Has Labour just opened the door to Jeremy Corbyn?

0:03The Telegraph.

0:09Healthcare can feel complicated. That's why Optum uses technology to connect the people and processes that make healthcare easier, more affordable and more effective. We're making it clearer for you to know exactly what your benefits cover. And to help you better manage your health, we're coordinating care between your doctors and your technology. We believe better, simpler healthcare is always possible. That's healthy optimism. That's Optum. Visit Optum.com to learn more. In a world where AI is changing every role in every industry, knowing who actually has deep expertise matters more than ever.

0:46Upwork connects you with the highly skilled freelance professionals with proven track records, so you can hire with confidence. Upwork gives your business fast access to highly skilled specialists with deep expertise, so you can fill critical skill gaps, launch projects faster, and scale support up or down without committing to full-time headcount. With Business Plus, you can access the top 1 % of talent on Upwork. AI-powered shortlisting delivers a curated shortlist of top freelancers matched to your goals in under six hours. No endless searching required. Thousands of growing businesses already trust Upwork to hire highly skilled freelance professionals for everything from one-off projects to ongoing support.

1:25It's free to sign up and posting a job is easy. Visit Upwork.com right now and post your job for free. That is Upwork.com to connect with top talent ready to help your business grow. That's U-P-W-O-R-K.com, Upwork.com.

1:44Camilla: Tim, it's like the suffragettes just with iPhones and bad attitudes. And at least the suffragettes washed. I was in the House of Commons to hear this momentous change to our democracy announced by Labour. The strategy we have published today will set out how we will legislate and implement provisions to extend the voter franchise to 16 and 17-year-olds. Will it help Labour, though, or will it actually hand victory to either Nigel Farage or Jeremy Corbyn? We speak to the rebel MP, Rachel Maskell, about what she thinks of Keir Starmer's claim that he is, quotes, a hard bastard. Welcome to The Daily Tea with me, Tim Stanley.

2:23Camilla: And me, Camilla Tominy.

2:36Camilla: To be fair, Tim, there was a spoiler alert for this in the Labour Party manifesto. They did say they were doing this whole let's let 16 and 17-year-olds vote. You were in Parliament witnessing the statement that was made by whom? By Rasha Nara Ali, who is the minister for both democracy and homelessness. What? What a brief. It doesn't make sense. Labour did say it would do it, but in the same way that we never quite believed Putin would actually invade Ukraine. There was a part of me that thought they might not go ahead with it. Yes. So today in the Commons, they unveiled their package of democratic reforms.

3:09It's not just votes for 16-year-olds. It's things like tightening up foreign money donations, crackdown on intimidation of MPs, which is something which worries MPs a lot. It's a bit like those signs in train stations that say, we know the service is terrible, but don't abuse the staff.

3:23Camilla: No, indeed. And also in the light of David Amos, Joe Cox and all the rest of it. Of course, yes. And interestingly, they are going to keep voter ID. Yes. Well, that's a good thing. That is a good thing. But I just think it's interesting that Labour have decided to stick with that one. Because we thought that they sometimes had the odd voter that might vote in their university town and then vote again in their hometown. And they always denied this. By the way, just for the record, before we get onto the age thing, I thought it was absolutely ludicrous that you didn't have to show ID to vote. You have to show ID to hire a car.

3:55Yes. You say that. I've argued it for years. The first time I went and they asked for it, I was really angry. Yes, I remember you writing about that. How dare you? How dare they? Who do they think I am or not know who I am?

4:06Camilla: Yeah, but I think it's sensible. But on the youth, the youth of today. That was the big one. So the rationale for this is various MPs said, in fact, the whole session had the air of a meeting of the youth parliament, that 16 and 17-year-olds are desperate to get involved. They are the future. That phrase was used a great deal. And we must give the younger generation a say. Now, of course, I wanted to scream from the gallery, if they just wait two years, they can have a say. Also, they're having a say the whole time on social media. Well, precisely. We don't stop hearing from these people. Some of them are children.

4:43Camilla: They start turning up at COP climate conferences, like Greta Thunberg. We all have to listen to them. Then they get in boats and get involved in the Middle East. I mean, we've had it up to here with, you know, frankly, children pretending to be adults. Yes, exactly. The Tories, Paul Holmes, made a decent, but I didn't think very passionate, pushback against it. He pointed out that under this change, 16-year-olds will be able to vote but not able to run for office. Yeah. And, of course, they will also be blocked from having a drink, having a smoke, getting married, going to war, etc. But I didn't feel the Tories pushed very hard.

5:17Camilla: Yeah, but they've given up. They've given up on the youth vote. They've given up, but I also wonder if there's an element of once a group of people have been enfranchised, you're not going to slag them off. So prior to them having the vote, you were free to say young people aren't ready. Once they have the vote, no politician is going to go around saying this block of voters aren't ready to do it. No, but the other problem is that a young Conservative is now as lesser spotted than a snow leopard. Yes. In Haringey. Well, a young conservative is anyone under 80 now. But so I sensed watching this very sparsely attended, very dry and dull debate.

5:52I got the sense there were two sides to this. One is a group of people who passionately believe for whatever mad reason that 16-year-olds should vote. But there's also, of course, a cynical side to this, which is Labour has always assumed that the electoral system is stacked against it because of first past the post and because the old vote. And so the left has begun to endorse things like proportional representation, which is permissible in local elections, right, but for some reason not in a general. Why is that? Is it because Labour's worked out that actually it would have lost the last election?

6:22Yeah, protectionism. And the other thing is Labour thinks if we give 16-year-olds the vote, then we are more likely to get their votes than the Tories are. Now, of course, one of the ironies of this is now they're in government and now that they are less popular than Putin in Kiev, they might be starting to realise that that wasn't such a good move because younger people who don't yet have a stake are not quite so conservative in their temperament, let alone their politics. So younger people might be drawn towards those parties which are benefiting from the collapse of trust in Labour, which is either the far left, Jeremy Corbyn and Sultana's party, yet to be named, or even the right, reform.

7:04And I just thought it was so ironic that the one MP who gave the strongest case against lowering the age of voting is someone who could have benefited from it. And that's Richard Tice. We at Reform are very much against votes for 16 to 17 year olds. It's interesting to know that they themselves are completely split down the middle on this issue. But I would urge the minister, in particular with regard to poster voting, we have grave concerns about the risks to security and the risks of impersonation of poster voting. I myself, minister, have seen people carry bag loads of poster votes to a polling station on election day.

7:43That is surely completely wrong.

7:44Camilla: That is interesting because I have felt so hard to judge from your own teenagers-in-the-home demographic what the wider country is feeling. but I did think post I'm a celebrity that Farage had become much more popularised among that generation and for instance when I come home from work you know if I've seen Farage I would probably mention it to my son because he'd be interested in it but not if I'd seen Starmer or Badenock and I think when I'm asked by younger people you know who do I know it's often do you I mean do you get this do you know Farage I mean you work with Farage and if you follow him on in a way if you follow him on the campaign trail he's mobbed by kids yes he is in a way that no adult but then politician is so was the gentleman who was sitting in this chair yesterday jacob reese mogg you'd get that's true you'd go to university campuses and he'll be mobbed and he lost his seat i think because of reform mps think one you're not a real person unless you're engaged in politics they just think every politics is the be all and end all of everything and second they have an image in their head of what kind of politician people like and it's them they think they think everyone likes a boring, white, middle-aged man.

8:50They just... I mean, ironically, I am... They're not boring. That could be Farage or Mogg. They don't realise that actually people are drawn to character.

8:57Camilla: Yes. Also, they're drawn to clarity. Yes. I mean, oh, Jeremy Corbyn and that era. I'll tell you what, this is a stunning statistic. So at the 2017 election, when he won 40 % of the vote, 60%, 6-0 of 18-24s nationally, voted for this guy. Yeah. Crazy. I mean, the young, hey? Yeah. In common sense, bless them, so idealistic. This was you once. You were one of these lefties, weren't you, before you just gained a few years and realised it was all a bit silly. That is correct. And I'm sure I would have loved to have voted at 16. I probably wanted to vote at five. But is this partly the consequence of our education system and our culture?

9:38Camilla: Yes. Aren't we telling kids in school, your country has an evil history, The planet is dying, screaming. You have no future. What a surprise that they don't go on to vote for centrist, milquetoast parties that offer more of the same. I totally agree with you. And I'm all for democracy if it is carried out throughout all of our institutions. So this whole idea of being really equal when it comes to giving 16 and 17-year-olds a say. But hang on a minute. Do you give them a say when they're right-leaning and they're in a debate at school and they want to say things like, I'm a bit worried about immigration.

10:12Camilla: Actually, I quite like what Nigel Farage says about X, Y or Z. Oh, I think that Priti Patel and Suella Braverman were unfairly treated. I'm not sure women should be men and men should be women. No, they don't have that equality in school because anything remotely right of centre is usually shut down. Most of the teacher body, let's be honest, is unionised and therefore left-leaning. And I'm sorry, children aren't introduced to both sides of the debate. This is what worries me. So they then end up in the ballot box, influenced by others in social media echo chambers, following the herd. I think it's difficult unless you're really actively and politically engaged.

10:53Camilla: We are going to speak to a young person in just a moment because we're just two old boomers. Don't know what we're talking about when it comes to gen Z's. I'm not a boomer, I'm a millennial. You're a millennial. Actually, I'm a Gen X. Right, there you go. But what I'm saying is she's going to think we're boomers because we're both over 40. Yeah. We're basically gamins. I'm Karen, you're what? What's the equivalent? Yeah, I wanted to do the male, my father. Yes, exactly. So basically, that's where this slightly comes unstuck because I feel that an entire generation or two has been indoctrinated against the right and I don't like it.

11:24Well, let's talk to someone who knows what young people think because they've been polling them. Scarlett Maguire is joining us, who is the founder and director of polling firm Merlin Strategy. You've seen some numbers. Can you tell us, first of all, how keen are young people to vote? Yeah, no, so we actually ran a poll of 16 to 17-year-olds for this announcement and we found that they're not actually keen on voting at all. Only half of them think they should be able to vote, so 49 % think they should not be able to vote. And only 18%, so that's less than one in five, say they would definitely vote if there was an election held tomorrow.

12:01This is mind-blowing because I have just sat through a statement in the House of Commons in which Labour MPs have told us that young people are raring to take part in democracy. They feel completely excluded and they deserve a say in our future. But the polling doesn't seem to support that. No, absolutely not. And actually, you know, and previous examples, so fine, not of 16 to 17 year olds. But if you look at 18 to 25 year olds, for example, they vote at lower rates than older age groups. There is nothing to show that this age group is particularly politically engaged. Now, that's not to demonise them.

12:31Absolutely fine. And they're off busy doing other things. But I do not think that I'm raring to go to catch the ballot box. Not yet, anyway.

12:38Camilla: Scarlett, we'll get on to the Farage factor in just a moment. Am I imagining it or was there a map that was doing the rounds either after 2017 or 2019 showing if young people had been given the vote, this is what would have happened? And it was like, I'm sure under Corbyn and the whole map was like, it was like a bloodbath. It was so red. Am I imagining that, Scarlett? For a nuclear blast. I don't know if you're imagining it, but there definitely was a lot of talk about how Corbyn was able to turn younger people out to vote. So again, not this young, but there was a lot of talk about the fact that he was managing to appeal to much younger voters.

13:12And in fact, part of the reason why he ran Theresa May so close in that 2017 election was because he was inspiring young people to vote. Now, it turns out that in retrospect, that was actually greatly over-exaggerated. So yes, he did appeal to younger voters, but it was not this sort of tidal wave of everyone desperately going out to vote. Far from it. But actually, it is interesting because, yes, we've seen, so I can break down some of the roles if you like, but Labour is ahead, but not by a massive amount. Reforms in second, but Jeremy Corbyn is the most popular politician. And I do wonder if there is any politician potentially capable of mobilising and motivating this group, whether it might be Jeremy Corbyn.

13:49Camilla: Wow. So inadvertently, Starmer has emboldened Corbyn to potentially at least split the vote on the left, because, of course, these youngsters, they will do silly things and they will go and vote for the Greens, Tim, in line with your kind of they want to rebel, they don't want to go for a uni party. Yes. But looking at Merlin's figures on how 16 and 17-year-olds would like to vote, it skews left, but it's very divided. So it's Labour 33%, Green 18%, Lib Dems 12%. And in a way that's not entirely dissimilar from the way everyone else is going. it's not just about whether they naturally go left or right, it's that they're actually torn between different options, different varieties of being left-wing.

14:33Yeah, absolutely. So you're right. So there's still the sort of left-wing voters at 16, 17, still far outnumber the right-wing voters. It's about two-thirds to one-third split. It's interesting that you're right, it looks more like the population as a whole as you might expect. And I actually think even though Labour have a 13-point lead here, it still might be quite disappointing for Keir Starmer. So, for example, at the last election, over 40 % of 18 to 25-year-olds, just over 40 % voted for Keir Starmer. So he's doing significantly worse with 16, 17-year-olds now than he did with 18 to 25-year-olds at the election.

15:02I'm sure he'll be quite unhappy about that. Likewise, reform, so polling 20%. So yes, underperforming their national polling, if you look at everyone overall, but significantly outperforming how they did with this or a similar age group, 80 to 25s at the general. So if you think about those trends potentially continuing, then actually this could become a bit worse for Labour, maybe a bit better for reform.

15:22Camilla: Won't we be given a very clear indication of what impact that might have when we look at Scotland and Wales next year? Because we know reform is already performing well in those areas. Therefore, we can extrapolate probably quite a lot when it comes to Farage's popularity among the Gen Zs from that vote. Am I right, Scarlett? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, again, we'd expect probably lower turnout anyway from those elections. But yes, absolutely right. I think it'll be a very good indicator of how reform is performing across the board. But yes, also with younger voters, which I think everyone is now going to be terribly interested in.

15:56I mean, I was quite interested in this poll, not just because 16 to 17 year olds have now been given the vote, but because the 16 to 17 year olds we polled will, of course, be eligible to vote in a few years, regardless as they get older, because they will be past the old voting age at the next election. And I think it points to quite a disengaged, apathetic, divided. And actually, I think slightly there's some quite alarming signs as well. So these findings weren't picked up in quite the same way. But, for example, we found that significant minorities, so about one in four, had favourable views of things like a king with no elections, which is over one in five, a military strongman with no elections.

16:28So I think there is a sort of general decline in trust and democracy with this group as well. And I think that's quite worrying. But I guess that's not entirely surprising given their experience of recent history. I think Labour has gone into this assuming that young people are the way they felt when they were young in the late 80s and early 90s, which is hopeful and full of joy about the future. But actually, the group of people who they are looking to register here, their education has been ruined by lockdown. They're told by everyone that their economic prospects are destroyed. They've got the fear of AI creeping up on them.

17:03Could we actually be inviting a large cadre of voters in who are not as naturally social democratic and liberal as the ones that came before? Yeah, I'm actually incredibly glad you said that, because I think there can be a lot of stereotyping of younger voters based on the preconceptions of what older voters were like when they were that age. And it's actually not quite far from the truth. And again, actually, I think what was quite interesting, just a slight tangent here, but I found it very interesting, for example, that their most important issues are still health care, the economy and immigration is still in their top three issues.

17:34So they are not sort of raging progressives, all of them, even though, you know, Greens are in third place, for example. So there's definitely a sort of progressive faction in there. And they do actually, it has to be said, they care more about the Israel-Palestine conflicts than they do about climate change, for example. But climate change is low down. And again, I think that doesn't fit the stereotypes of these voters. But no, I think what you're seeing is not just with 16, 17 year olds, but in fact, people under 30 or even just people generally who came of age after the financial crisis have a very different idea of how society should work, mainly because the society that we live in haven't worked particularly well for them.

18:06And I think that does mean they are potentially more open to alternatives, even if those alternatives are quite unsavoury. You can be green and authoritarian, right? Because if you're being told that the climate is on the verge of destruction, and an entire generation of elected politicians have failed to save it, then logically, you might vote thinking, I actually want more power to go to the state to fix this. And I'm frustrated by democracy and feet dragging. So again, as you've suggested, we shouldn't assume that just because they are left wing on some policies that they are liberals. I think that's absolutely right.

18:41And they look quite different. I think that's why it's also quite interesting for everyone, I think, to pay a little bit more attention. Again, it's not just the 16, 17 year olds is very attention grabbing. And I think that's great. But in all likelihood, I don't think it's going to make much of a difference the next election, just because for the reasons we've just been discussing, they're not very likely to vote. And the voting intention looks quite a lot like the general public anyway. But I think it is good to shine a light on younger voters generally. Now, this is probably because I'm getting older, but I now think of sort of younger voters as under 35s rather than maybe under 25s as I used to.

19:06But it's a very interesting demographic and their concerns get overlooked. And I think what is particularly interesting about them is they don't seem to be aging out of a lot of these trends. And so that, I think, is quite worrying about the sort of country we're going to become. And again, it's not to demonize them. I'm very, very reluctant to do that because I have a lot of sympathy for how you might end up with some of these sort of more outlandish or alarming opinions. But I do think it is quite worrying.

19:30Camilla: Scarlett Maguire of Merlin, thank you very much indeed for joining us on The Daily Tea. Thank you. Shall we speak to a youngster, a young 'un, the youth of today? Do we know any? We just happened to have one in my handbag, actually. My daughter Annabelle joins us now. Welcome, Annabelle. Hello. She's doing work experience in Westminster this week. And then when this news landed, I did say to you, got an opinion on this? And you do. I do. Share it with us. So tell us, first of all, how old you are. So I am 16. Right in the firing line. Indeed. Starmer insists you're absolutely chomping at the bit to cast your vote.

20:06Camilla: Is that right? Well, I'm personally quite politically engaged, so I wouldn't mind voting, but I don't trust the rest of my generation with the vote at this stage in our lives. I don't. Why not? That's how we feel about everyone we know as well. That's nothing I believe. That's how we feel about everyone we disagree with. The best argument against democracy, et cetera, et cetera. Well, most of the vast majority of my friends, I don't think, feel ready to vote and don't actually have that much of an interest in voting themselves. When we have political discussions at school, people don't really read the news.

20:36People discuss it from sources like TikTok. And that's where they're getting their political ideas and things like that, which means that everybody, that people my age do have a bit of a bias. and I think that social media has played a huge part in the Israel-Palestine conflict being really important to people because that's been so big on social media. Yes. So I think that you get in a position where micro-trends are going to sort of drive people's votes rather than long-life principles and thinking about things like housing and the economy and it's more just sort of flash topics.

21:08Camilla: I mean, should you actually pay tax? I shouldn't say how well put that was. Give a girl a job. Should you have to pay tax before you vote on how it's spent? I mean, I appreciate some youngsters do leave school at 16, but I think the majority remain in full-time education. They do pay some forms of tax, don't they, because they pay things like that. But don't you think there's something completely ridiculous about you not being able to stand as a candidate at 16 and yet you can vote for one? That's very strange. You can't drive. You can't drink. You can't even buy a lottery ticket, can you? No.

21:41Camilla: Yes. Do you need to give 18 for any form of gambling or entering any of these sort of even if you wanted to enter a crossword puzzle at the Telegraph, you'd have to be 18. Yeah. Good point. Thank you. And yet give you the vote. I mean, this is do you think this is cynical? I mean, would you imagine that most of your peers would be going in a Corbyn Labour in green direction, as we were just discussing with Scarlett? Well, in my personal experience at my school, they did do in July their own sort of vote, I guess, to encourage people to be more politically engaged. and the lowest parties were the Tories and Labour.

22:14They had the lowest number of votes. The Green Party got the most at my school. Really? And I genuinely think that the only reason for that is because people know what the Greens stand for without having to do any research or anything. They just go, oh, it's the environment. OK, at least I know with that, rather than actually taking the time to understand the principles of conservatism or of what Labour stand for. So I think people just go for whatever they understand or they recognise Nigel Farage, so lots of people are going to reform. Not because, again, they understand the principles, but just because it's like the recognizability of it all.

22:45Like, oh, I know who Nigel Farage is. Yes, but we're not entirely sure what the principles of Labour and the Conservatives are either, which is, I mean, seriously, because everything has changed, because parties have turned on so much and, you know, Labour, you're now voting for what? Higher defence spending and cutting welfare. It's difficult for anyone to figure out. And so that's one reason why, as we discussed in the interview, everyone's voting that way. Everyone is now splitting their votes and going for small parties. It's not just young people. I wonder, is there some confusion here between are we saying that we're worried about young people getting the vote because we assume they're all going to vote for communists?

23:21Camilla: Or do we think young people just won't vote, in which case it doesn't really matter, does it? Yeah, but this whole thing about luxury communism and the repackaging of communism under Corbyn, oh, Jeremy Corbyn at Glastonbury, is really interesting and it speaks to a lack of education about how many millions of people were killed under communism at school. Yes, but Annabelle is saying that very few of your friends would probably vote anyway, in which case who cares if a few extra points go to Corbyn and his party? I think they would vote. I think they would vote, but I don't think they're politically engaged and I don't think they care to vote.

23:55I don't think they would put that much thinking time towards their vote. I think that somebody's vote could genuinely be determined by two or three TikTok videos. I think people still would vote because it's like quite an exciting thing to do and I think that you know it would feel quite historical like well we can vote but I don't think they'd use it very intelligently. You have just described the average British I mean I just don't think there's much difference between that and most people are like that aren't they?

24:21Camilla: Indeed I mean you'll be over the age won't you by the time that the next election comes around you'll then be 20 so you'll be very mature hopefully earning your own money, keeping your mother in the manner to which she's become accustomed. Annabelle, thank you very much indeed for joining us on The Daily Tea. Thank you for having me. Coming up, Rachel Maskell has been suspended from the Labour Party for her rebellion over welfare reforms. People might not agree with her, but she is a person of principle. And we want to know what it's like to be suspended and what does she think about Keir Starmer's leadership?

25:00In a world where AI is changing every role in every industry, knowing who actually has deep expertise matters more than ever. Upwork connects you with the highly skilled freelance professionals with proven track records, so you can hire with confidence. Upwork gives your business fast access to highly skilled specialists with deep expertise, so you can fill critical skill gaps, launch projects faster, and scale support up or down without committing to full-time headcount. With Business Plus, you can access the top 1 % of talent on Upwork. AI-powered shortlisting delivers a curated shortlist of top freelancers matched to your goals in under six hours.

25:36No endless searching required. Thousands of growing businesses already trust Upwork to hire highly skilled freelance professionals for everything from one-off projects to ongoing support. It's free to sign up, and posting a job is easy. Visit Upwork.com right now and post your job for free. That is Upwork.com to connect with top talent ready to help your business grow. That's upwork.com, upwork.com.

26:10Camilla: Yesterday evening, the Prime Minister suspended four MPs from Labour over repeated breaches of party discipline. One of them, Rachel Maskell, the MP for York Central, joins us now. Rachel Maskell, thank you very much for joining us. Could you explain to us, first of all, why did you rebel? Well, not only did I read all the evidence as the impact that these changes would bring, but I reached out to my constituents and heard their lived experience. And what became evident to me as soon as I read the Pathways to Work paper was that, first of all, disabled people weren't involved in the big decisions, the fiscal decisions, are things that would remove money from their pockets and push them into poverty.

26:54Camilla: And indeed, the analysis, 400 ,000 people to be placed in poverty, but also taking away their agency. But also, you know, we're not in the Labour Party for people to experience greater hardship. And I wanted to ensure that people had a voice, but also people had the means in which to live. And therefore, it's really important that we return to those Labour values of equality and justice and fairness and ensured that disabled people. And I heard some pretty harrowing stories from my constituents to ensure that they had franchise in this debate. And that's why I worked so closely with deaf and disabled people organisations and charities.

27:38Camilla: 138 of them signed my reasoned amendment although that's not formally recorded in parliament that's what happened because they universally did not support the changes the government were bringing in i should put it to you that the government of course would say we already have listened we already have compromised and we've agreed to delay the changes to pips until the tims review comes in why were you not satisfied with what the government was prepared to give to backbenchers? This couldn't just be about people receiving PIP today, it had to be about people receiving PIP in the future. And of course, that change happened the day before the report stage and third reading.

28:18Camilla: But also, there are significant changes,£2 billion worth of cuts to universal credit, the health element. And that would have had devastating impact on disabled people and the evidence in the impact assessment demonstrated 150 ,000 people being pushed into poverty and many more people being worse off so again the same arguments and the wrong approach being taken towards those cuts and quite frankly we need to protect and support people and I said to government if there's proof in case that the rest of the package got more people into work, really help people that could work, then that is a fantastic thing.

28:59Camilla: And we've got to champion that. However, if it left people desperate and without, then clearly the policy would have failed, but it really would have failed catastrophically, particularly for those people with very fragile mental health. And I couldn't cross that line. Rachel, cards on table. I disagree with you on the welfare bill and think it should be reduced dramatically. However, I respect that you've taken a principled and sort of dignified stance on this. Your treatment, along with the colleagues that have also been suspended, that's Neil Duncan, Jordan, Brian Leishman and Chris Hinchliffe, hasn't been great, has it?

29:36Camilla: I'm staggered to read this and I do apologise in advance for the language, but one party source said the MPs had been suspended for I quote, persistent knobheadery. I mean, what's your reaction to that? That's not the way to treat backbenchers who might not agree with government policy. No, I mean, I hope that that's drawn out where that's come from, because quite frankly, I find it very insulting and unprofessional. And I think we've approached this, all of the MPs who really wrestled with this, with a degree of professionalism, wanting the very best, acting in the interests of others, that speaks of factionism and quite frankly should not be tolerated within the Labour Party.

30:22Camilla: Whereas I do think that taking a more evidence-based approach, supporting people with lived experience is the right way forward. It reflects the culture of our party. And just to disagree slightly with yourself. I want to see the social security bill come right down because I do believe that work is good for your physical and mental health but we've got to protect those people that can't work and take people on that journey where their health is so fragile which stops them from working and the best way of doing that is of course looking at employers. We don't have the Charlie Mayfield report yet but employers have got a huge responsibility because they discriminate and that we see that revolving door so much for disabled people and people that are unwell.

31:08Camilla: They've got to have duties placed on them to keep people in work and to guarantee secure employment for disabled people as well. Just to use more bad language, again, apologies. Is this all part and parcel of the Prime Minister's boast to Nick Robinson that he's a, quote, hard bastard? I mean, is he trying to flex some muscles here? Well, let's face it, I think our political system is quite broken because it doesn't have kindness and compassion at its centre. And they're the values which I hope to bring to the table, because I do believe when we are a kinder and compassionate country, that more people will thrive, that will help us economically, it will help society be more cohesive.

31:51Camilla: I just think we need some healing across our country and across our politics. And I think it does no one any good to talk about being hard, hard for what purpose, you know, what's achieved from that. And I just don't think there's any evidence behind that. Having said that, we've had some rather unkind and uncompassionate words from your colleague Diane Abbott today. she's been saying once again and this is a sort of doubling down on a claim she made some time ago that Jews experience racism differently to black people claiming it's silly to liken racism based on skin colour to racism faced by Jewish and traveller communities.

32:33Camilla: This understandably has caused a huge amount of offence to Jewish and traveller communities and there are now calls for her to be suspended from the party. It's not gentler, kinder politics, this, is it? Look, there's no hierarchy in discrimination. We know that so many people experience discrimination for whatever reason, whether it's because of religion and belief or their ethnicity or because they're a disabled person. And of course, Diane Abbott has got her own experience of discrimination. I think we need a broader debate around discrimination because I think it's poorly understood. We know that it's on a very sharp rise in our communities and that troubles me greatly.

33:18Camilla: You know, in my own constituency, I see that too. And I think we've got to understand what is happening and get ahead of that curve and ensure that we really clamp down on all forms of discrimination. But if you're right. It is right to say that there are different kinds of discrimination experienced by people of different protected characteristics. Well, even if you don't have any... I don't know what's behind the comments. I don't know the full context, but all discrimination is wrong. Even if you're not Jewish, if you're white and somebody refers to you in racist language, like calling you white trash or a white bitch or bastard or whatever, that's racism, isn't it?

33:58Camilla: White people can be subjected to racism in the same way that black people can, correct? Or, yes, anything which is discriminatory, which is about identifying somebody's characteristics and using that in a derogatory way or even worse, then, of course, that has got to be stamped out. And that's why I am talking about having a different culture in our country, because I think it's what's really important is that we elevate the way that we engage with one another into a place of greater respect and dignity. and we need to talk about those values so much at the heart of our politics and linking back to the reason you've got me on your podcast there is to say that if there is respect and dignity for disabled people, it means about giving people agency and opportunity and voice and presence and that was so missing from this policy decision.

34:57Given that Labour is pursuing these sorts of policies and it's not the only one, As we mentioned earlier, it's also raising defence at the same time as it's doing this sort of stuff. Is there any part of you which is tempted, especially now that you've been suspended, to cross the floor and join Jeremy Corbyn?

35:12Camilla: Well, look, I'm Labour through and through, whichever way you cut me up. I've been a member of the party for 34 years. I remain a Labour Party member. And I think the Labour Party is founded in incredible tradition and values. I think about where it came from, from Christian socialism, from the trade unions, which again have real deep roots about speaking around social justice, speaking up for the disenfranchised in our society, giving agency to those people, quite frankly, who are being exploited. So, of course, I'm Labour and I hold on to those values. I want this government to be the very best of governments, the best government we've ever had.

35:52Camilla: But I think things are going to have to change to achieve that. And quite clearly, the polls are saying that as well. And I will support our party in that transition to be better than it is at the moment. Everything you've just said, Jeremy Corbyn would agree with. And he would also describe himself, I'm sure, as Labour through and through. And he's been a member of the party even longer than you have. But ultimately, he was pushed out. what happens when the leadership of the party just is determined to walk away from those values? Surely people who are loyal to those values will be forced and compelled to seek an alternative party.

36:28Camilla: Well, what I say to the Prime Minister, now we're entering that summer season, and I hope he has a decent break, but also a time of reflection. I think it's really important to do that in politics for all of us. But in that time of reflection, to think about how we can really build trust in our party, build engagement, collaboration, cooperation, those values, which are so important, but also inclusivity, which is, again, important. So politics has to change. Our country is crying out for it. People are looking in some very dark places and difficult places to find the hope in their lives. And I think particularly people are going online.

37:09Camilla: People have got really severe mental health challenges. People are being exploited because they're looking for hope in the wrong places. And people are voting in places which are quite unimaginable to them a few years ago and certainly will not serve them well in the future. So I really do hope that people can see a government which wants to engage with them and wants to include them in a much more engaged, inclusive society, I think will benefit us all. Rachel, if you don't mind me saying, you're a poster girl for the left. So let me ask you this one final question and maybe you can try and give me a one word answer.

37:48Camilla: You have to advise a 16 year old how to vote. Do you tell them to vote for Keir Starmer or Jeremy Corbyn? I would say Labour. Absolutely. That's not the same as Keir Starmer. That's not the same as Keir Starmer. Look, we don't vote for prime ministers. We vote for parties in our country. The reason I say that, I've seen so many prime ministers in my time that probably by the time that person reached 20, there'll be three or four prime ministers. That's a very good answer. Politics will never be perfect, but get engaged and change it yourself. Rachel Maskell, thank you very, very much indeed for joining us on The Daily Tea.

38:31Camilla: Thank you. We'll be back tomorrow, 5pm.

39:19The End It did, actually. Okay, good story. Car buying you'll want to tell stories about. Buy your car today on... Carvana. Delivery fees may apply.