener on the other side. But I still would like to have had the experience of being a minister because if you're a minister, you can get things done.

40:08I mean, as chair of a committee, you try to influence those who are able to get things done. So you may be able to get things done, but it's all very indirect. So to actually be able to make the decisions. Listen, I don't even know because I haven't had the experience. Yes, although I wonder on something like Gaza, Palestinian recognition, whether your influence and the influence of certainly the parliamentary Labour Party is quite a lot bigger than, say, a minister of state in the Foreign Office. I don't know. So anyway, we will see. We will see what happens to your career. I mean, it's certainly been a fantastic career today.

40:48And as I say, I'm going to end where I started. You know, as I think you demonstrated, you just enjoy it. Yeah. And you take whatever's coming next. And so I think you're going to have a pretty interesting parliament ahead of you, would be my prediction. I think so too. I think so too. Thank you very much for having me. Thanks for coming to your neighbouring constituency here in Hoxton. Hopefully I'll be able to find my way out again. I think you go out and turn right, from what I understand.

41:23Welcome back. We hope you're enjoying the summer. Maybe you're by the pool with a drink in hand. Maybe you are powering through work in August. Maybe you're on the road on holiday somewhere. But we're glad you are listening. And what we've been doing this August is picking a subject to muse over to help entertain you and make you think during this August break or work. And today we're going to talk about reshuffles, or in particular, the first reshuffle of a government. Yeah, we're going to talk about first reshuffle. So this is not those moments when a prime minister has to replace an individual minister.

41:58So, for example, Keir Starmer has already got a new transport secretary because the transport secretary had to resign. But we're talking about the big government-wide reshuffles. And there's a lot of speculation that Keir Starmer is going to carry out one of these in September when Parliament returns. So we're going to use some specific examples from recent prime ministers, and we're going to learn the lessons of why they happen, what they were trying to achieve, and whether they achieved those goals as prime ministers. Let's start with Tony Blair's first reshuffle. That's the most obvious sort of direct parallel.

42:34New Labour prime minister after years of opposition. He's come in with his team, his shadow cabinet team. They're a kind of band of brothers and sisters who've led their party from the wilderness into the promised land of government. And he has his first reshuffle, doesn't he, a year after coming into office in July 1998. So he does it just before Parliament breaks. It has to be said, normally, Prime Ministers do do it in July before Parliament breaks. It's not unprecedented to do it in September, but that's normally the time you have a reshuffle because Parliament's not sitting in. You've got a whole summer for people to settle into the new jobs before the political autumn starts.

43:11That's right. And I think if you're thinking to yourself, what does a reshuffle tell you about the prime minister's motives? What is the purpose? What are they trying to convey? What are they trying to do? In that summer of 1998, this was Tony Blair taking control, taking control of his government. And it may seem kind of odd to say that because surely he'd won this huge majority the previous year. You know, he was in charge, but his first government reflected, I think, two things. One, that in opposition, the shadow cabinet had been elected by the parliamentary party. And so people had been in senior positions, not because Tony Blair had chosen them, but because they'd won a poll of MPs.

44:00And although some of them didn't transfer over into the first government in 97, quite a few did. And secondly, Gordon Brown and Tony Blair had had a sort of partnership approach to the conversation about appointments. I've been quite surprised in 1997 about how much influence Gordon Brown had over appointments to the first Blair government. You know, Doug Henderson, a close Brown ally, was made Europe minister, very much what Gordon wanted. Chief whip was Nick Brown. And the first year had been fractious between Blair and Brown. You remember the Routledge book had come out in which Gordon Brown had talked about the pain of losing the leadership election to Tony Blair.

44:46There had been some arguments along the way. And in that summer reshuffle, it was done from Chequers. Gordon Brown was not involved in it really at all. He was quite excluded. So this is Blair moving from a kind of dual leadership, which was stitched together after the Labour leadership contest, the kind of Granita deal bit of their story, to Blair's now been Prime Minister for a year and he's beginning to exert more sort of central Blair-only control. And in some overt way. So first of all, people who lost their jobs, David Clarke, Gavin Strang, lost their jobs in the cabinet. People like Stephen Byers, Peter Mandelson came into his first cabinet job at Trade and Industry.

45:35So this was Tony moving out some of the older people who had been stalwarts of the PLP and bringing in the Blairites. the Blairites. Nick Brown was removed as chief whip. Gordon was very upset about that. And Ann Taylor was brought in as chief whip. Harriet Harman also seen at the time. She'd been Gordon's deputy when he was shadow chancellor, shadow chief secretary. She'd been the social security secretary. She was removed from office very significantly. Stephen Byers came in against what Gordon would have wanted to be chief secretary to the treasury. So Tony Blair puts in one of his people to be in a spy in the camp alistair darling a close brown ally replaced by stephen uh byers and it all happened i think baroness jay didn't gordon brown put off the same trick when he put a certain yvette cooper in to be chief secretary with alistair darling was charles well um yeah although yeah don't forget that that the alistair um was you know a close ally or had been but that was anyway we're getting on to another that sort of slightly jumps us to you're jumping us ahead bairn s j becomes leader in in in the lords it was definitely seen as tony blair stamps his authority his people on the government and its direction including the the treasury it didn't work at the treasury i think both stephen byers and alan milburn were chief secretaries and then they were replaced by andrew smith which returned to the previous rather more cooperative uh model um but um i think the treasury didn't you know they had a they had an entirely separate scorecard for the chief secretary, which is important, no relation to what they were actually doing with the Charles.

47:15I spent a lot of my time briefing the chief secretary to make sure they were up to speed. I'd love to get a briefing from you if I was an enemy of Brown. With where we were. But so, you know, there are different motives for reshuffles. This one was Tony Blair takes control. That was his first reshuffle. So now let's jump ahead to Gordon Brown. He's been prime minister for a few months. and he takes over in the summer of 2007. Things go well to begin with, but as anyone who's listened to our Inside the Room on the election that never was, will know that by the time you get to the beginning of 2008, it is like they are in serious trouble.

47:55And what do we know about Brown's reshuffle then? Well, I think the motive by that point is very different from that first Blair reshuffle. Gordon had appointed the cabinet he wanted, but with a very big eye on keeping Blair allies happy and in the tent the previous summer. But it had been a very tough autumn. You'd had the election, which didn't happen, the leaking of the child benefit discs, the early beginnings of what became the financial crisis with Northern Rock. and the first brown reshuffle is briefed as brings in youth so caroline flint andy burnham uh yvette all come into the cabinet for the the first time this is um these work in the case of caroline and andy strongly tony blair supporting people but also young people and it was we aren't tired we're fresh and youthful we've got momentum for the next phase and this is even more than before you know a balanced ticket later in that autumn there's another reshuffle which brings back peter manderson if you remember and that summer that's an incredible surprise a huge surprise although i think that summer gordon had been discussing whether to bring in alistair Campbell as a minister as well.

49:24Peter Mandelson comes back. At that time, Gordon had chosen Jeff Hoon to be his first chief whip. I think when Peter Mandelson comes back, Nick Brown returns as chief whip. So that is sort of Peter Mandelson comes back into the fold as the Blairite figure. But Nick Brown to rescue the Brown premiership. But Nick Brown takes control of the parliamentary operation. So there was a sort of bit of quid pro quo. And David Miliband is foreign secretary? David Miliband is foreign secretary from the beginning all the way through. But that first reshuffle, the message was we've not lost momentum, youth, dynamism.

49:58Next generation. Next generation. I think James Pennell may have come into a cabinet position in that reshuffle as well. Yes, only to resign later. So let's go to the Cameron reshuffle. Because I think this is an interesting model for Starber. So in both those cases, what are the parallels for Starmer? In the case of Blair, well, he doesn't really have a sort of duopoly with his chancellor, even though Rachel Reyes was a very important part of the election campaign. I mean, no one doubts that Starmer has been making decisions on who's in the cabinet already. So I'm not sure he needs to kind of assert his control.

50:37And it's quite useful. It's not an old, experienced team. He doesn't have the kind of Gavin Strangs and the David Clarks, does he? So, and then the Brown reshuffle, or maybe there are some parallels, which is, you know, it hasn't all gone according to plan. But, you know, we're still on track. If you look at the Cameron reshuffle, so the first thing about the Cameron reshuffle is it doesn't happen for two years. So Cameron doesn't reshuffle, skips this reshuffle. And it'd be quite interesting, isn't it? Keir Starmer could just say, I'm not having a reshuffle at all. Why do I need one? And the problem with reshuffles, let's be absolutely clear, it's not the people who are promoted.

51:16That is not the problem. That's what all the attention is. But they, you know, they love you. You've just promoted them. It's all the people who aren't promoted who are like, oh, God, I've been overlooked. And above all, it's the people you fire because the people you fire never, ever forgive you. I know there's a, you know, sometimes people are reappointed later on, but it's pretty rare. And, you know, whips always tell you, oh, Prime Minister, reappoint one or two people just to show those who've been fired that there's hope. But the truth is, once you're fired, you're like, this person is now an obstacle to my career and I'm no longer their friend or ally.

51:53So anyone you get rid of, that is the hardest decision in a reshuffle. And I think, first of all, Cameron had a pretty stable team. He'd had one or two hiccups like David Laws had had to resign almost immediately, a liberal Democrat. And in two years later, what does he do? He doesn't move any of the senior top jobs except for one. And I'll come on to that. There are a couple of people who have been kind of long serving, very important to show the party had experience coming into government. George Young, wonderful guy. Ken Clark, who had been brought back. They move either out in the case of George Young or in the case of Ken Clark, he goes to being kind of minister without portfolio.

52:32And he does the other thing which you need to do in these reshuffles, which is if you want to think who's in your cabinet at the next general election. So who do I need to get going? Who can be in my top team at the next general election? And who can be in my cabinet at the next general election? You need to start promoting the backbenchers and the junior ministers who you have an eye on. Cameron was always thinking like, what about my reshuffle in the new year? What about my pre-election reshuffle a year before? who's going to be in my cabinet at the general election, in which case I need to get some of these backbenchers moving into junior positions and I need to get the junior ministers moving up.

53:09And he starts to appoint some people who actually didn't ultimately make it to the very top. But, you know, for example, Maria Miller is brought into the cabinet. Teresa Villas is brought into the cabinet. These are kind of younger female MPs. Chris Grayling, who had sort of lost out a bit in the coalition construction of the cabinet, is brought in as well. And he had really struggled to get women into his cabinet suddenly. And he was criticising this research for not having enough women. There are a couple of things that have gone wrong. So Saeeda Varsi is basically fired. Was she chair? She was chair of the party.

53:43And she was the first Muslim woman who had served in a cabinet. And it was like a big deal. But that was not working out. Why? I don't. Well, it's interesting. And I had a huge amount of time for Saeeda. It just wasn't working. I mean, to be fair, I think being David Cameron's party chairman was quite hard. I think everyone found that quite hard because David Cameron was his own party chairman. And so he kind of expected you to kind of go around the constituencies and you were never really going to be involved in the inner kind of sanctum of the strategy, which is what I think they expected to be.

54:19Because they thought they would be like Chris Patton was to John Major in the 92 election much earlier. But he didn't really ever create that space. Or if anything, the person who was the sort of de facto party chairman was me as his kind of chief political advisor, if you like. But the really big decision he makes in 2012 is to fire Andrew Lansley as health secretary. And Andrew Lansley had been a long-serving member of the team. More importantly, both David and I had worked for Andrew Lansley years earlier when he'd been running the research department. So we went way back. And, you know, the firing of Andrew Lansley is the admission that the health reforms have been a fiasco.

54:59And that's really what that reshuffle is about. But what is interesting about all of these reshuffles we're talking about is I would say that, you know, reshuffles come, reshuffles go. Of course, these jobs are important. But the really significant reshuffles are the ones where you decide you're going to have a new chancellor of the Exchequer. and maybe also a new foreign secretary and home secretary. But I'd focus almost entirely on that job. And it's not just because I did the job myself. That's your biggest call. So when Boris Johnson decides to remove Sajid Javid and bring in Rishi Sunak, it's not part of the big reshuff.

55:37It's not actually particularly planned, if you remember. It's because Dominic Cummings is trying to kind of take control of the treasury. But it sets in train all sorts of events in the Johnson premiership that turn out to be very important. both positive in terms of how Sunak handles the furlough scheme and the early stages of COVID, which come very soon. But later on, both Sunak and Javid, who's fired, are the people who bring down Boris Johnson. So I think for Keir Starmer, isn't the kind of big, big question. Not he'll bring in some new rising star Labour MPs. He might move out a couple of middle-ranking cabinet ministers who haven't really made a mark, he's got to decide what to do with his very, very top team.

56:25And I would say, you know, I mean, you know, you may want to plead the fifth on this. I mean, there's no way he's going to get rid of Yvette, who's looking one of the strongest members of the cabinet at the moment. He's not going to get rid of David Lammy from the Foreign Office. And he's therefore got this question about Rachel Reeves, you know, who's definitely had a difficult time, as she herself says in the Mansion House speech she gave before the summer. I'm assuming he doesn't move her, but I bet he's thinking at least perhaps I should. And any reshuffle that you don't make big moves at the top, you know, it matters a lot in Westminster.

57:10It matters a lot to the individuals concerned, but it probably makes little difference to the fortunes of the government. There's one other dimension in reshuffles, which is how you organise and project the message from the centre of government. And there are some prime ministers who do that themselves more effectively, and some do it less effectively, but it needs to be done. so you know for for keir starmer you know it may be that there are particular jobs he needs to um to switch people in because for whatever reason he doesn't think they're doing as well as he'd like and as you said um we discussed the question of rachel reeves and her job and i think you know we both said that um if he thinks this solves a problem for him on fiscal policy and taxation in this budget simply by changing his chancellor you know that's for the birds because you know he is very much implicated in things which have happened so far so it's actually the change of it's the strategy which is you know as important as the the individual but the other thing is um you know the projection of government message and um not every politician gets 10 out of 10 for every category and great leadership is about knowing the things you're good at and knowing the gaps you need to fill and and i think this government still has a challenge about really effective and robust storytelling from people who can devote their time to that which includes sometimes going up and doing the sort of tough rebuttal interviews and that isn't something that the prime minister should be doing in terms of rebuttal, but it's also not Keir's greatest strength when it comes to projecting the government's message.

59:02I'm not sure that's the greatest strength of either the Prime Minister or the Chancellor, that storytelling. You have some people who do that well. I think West Streeting is as good as that, but he's got a big job. You have Darren Jones gets put out quite a lot as Chief Secretary, but every time he does, it all comes back to tax and to the Treasury. Pat McFadden is a very, very effective at the centre of government, holding the ring politician who closes down issues rather than opens them up. He's the current, I don't know, in the social media age where this title still applies in the podcast age, but the minister for the Today programme, isn't he?

59:39That was always the sort of John Reid role. You would put him out and, you know, he's the sort of straight bat at the wicket, gets through the interview. That's true, but I'm not sure whether... But I think he plays a quite important role behind the scenes. I think he plays a really important role behind the scenes. And sometimes you need somebody to go out there to close things down. But I think actually when you think of people who've done those jobs in the past, you know, I was thinking in the Blair period, John Reid or Charles Clark. They actually, when they were doing that, that chairman role went out and sold with more sort of...

1:00:08A bit of basball. Exactly. For those who don't know cricket, they know what we're talking about. But it's basically hitting the ball around the ground a bit. And you would have Pat in a senior job. But I don't think Pat would describe himself as a sort of, you know, a basball style politician. He's not the Stokes of the team. and the John Prescott, Angela Rayner figure, they play a different role. They aren't that role. So I would say in this reshuffle, who does Keir Starmer think at the centre could be that more front foot storyteller, not a closing down, but opening up, sometimes going on the attack?

1:00:41I don't know the answer to that, but I would think that is, if you're doing a reshuffle, that would be, and that might be related to, it might be that Keir Starmer still got work to do to make his own internal operation stronger. Because I still look at this government and think on foreign affairs and on European affairs, I think they've got a grip. But on the domestic political policy communication agenda, I still don't feel as though they are selling, communicating, deciding. And that may be an internal number 10 issue. And Morgan McSweeney is clearly a very effective political strategist, but I'm not sure he's the person to do that job.

1:01:20I'm not sure whether chief of staff is actually the job he wants. So, you know, I wonder whether a new team of somebody who can... Upgrade the comms effort. Well, it's actually more than comms. It's policy, comms, politics altogether. It's across the piece. It drives and holds the ring in terms of domestic purpose. And alongside that, a politician who plays that storytelling mode. They might be in a cabinet office job. They might be chair of the party. If I were here, that would be the thing I would be wanting, the gap I'd want to fill in a reshuffle. Yeah, but you're still, the trouble is the central story and the troubles of the government, the travails of the government are all around the economy and the budget and making the sums add up.

1:02:04And so, you know, you've got some good communicators in there like Wes Streeting or Shabana Mahmood or, you know, Liz Kendall or Bridget Philipson, you know, they're all, you know, but, you know, if you put them into, if you tell them, go and sell the economic message, they're going to get the question that Darren's getting, which is, well, are you going to put up taxes? And, you know, there's only so many interviews you can do before people start thinking you're not answering the question. Well, it might be that you need to get a grip at the centre of how you think about that messaging. Yeah.

1:02:35That is so interesting. I want to talk more about that. But before we do, let's go for a break.

1:02:51welcome back i'll tell you what i was just thinking as we're having this conversation i think you know i don't know if it was the first reshuffle i shouldn't have done my research for part of this i think the most consequential early reshuffle in modern british history was the margaret thatcher early reshuffle when she basically clears out the wets doesn't she she i think it's in like 1981 or 1980 so they may they may have had one in 80s but she basically gets rid of the kind of, you know, when she becomes party leader in the 70s, she kind of creates, there's an awkward alliance between the Heathites and the emerging Factorites.

1:03:30And it's that moment in the kind of 80s when she, even though her own political position is in peril, it's before the Falklands War, the economy is in the, you know, crisis. The 1981 budget is a massive throw the dice and but she's kind of pushing the thatcherites into keepers the young the cecil parkinson's the nigel lawson's the people who are going to gun and become the thatcher revolution but so in the run-up to that 90 that's because she knows what she's well she has a clear view about what she wants to do right but if you think about what you've just said i mean the run-up to the 1981 budget there is a big debate in the cabinet about whether tax rises the right thing to do the wets are a powerful voice in those whether you know um jim pryer or um peter walker peter walker or um norman singen severs but um that reshuffle doesn't happen until after that budget that's two years in this is not an early reshuffle no but i would say you know we okay so we we chose the topic so we've got no one else to blame it's the mid parliament reshuffle Not this one.

1:04:41The first big reshuffle. It's the one that you basically start to clear out the people that helped you win the last election and assemble the team that's going to try and win the next election. Ian Gilmore was the one I was thinking of. Yes. Another classic wet. Yeah. Very, very worried about the Howell budget. Yeah. Very interesting. We will see whether Keir Strahm has his reshuffle in September and October, before or after the party conferences. He may not have it this year. I think my advice would be not to have it, actually. The more I've had this conversation, I'm not sure you need to, I think we need to know more from these characters.

1:05:14I mean, Bridget Philipson, who I met for the first time in person a couple of weeks ago, first time I'd ever really had a conversation with her. No, quite a long conversation. I was pretty impressed with her. And I thought, but I haven't really heard her speak. I haven't heard her story. You know, I felt like, why am I not seeing more of someone like her? I think there's lots of members of the cabinet like that. And so I think he's still got a job of establishing these people and their jobs. I don't think there's a particular need to change any of the departmental ministers. There's a big challenge on the economy.

1:05:42But if you're not going to move the chancellor, you know, there's not much point doing, you know, the junior economic jobs. And I don't think, you know, for the reasons we discussed, it would be particularly sensible to move the chancellor. And, you know, the lightning would pretty quickly go straight to number 10. So maybe you should just never reshuffle. It might be. Keep everyone waiting. And by the way, you've got all those new MPs and you're only going to disappoint a load of them if you start to promote one or two of them. It might be that Keir Starmer needs to share the load a bit more.

1:06:13He might need to put some of his cabinet ministers under a bit more pressure. I can't think of a government which had, you know, more articles by the prime minister about every area of policy. Governments where the prime minister alone was continually doing the announcements and the press conferences. if I were Keir Starmer I'd stand up in a big Downing Street press conference with Bridget Philipson and say this is really important, Bridget tell me and all of us what you're going to do and let her get on and do it, let her then do the Today Program interview, stand or fall I personally think Keir Starmer absorbs too much of the pressure and the focus onto him and I don't think, you know, he's quite a managerial politician, maybe he should send other people out to do a bit more storytelling Yeah, because the Blair government, you know, we talked a lot about Brown, obviously, but, you know, there was Jack Straw in that period, David Blunkett, Donald Dewar, you know, George Robertson.

1:07:12There were some big, big figures around in the kind of departmental jobs. And Cameron, not only had me, but he had William Haig. And we were just talking about Ken Clarke, Nick Clegg, of course, because we were in coalition. Well, people talked about the presidential style of Blair or Cameron. But the truth is they were much more. You think Starmer's more presidential? Well, I think... But maybe by accident. I think for whatever reason, in communications terms, they thought the right thing to do is, you know, every day there's an article which says, let me tell you about the biggest priority for me and the country.

1:07:47And it's a different biggest priority every day. And Jack Straw's biggest priority was policing. And Bridget Phillipson's in this government biggest priority is education. Keir Starmer can't have everything as his biggest priority. So if I were him, I would push these people out more, make them more known, responsible and accountable. And then, you know, they're not up to him. Get rid of him. Change the cabinet or use the cabinet more. I think we're saying use the cabinet more. Use the cabinet you got a bit more. OK. That is all for today. Thanks for listening to this summer special edition of Political Currency.

1:08:20We'll, of course, discuss any reshuffles that happen when we are back in the studio. But thanks for listening. and we are back with emqs on monday or of course if you're a gold or kitchen cabinet member you can listen to them early and ad free tomorrow and you can find the link to subscribe in the show notes we hope you're enjoying listening throughout the summer and of course you can always see our episodes on youtube as well as getting them wherever you get your podcasts and don't forget to review the show because that helps us reach more listeners and send your questions and voice in to questions at politicalcurrency.co.uk we're not being reshuffled we are staying here in these jobs have a fabulous summer and uh here's to the autumn political shenanigans to come no rearranging the deck chairs till then

1:09:12thanks for listening to political currency this has been a persifonica production