Election Special: Is it change or die for Labour?

23:29We literally don't. Right. He's he's what did he say last week? We're going to put, you know, migrant detention centers in everywhere that doesn't vote reform. Right. I mean, is that why people voted reform? You know, according to Luke Trill, he says, actually, that was the point at which people started looking at them going, that's not very grown up, that's a bit stupid, that's actually pretty, you know, un-British. It's not something that a serious political party says. People aren't looking for serious politics at the moment. They're trying to tell everyone that they're really hurting. And I understand that, but let's wait and see what they actually come up with.

24:00Jon Sopel:I think the Labour government, whether with Keir Starmer at its head or someone else, it needs to have a clear story of what it's doing and why it's doing it. It needs to be able to sell it compellingly and to kind of make people realise, you know, except that an awful lot of people think they are absolutely hopeless, useless shysters and are not very good at what they're doing and that they need to lean into that. And I think that if they're able to do that, but know that they that they've got a story to tell and they've got a direction of travel and they have got a policy agenda that is going to make them better off.

24:35Jon Sopel:I think it's virtually impossible. What is that? Because I don't know, but I given the Iran war. Because every time I've listened to an interview this morning and I've heard somebody from the Labour, somebody from government try and set out what they're actually doing. And the interviewer has always cut them off and said, yeah, yeah, yeah, but it's not working. Nobody wants to vote for you. Right. And so in a way, like, you know, and we're probably as guilty of this. We don't talk that much about government policy. We don't talk that much about the things that are actually being done. And maybe that is about the message and communication.

25:06And, you know, I'm not I'm not I'm not here as a pretender for the Labour government, but I am trying to say we've got to a place where we just we just want to shout and scream at everyone without actually listening.

25:17Jon Sopel:Let me give you one example of where Labour are probably getting into the right place, which is Europe and fostering a closer relationship with the European Union. Is that being sold as because it is a good thing to do and it's for our wealth or is it because we've got no option left? and it feels like the Labour government is doing this saying, yeah, I know, we've tried everything and it's been crap. So I think we just have to do this now. And that's not a very compelling argument to make to the British people if you want to win them over. And I think that that's... So is it about personality then?

25:51Are you saying optimism?

25:52Jon Sopel:I think there is an element of it which is absolutely personality. I think it's more than an element. Honestly, I think, I really believe... Look, people talk about this government needs to be more progressive. You make a strong argument that this is one of the most progressive governments, most left-wing governments we've had for decades. If you look at the actual legislative agenda that the government has in all sorts of directions, whether we've seen it in Employment Rights or the Renters' Rights Act, which has just gone through, there's lots of other stuff as well. Tenants, housing, all that stuff.

26:18Jon Sopel:Yeah, pouring loads of money into public services. Increasing the pension. Yeah, you can make a strong argument this is the most social democratic government that we've had for decades. And yet we have this situation where the Labour Party is bleeding votes to the Greens. I think that partly does go back to Keir Starmer's political strategy, the Morgan McSweeney strategy, where they decided to try and sort of basically tell the Greens or left wing voters, you know what, if you don't like it, you can leave. And guess what? They did. And they went somewhere else. So there's bad political strategy from the beginning.

26:46Jon Sopel:But it's more than that. Honestly, I think it is about Keir Starmer. It is about the man. And, you know, sometimes we talk about this guy as if he's Atticus Finch or something, that he's a man of sort of pure integrity and pure self-interest or pure sort of interest of the Labour Party. Let's be honest, right? If the Labour Party cared about its survival and it cared about keeping reform out, they would be moving hell and high water right now to get Andy Burnham a seat in Parliament, the most popular Labour politician in the country, and either giving him a very senior role or giving him the whole damn show.

27:18Jon Sopel:I think they probably are. I mean, frankly, I think they probably are. I think this is this is going to take, what, four months. But I think by October we will probably be there. So I spoke to someone a couple of days ago, very close to Andy Burnham, who said to me, look, this is all moving and it will move. And what's going to happen is that a Labour MP will stand down, force a by-election. Keir Stamm will say, no, you can't stand because you're the mayor of Manchester. and he said, fine, I'll resign as mayor of Manchester. And the NEC has already said they won't get in his way. And press the nuclear button and Burnham will get back to Parliament.

27:54Jon Sopel:Now, what is a safe Labour seat right now, given the results in the North West, which is where he would stand? Islington. Yeah. Are you talking North West London, not the North West of England? Exactly. So they've been going wrong. Yeah. And so you can imagine that, you know, look, there are huge risks for Andy Burnham in all of this because he could roll the dice, resign as mayor of Manchester, stand in a by-election and lose and then he is well and truly fucked. Yeah, and Andy Burnham may have a bit of the David Miliband to him, right? Somebody who sort of goes towards the flame and then sort of backs off.

28:26I mean, we've seen that a couple of times with Burnham now, right? I think there probably is still a fire there and I think he's probably just trying to choose his moment well. But if I remember back to David Miliband and Gordon Brown, right? He kept on saying something must be done. Nothing happened and of course Brown lost in 2010. circumstances that will save Keir Starmer and there are a few factors that you could sort of

28:50Jon Sopel:line up on a ledger and say well this might save him and that might save him they're all really negative reasons there's not a really great reason for say I mean you know the bond markets will take fright at the idea of a more left-wing prime minister coming in and the cost of government borrowing will go up well that might save him there's no agreement about who the alternative candidate should be well and they can't sort themselves out about that well that might save him none of them are arguments which says we should save him because he's bloody good at the job nobody is saying that you know when when brown replaced blair it was the battle that brown fought and his allies fought an attritional battle that blair has to give a timetable by which he will stand down and he was forced out there were an awful lot of people who thought my god this is madness, Blair is brilliant, why is this happening?

29:39Jon Sopel:No one is saying, oh yeah, but Keir is absolutely the right man for the job right now. And that is a really terrible place for a sitting Prime Minister to be. We'll be back in a moment with Luke Trill.

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31:07Well, Luke Trill has just walked into the studio more in common. I thought you looked like a zombie, Luke, but you're kind of disgustingly fresh. It's ten past one in the afternoon. We're still waiting for quite a lot of Scotland and Wales. What would be your top line at this point? What is your takeaway if people are just tuning into this? Well, I think my takeaway is that we really can now write the obituary for two-party politics. You know, these elections have proved that the notion that we are in a conservative versus Labour world is quite literally dead and buried. And I guess that electoral fragmentation that we saw in 2024 and we wondered, you know, is this a blip?

31:50Is this a one-off? Is this an unenthusiastic election or an election which looked like it was going a particular way so people could afford to vote independent, green, reform? Was it just a bug? No, no, no. That fragmentation has gone into turbocharge in these elections. You know, there are places in the north of England where you've seen 50 point swings from Labour to reform. In places like Essex, reform have absolutely dominated that Leave voting heartland where Kemi Badenock, James Cleverley have their seats. In other areas, you know, there have been wards where the Greens have pushed Labour from first place into fourth.

32:33They've just won the Hackney-Marel race on more than a 20-point swing. You know, our politics is sort of kaleidoscoping in all sorts of different directions. So if I did the sort of unforgivable and fast forwarded this to a general election picture, and obviously we know that this is about local issues, but it's also not. we're talking about um the potential of the party of government being won on a really small majority now right i mean what what is the smallest i mean could could could you imagine a reform government on basically 25 of the vote well certainly on the high 20s yeah you could see that and we see that in some of our mrp modeling but i think that leads to another interesting thing that we're clearly starting to see a lot of in these elections, which is tactical voting really coming into its own.

33:32You know, in Wales, from the early reports, we're seeing Labour squeezed because people think it's applied reform fight there. But interestingly, I've been looking at some areas where the Tories hung on. So Bexley, Broxbourne, where it looks like, and this would have been unimaginable a few years ago, It looks like some Labour and Liberal Democrat voters lent their votes to the Tories because they saw them as the best vehicle for stopping reform. So we're also moving into an era of politics where it's going to be much more about who you want to stop rather than who you necessarily like. Meanwhile, with the locals, we're seeing all these councils fall into an overall control, this big, massive grey.

34:13I mean, is that going to be an absolute shit show for governing there? Are we going to feel that? Well, it's really interesting, right, because, you know, I think we visited 40 different parts of Britain in the run up to these elections. And the one thing which has come out consistently is people want change. People feel that local national government isn't delivering on their priorities. Now, if, and this is obviously in Westminster, a government with a huge majority can't deliver, what is it going to be like in these local councils where every day is going to be bargaining between different parties going across them?

34:46it actually could be a recipe for making the disillusionment that people are rebelling against even worse. So at the end of kind of today, we've already heard Keir Starmer come out and say, I will be the prime minister fighting the next election. Is he more vulnerable or is he safer? I think he is more vulnerable because in some ways, I think it would have been easier for Keir Starmer if we had come out of today and seen there was a very clear pattern of either Labour was particularly losing votes to the right to reform always losing votes to the greens because then you can do a pivot then you can start to say do you know what this is going to be the direction he's losing in both directions and my worry if i were the prime minister and look i don't think that the seat losses are going to be at the very bad end of where they might have been although i think scotland and wales are going to be um pretty bad but they're still going to be bad losses and we still haven't had places like Sunderland, in places like Manchester, Labour losing a lot of seats.

35:47There's more of London where they will do badly. But I just wonder from the conversations I've had with people in focus groups, whether the Prime Minister's window to reconnect is still there. That said, that there needs to be an alternative who can connect. And in your focus groups, are people talking about other potential leaders? Yes. The one thing I will say is that, But prior to the tax scandal, people used to talk really favourably about Angela Rayner. People used to say she's different, she's got something else, particularly that Keir Starmer doesn't have. As a prime minister? As a leader, perhaps.

36:20But now people say, well, she got in there and she was just the same as the rest of them. It's a really tangible thought for Angela Rayner. And I think Westminster seems to have almost moved on from the tax that the public haven't. interestingly um the one person in the cabinet whose name has started coming up more organically is west streeting um it's not not huge numbers of people but people say i quite like that health secretary seems to be doing a good job but he obviously has problems with the left of the party potentially whether he could win the membership and then you know i was in west yorkshire that's where we did our final road trip of this campaign and even in west yorkshire on the other side of the Pennines from Manchester, people were bringing up Andy Burnham and saying, you know, we wish we had an Andy Burnham here.

37:08Actually quite cross with Starmer for having blocked him and saying doesn't say good things about how they view the north. But then he's not in Parliament. And whilst I think Andy Burnham has a big personal vote and would probably win a by-election, the results in parts of the north-west do make you think, you know, I mean, there isn't such a thing as a Labour a safe seat anymore. So you'd have to pick the right one. And last thought, you talked about Angela Rayner's tax problem, but it seems like Nigel Farage's£5 million donation isn't a problem at all. It's interesting because, again, the£5 million does come up and I'll be interested in where reform and reform are going to, you know, when the PNS, which is the way John Curtis calculates the national share, it'll be interesting to see if they're as high as they were last year.

37:55I think, you know, based on the results we've had so far, they'll be around there. Still in focus groups, I was getting a lot of people saying, I'll vote for him this time. I'll give it a go. But he does just seem to be getting a bit establishment. I've heard that phrase, establishment. About Farage. About Farage. And I think the five million plays into that. Look, it's for his true believers. Doesn't make a difference. There's another group who say, well, yeah, all politicians do it. But there's this other group who is sticking with them for now, but is saying, I don't like everything that I'm seeing and I think the next few years will decide whether he keeps that group or whether actually things like the five million make them go actually do you know it doesn't feel right really interesting Luke Chil thank you thank you

38:46from a range of trusted voices and award-winning journalists good morning I'm Nick Ferrari it's time to get to your calls. Find out the latest news and hear every side of the story. The voters have sent a message about how they want their lives improved. Labour are being wiped out by reform. As we sit here now, Nigel Farage is going to be the next prime minister. I think we are on course for a reform victory in the next election. Elections 2026. Follow it live on LBC. Are you trying to get weight loss support through telehealth, but it feels overwhelming and rushed? Check out orderlymeds.com now.

39:24Orderlymeds.com was built to be different. Here, you connect with real doctors who take the time to understand your goals, review your eligibility, and guide you through a plan that's right for you. Orderlymeds provides access to proven GLP-1 medications like semaglutide and terzepatide, including both name brand options and personalized compound versions when appropriate. So you have choices backed by clinical oversight, not guesswork. It's a simpler, more supportive telehealth experience designed around people who want clarity, care, and confidence in their weight loss journey. And your medication is delivered directly to your home in discreet packaging.

39:59So your experience stays private from start to finish. Do your research. Ask the right questions. Then visit orderlymeds.com slash podcast for an exclusive offer. Again, that's orderlymeds.com slash podcast. Individual results may vary. Not medical advice. Eligibility required. See site for details.

40:23And I should just admit, as Luke Trill was sitting here talking about the end of the two-party system, he had a red sock and a blue sock, which is his customary neutrality. But it's starting to look quite anachronistic now.

40:35Jon Sopel:Are you worried the newsagents with our colouring is looking distinctly reform? I, for one, welcome our new reform overlords. We got there first. But I think Luke needs about five other legs to cope with where we're going. A spider. A spider. Talking of which, or not really talking of which at all, John Curtis has done his projected national share, which is the sort of drumroll moment. This came out about half an hour ago. What's the time? It was about half past two. And the projected national share is that moment where we're all allowed to go, OK, we're going to pretend for a moment these aren't local elections.

41:11What would happen if this was a general election? Just a bit of fun. Just a bit of fun, as they were saying. There's massive warning lights all over the BBC. That's exactly what gets you off, correct. Exactly. They always say things like, obviously, these are all about bin collections and potholes. But just for a bit of fun, let's have a look. So here we are. Drum roll. If this was a general election, it would be, and I guess, is this just for England then? I guess. I mean, it's carcadish, isn't it? It has to be. So reform would be on 26 % share of the vote. Labour on 19%, the Conservatives also on 19%, the Lib Dems on 18 % and the Greens on 16%.

41:51So what you've got there essentially is one out in front, clear leader, winner, but only on 26 percent show of the vote. And then this cluster of all the other parties basically within two points for each other.

42:04Jon Sopel:So we've talked about Labour a huge amount on this and we've also talked about reform. I do think there are moments that just cut through in politics that kind of just it causes the scales to drop from the eyes. and I do think that the brilliant as I think that Farage has been in the way that he's navigated a lot of the politics of the past two years I do think this five million quid thing is problematic I agree I think it sticks in the mind I think it makes him look just like every other politician and that claim to be above it all and I'm bringing change and I'm the outsider really there's five million then there's crypto as you yeah and I will say this as well I mean actually the relative lack of scrutiny.

42:50Jon Sopel:I'm not one, as we know, we talked about a lot, you know, to say, oh, it's always the media and you can blame the media for all Labour's problems, sort of in a way it was ever thus. But my word, I mean, the relative paucity of scrutiny about this. You know, remember we think we had two months talking about a pair of bloody glasses and some suits or whatever happened to be the Starmer, which actually, so much of the rot, you still get voters talking about it now. Freebie gate, they're taking freebies and whatever. And then we discover, and all of those, by the way, they were declared. They were declared.

43:15Jon Sopel:And we had this five million, which, you know, I mean, I mean, I was asking reform spokesperson after reform spokesperson last night on the election show. Well, OK, Nigel Farage says it's for security. Well, can we see the receipts? Can we just check so we can all just be absolutely certain it's all above board and so on, not even the merest hint of impropriety. Oh, we don't need to do that. At one point, Richard Tye said, I said, well, why didn't we? Why don't we need to do that? He said, well, you can just take my word for it. All right, that's OK. That's fine. Lewis, little Louis. I mean, what this comes down to is unexpected versus expected.

43:45Right. That is the tragedy of this. Why was the Keir Starmer stuff a story? Because it was unexpected. With Farage, it's kind of expected. It's built in, right? Is it a surprise that he goes off and launches a cryptocurrency, you know, company with quasi-quateng? People barely bat an eyelid.

44:04Jon Sopel:I think that's such an interesting question because then you're into the sort of Trumpian world. Do different rules apply? Totally different moral compass. Well, I'm not sure about that. Different media. I think that we have, you know, Trump was the TV entertainer, the flamboyant business guy, the property tycoon from New York, always surrounded by beautiful women, etc, etc, etc. And so people said, oh, yeah, well, he would do that, wouldn't he? I think that British politics is judged differently. Even Boris Johnson, who seemed to have that sort of Teflon coating. He was brought down by, you know, his own behaviour in the end.

44:40Jon Sopel:In the end. In the end. But it happened quite quickly when it gathered speed. and you don't know whether Farage will be damaged by this. I'm just putting it out there. I think this is something. But also Labour just need to get their act together in terms of firepower in attaching this stuff to the guy. I mean, something that I thought, and I was talking to a couple of Labour people about this who had their heads in their hands during the campaign. I don't think we did it on the show because there was so much else going on, probably with Iran. But there was a point in the campaign where Labour actually had a very effective party political broadcast where they basically got someone to mouth all of the different things that reform had sort of said, different sort of spokespeople, controversial things, controversial policy.

45:21Jon Sopel:That was the entire party political. And for some reason, Ofcom said that it wasn't allowed. Now, whether it is against the rules or not, can you imagine if reform, all the Tories for that matter, if that had happened to them, you would have had every reform MP or every Tory MP tweeting about it, saying this is a rigged system. How dare you? The establishment trying to shut us down. So just telling the truth. Because the Labour Party, frankly, are a bunch of political herbivores to offer. The MPs just go, oh, no, OK, that's fine. Yes, I suppose we probably did break the rules, didn't we? They've got to change the game.

45:53Jon Sopel:They've got to realise that the game is different and they need to start acting like it. So what about the Green Party on the strength of last night? Because we talked about earlier this week that Zach Polanski had had a bumpy few days. the comments he'd made after the stabbing of the two Jewish guys in Golders Group. Bumpy for a few days doesn't cover it. In that last poll from Luke, he was down, I think, 14 points, right? So do we think that the Greens are here to stay as an enduring force or are they going to be kind of, you know, have the lifespan of a mayfly where they kind of are bright coloured for a brief period and then disappear?

46:32Can I say one thing? I think there's a very interesting observation in the response to that tweet mistake. The entire Green Party, including Zach Polanski, have come out saying, I got this wrong. Hands up. I fess up. Which is not the position that a Boris would have taken or a Farage would have taken. They would have ridden it out. They would have said, as you say, you know, oh, stop it. The establishment, blah, blah, blah, blah. I should be allowed to say it. I think there's something really interesting to see whether an apology in 2026 works to restore damage done. For Polanski's apology. Yes.

47:09I mean, does it limit damage?

47:11Jon Sopel:I mean, he's apologised so much for hypno-boob-gay or whatever it's called. You know, he's asked about it in every single interview. And it doesn't matter. He cast it. Yeah, it's interesting, Emily, because like, on exactly that point, he apologises every single time. It doesn't get him anywhere. You know, like, he's just asked to apologise. But does it stop it getting worse? I'm going to take a completely more cynical view of that apology, which was he didn't apologise for talking about whether the police had used too much force. He apologised for making it public and saying I should have spoken to the police himself.

47:42Jon Sopel:And in doing so, ensured another news cycle where the story is not about the two Jews who've been knifed. It's about the Muslim guy lying on the floor. and I thought there was something distinctly Trumpian about that in the way that you do something that you know a lot of people will find obnoxious but maybe red meat to your supporters. And so it's perfectly possible that's also an explanation for the so-called apology. I mean, the Greens, they're having a good night. I mean, right now there are 76 seats. They're going to do well. They've been done really well in Manchester. They won the Hackney Maralty.

48:21Jon Sopel:I'm sure we haven't had that many of the kind of sort of inner London results yet. I'm sure they'll do very well in certain boroughs of London. It's also true to say that, you know, what is the big move that we've seen in politics with regards to the Greens? Well, it's been Polanski, who, no, make no mistake, he has got so much more attention. He has got them as part of the conversation. I mean, I don't know about you. I can't quite remember many times that Adrian Ramsey, when he was leader, made significant waves in the political conversation. And what he's done is moved them basically to be a sort of Corbynista party.

48:51Jon Sopel:that also has some consequences, right? We've seen in some parts of the country, the slightly sort of more leafy, Lib Demi parts of the country where they were sort of starting to do well. But actually that cost them. Exactly, that cost them because actually that sort of more economically populist red and tooth in the claw agenda does not particularly resonate with those voters. But what we're absolutely seeing, there is absolutely no doubt that, you know, Emily, you talked about have reformed people. Maybe they have. The worry for Labour is that maybe they haven't reached their floor. And it is possible that the Greens could have further room to grow.

49:23Jon Sopel:Let's not forget that Jeremy Corbyn, if we do accept that they are a sort of Corbyn Easter party, Jeremy Corbyn got 40 % of the votes in 2017. He got 33.5 % of the votes in 2019. That's only 1.5 % less than Starmer got in 2024. And that's the other big part of this picture that we mustn't forget, right? Starmer was never very popular to begin with. And so, you know, there is potential room to grow and therefore there could be more places where they cost Labour more seats and more votes in other parts of the country next time around? I mean, we should talk about the Hackney Mayor result, which is a 24 % swing from Labour to the Greens.

49:55And that was, you know, that's Diane Abbott, that's diehard red Labour stuff. Now, it's just one result. Obviously, we're still waiting on lots of London. They didn't, you know, interestingly enough, they didn't take the places like Hammersmith and Ealing and some of the places in sort of West London that we were talking about. You know, Labour did hang on there. And I think that they will, you know, you were asking last night, where does Keir Starmer go to celebrate? I guess that's where, right? There are a few places in West London that looked quite perilous for Labour at the beginning of this election and they firmed up, but we still don't know the rest of the country.

50:30Jon Sopel:I'm telling you what I'd be really interested in to see is the breakdown of the age of the voters who are voting green and whether it's, if you're in a young London borough, you know, they're going to be voting green in big numbers and if it's a slightly older borough, they're going to be maybe a bit more prone to stick with Labour. OK, let me say one other thing on that, because I think the same applies to reform now. If you look at where reform has done really well on the sort of northwest parts of England, right? They are socially economic Labour kind of strongholds, right? So reform now must be thinking, what am I doing with Generic?

51:04What am I doing with Suella? What am I doing with Zahawi? All these people that they just imported from the Tories, that's not who's voting.

51:11Jon Sopel:And may have actually started to be one of the reasons they may have peaked, if they have peaked. Completely. So reform's actually got to start thinking, you know, were they right to back the triple lock? Were they right to sort of go on this conservative light area? I mean, the Tories kept Suella's own council last night in Farnham, in her own backyard. The actual Conservatives actually retained it rather than going to reform. Although embarrassingly, I think reform would have taken Kemi Baden-Oxy in Essex. Yes, indeed. Yeah. Well, Essex, I mean, Essex. And this is the thing. I mean, in a way, I mean, this is the conversation the Labour Party is going to be having, right?

51:43Jon Sopel:even if it accepts for the time being that Starmer, they're not willing to move against him for lots of different reasons we've discussed. These elections, what they will do is intensify the two pillars of the party, basically the two parts of the coalition. You'll have large tranches of the party in London and urban facing seats where the Labour Party has dominated for 15 years. You say we've got to take the green threat more seriously. We've got to sound more progressive. We've got to move to the left. And then you're going to have sort of the red wall places where they've got reform breathing down their necks going.

52:08Jon Sopel:You've got to be joking. I mean, you mentioned the EU, Emily, and this idea that Kieslumberg has been, you know, one of the signals that get close to the EU, you're going to have a whole load of Red War voters who are going, what? You must be joking. This cannot be the time that we turn around to my constituents who were heavily Brexit voting and now voting for reform. I mean, Angela Rayner, Lisa Nandy, I think it was Tamworth and Wigan where they were pretty much wiped out there, right? And this is basically what the Labour Party's got to work out, right? Which is that on paper, it's like the Reform Coalition now.

52:38Jon Sopel:You've got Essex, you've got these places in the north of England, You've even got some in sort of semi-urban seats. On paper, Scotland, Wales. It kind of looks like this isn't a coalition which should cohere. But that's the point, right? Successful political leaders do gel these unwieldy coalitions. And Labour's got to find someone. I don't think it can be Starmer. But if it is Starmer, he or they have got to find someone who can gel these two poles again. I mean, that's the thing. Brexit is still not over. Not indeed. All other things being equal, we will be back on Monday. But this is not a weekend where things might be that equal.

53:10Jon Sopel:so who knows maybe see you Sunday maybe see you Monday little Louis needs to go to bed now because he's been up all night I'm not going to bed it's only 71 of 136 councils in May we think we are going to be speaking to Sadiq Khan on Monday so we may get some more insights into just how the wider Labour family might be Labour leader by then indeed yeah see you then bye this has been a Global Player original production