201. Question Time: Could the Tories remove Rishi Sunak?

0:00Thanks for listening to The Restless Politics, sign up to The Restless Politics Plus to enjoy ad -free listening and receive a weekly newsletter. Join our members' chat room again early access to live show tickets. Just go to TheRestlessPolities .com. That's TheRestlessPolities .com. Gatorade is the number one proven electrolyte blend designed to hydrate better than water. So you can lose more sweat and raise your game. Gatorade, is it in you? Hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. Now, I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited premium wireless for $15 a month is back.

0:36So I thought it would be fun. If we made $15 bills, but it turns out that's very illegal. So there goes my big idea for the commercial. Give it a try at MintMobile .com slash switch. Up from payment of $45 for three month plan equivalent to $15 per month required, new customer offer for first three months only. Speed slow after 35 gigabytes of networks busy, access and fees extra, see MintMobile .com.

1:26Rules and restrictions apply.

1:36Welcome to TheRestlessPolitics .com. Question time with me, Roy Stewart. And me, Alistair Campbell. Very good. We're here. I want to start with Alejandro Dominguez. What do you think of Trump's interview on Univision, which is a very, very major Latino television in the US? How will Trump's portrayal affect the Latino vote, Alistair? Well, the reason I suspect why Alejandro Dominguez is asking this question is because Trump did this huge interview on Univision. And I don't know how to describe it. I think it's fair to say he was given a reasonably easy ride, which suggests that the new ownership of this station is on the turn who weirdly are close to Trump's son -in -law.

2:18Yeah, because you're not exactly that. Yeah, so there's obviously sort of, you know, I mean, Trump is a bit like all these sort of right -wing populist, same as Farage, utterly obsessed with media, utterly obsessed about sort of using media to profile themselves and project themselves. And of course, this is the channel that Trump had objected to their previous star interview, interviewer, Jorge Ramos, because he was absolutely gunning for him over the whole build -of -all stuff. So it seems like they're on the... And Trump's racist moment, Trump's, you know, basically, I'm sorry. That Mexican immigrants are terrorists or gun -toting people.

2:53So it's extraordinary that Latino vote may be shifting towards him. There also seems to be evidence that the African -American vote is shifting slightly towards Trump. And Ritoffman, who we infidel on leading, the founder of LinkedIn was saying to me over the weekend that this is the only thing he's really worrying about over the next year is how to do what he can to make sure Trump doesn't become President of the United States. He says at the moment, he feels like they're playing Russian roulette with three bullets out of six in the chamber. And his hope is to get it down to one bullet out of six in the chamber.

3:22He says he still wouldn't want to play a Russian roulette. He's playing the Russian roulette. So his idea is the most of 50 -50 chance of Trump becoming President, which is basically like shooting yourself in the head. And he wants to reduce the chance down to one in six from 50%. How do you do that? Where is he on the sort of Biden to run, Biden not to run? Well, he thinks at the moment there's no way out that so long as Biden wants to run, there's nothing that can be done. I mean, people made a real concerted effort back in the fall to try to persuade Biden to step down. He's not prepared to do that.

3:52The polling does suggest at the moment that Biden is less popular than another Democratic calendar would be, although, of course, it's a bit unreliable at the stage because you know what would happen. You kind of came in. But one of the relevance of this is that a lot of it will come down to whether stations like Unifission start putting out pro -Trump propaganda will make a huge difference. And it's not just Fox News, it's all these other right -wing media stations will be critical for this vote and then social media and AI. One of the things that the Democrats and other liberal Latinos really objected to is, for example, in this interview Trump constantly claimed me that the election was stolen and so forth and there was no pushback at all.

4:31Now, the defense of the station was, well, you know, that stuff's been cannot underdest and we'll have you. But it was definitely perceived as a big shift by a major media player in the Latino. Just some quickens because we do think about this a bit. Don't we, when we interview people, you know, whether we're interviewing Tony Blair, how much time we spend talking about the Iraq war or doubtless when we interview quasi -quarting, how much time we spend talking about his Omni Shabbos budget? How do you as a journalist get the balance right between having a open interview where you get the person talk about themselves and also landing the points here?

5:03Because it can be very mechanical, can't it? When you watch some of the BBC interviews sometimes, it can be just we feel we have to ask the following seven things to prove that. Yeah, and they become really, really boring. I may be related to this question from John, ministers, media briefings. When a ministry sent to a TV show, Radio Broadcast, are they briefed on the phrases to use and how to dodge questions? I mean, I think Trump is a very, very difficult interview, because he doesn't mind lying. He likes to create distractions. He has his own talking points that he relentlessly pushes. I suspect they will have made a judgment.

5:33I mean, it sounds to me like they made a judgment to go soft on him. They were pleased to have him on there and they knew it would get written about and talked about and be seen as a big political event. Might they actually have agreed to go soft on him as part of the negotiation to get him on? Entirely possible. Entirely possible. Although I don't think Trump's one of those people who doesn't really care about the question, he just pushes back in in whatever way he wants. But look, it's like when you and I talk to each other about Iraq and I said to you before, I didn't think I was being asked anything.

6:04I've not been asked before, but people listening did. Now, I think that's about the tone. If you'd have been the stay program, if you'd have been newsnight, even before I got there, I'd have been in a mode. Yeah. And it becomes boring very, very quickly. I think what people like about our interviews, by the way, in fact, somebody said to me at an event I was at last night, they'd listened to the Angela Reiner interview and they said, what I like about your interviews is there's enough of your presence in there, you and me, without it being overwhelming. You're genuinely interested in what the person has to say about their life.

6:40Whereas I think what happens with a lot of media interviews is basically the journalist is doing it for other journalists. How am I going to impress other journalists by asking this really tough question? And they're trying to get a line, aren't they? They're hoping to, they've said the real four lines. We don't really care about that. We're hopeful, yeah. Right. Well, here we are. Thoughts from the developments, the Civil War, Myanmar, anti -Hunter rebels, pit -be -gain, lots of grounds. How can a lasting peace people with so many rebel factions, many splits on ethnic lines or wanting independence?

7:08It could. Yeah, I mean, so just to remind people, I mean, of all the horrors in the world at moment, Myanmar is one of the least reported and most horrifying. So, quick reminder, military government for many decades, then Ang San Suu Ji was the lady came in in the sort of democratic revolution, disappointed many people because of her failure to condemn the genocide against the Rohingya and was then toppled by a military coup in his now in prison. Since the military government took over, the country has collapsed into a horrible former Civil War and Myanmar is defined by a Burmese heartland, ethically Burmese heartland, and then a whole series of different minority groups around the French as soon addition to the Rohingya, Sham Kachin, Karen, Chin, many of them along the Thai Chinese borders.

7:56So, we're now in a situation in which drugs are involved. A lot of these groups grow, opium poppies, warlords, Chinese money, China's very very dominant in Myanmar. All of them now fighting the Burmese army along with a very very brave genuine democratic liberal group of people with 3D printed weapons out trying to take on the military. I mean, it's horrifying. And I was very optimistic about Burmian 2014 as was the British government. And I remember seeing 2012, 2013 thinking how much potential that country has incredible natural resources, perfectly located, very educated, could have been like Thailand or Malaysia or Indonesia, one of the great Asian success stories instead of which it's stuck in horror.

8:43And as you say, falling right off the international radar because of the focus on the Middle East, just as Ukraine's falling off the radar. It could be a classic example for the UN to get involved. But for this one to be resolved, it needs China and the US to speak because China's the dominant part there. And of course, the US isn't prepared ready to talk China, nor vice versa about this kind of issue. Now, more not happily because the content is is a problem, but a happier subject. Tree equity score, James from the Woodland Trust, are you aware of the tree equity score? Just launched in the UK by the Woodland Trust American for us in the centres for sustainable healthcare.

9:20And the fact that the areas which need the benefits of trees most have them least. And it's interesting, we should put it in the newsletter, it's a thing where you can go online and you basically can you can measure the density of trees and the benefit of trees in your area. I'm very lucky. I live in a very nice leafy area, very leafy ham city on our doorstep. And so we've got a very good tree equity score. But you can see this goes back to the sort of point about inequality. You go to the poorer areas in the country and they are worse off for trees. Yeah. And trees are so good for everything, aren't they?

9:55They're great for biodiversity, and oak tree can have over a thousand species, isn't it? Great for air quality. And of course, great for carbon catch and climate. So it can actually clean up the air pollution. So absolutely we need to plant more trees. And I'm always struck when I get a Paris that they're much more inventive about getting trees into the streetscape. I noticed that city can't is making moves in that direction, but we should be moving much much much faster. They're also very good for my social media feed and my tree of the day. Tree of the day, famous tree of the day. Now, IPP services, Donna, what impact what Alex Chalk suggested amendments have for those serving an IPP in the community of those Sanctuary.

10:31So IPP is just to remind people these are sentences which were introduced by David Blunkett in the Labor government where effectively for a minor crime, you can be detained indefinitely. And then when you're released from prison, you can be put on a license period of 10 years. And if you commit any offense during that 10 years, you can be brought back to prison. So for many prisoners, it seems like an intuminal life sentence where they may have done something quite minor and they're just stuck in the system forever. They have a very high degree rates of suicide, people dying in prison, and it's fundamentally inhuman and completely in contravention with a way that law should work.

11:10You should be sent to prison for a set sentence defined by a charge, not just locked up indefinitely. David Blunkett had an interview and I think he was in the House magazine and he basically has said that this policy has been a disaster and that the problem is that the judges used it, he says, in a way that was never intended. They were thinking this was going to apply to a small number of people and it's turned out to have been applied to thousands. And as you say, thousands of people often ending up with, it's a really serious self -harm and suicide. And although it was abolished by David Cameron 2010, we still did it with the overhang.

11:5113 years onwards, we still have an enormous number of these people within the system and it would be a lovely thing to see in a Labour manifesto when they come in as an ex -government to see them actually clear the sentences for all those people. Now, you confidently predicted, not long ago, I seem to remember in this very studio that a certain N forage was going to be crowned the King of the Jungle. That's right. Merri in Boyle wants to know, is the fact that Nigel Forage is in the final of a programme like Mr Liberty assigned that the Tory right might still be a lot more popular than we think with Middlingland.

12:25Now, first of all, would you like to apologise for the false solution? I apologise to Lester. And in fact, it was very striking. There was that saying he's definitely going to win. And I've probably... What did I say? Well, you said no. And our production team who really understands this stuff inside out was like, no way. There's no way. And they had some very complicated explanation of why Forage couldn't possibly win. Although I saw that GB News had a thing on when I was chan, I never stayed longer than a second when I'm chan on hopping. But they had a thing in the corner, you had to put your phone against it, you could get five free votes to vote for Forage.

12:54Five free votes. I don't know how it were, but they were trying to rig the vote for Forage. That's rubbish. So Forage came third. Yeah. And I noticed that some of the newspapers were running, I think it was the sun, ran a huge front page with a picture of Forage, mentioning a smaller type that actually hadn't won. But the front page basically gave the impression that he'd won the whole thing. We also saw the lady in his life. The lady in his life. She flew out there to greet him. And he flew straight back to do a really tough, rigorous interview with Richard Tyson, talk TV. So the leader of the reform party, interviews forage, about how terrible the government are on immigration.

13:34So I don't know that he's, I think he's less popular. I mean, the truth is that ITV are putting this down as one and a half million pounds that wasn't a very good investment. Oh, he didn't didn't get the viewers. Well, they lost four million. Oh gosh. And is it basically that apart from Forage, these shows are beginning to tank that people are watching them less and less? I got to hope so. I really hope so. But I don't know, but they apparently Anton Deck have decided that there should be no politicians in future. So I'm afraid Rory, you won't be going on. I'm going to miss extraordinary number of offers for the most bizarre shows at the moment.

14:10And it's only my respect for you that stops me going on these various issues. Or just put this in your head now. If the choice is between money and reputation, go for reputation. Well, that was not the choice made by the people discussed by Nora Smith's question. Can you explain what's going on with the European Parliament's investigation into the catargeites cattle? So given the choice between money. So in catargeite, there's been an extraordinary range of figures, including Antonio Panzeri, former member of the European Parliament, a woman called Eva Kayley, who's a sitting member of the European Parliament, all bribed in order to influence voting at the European Parliament in favor of catarge.

14:54And I think they've been arrested, allegations ongoing. We probably have to be careful making legal statements on this, but it is a mesmerizing case. It appears that Antonio Panzeri took two million euros in bribes from catargeite and Morocco in order to get a friendly resolution towards catargeite and Morocco in the European Parliament. It's certainly that they think it's worth two million euros to get a friendly resolution towards the European Parliament from one person. Was it to organize the resolution? I don't know. I don't know what that is. It's only something that's happening. That's right.

15:27And Eva Kayley, her father, was found with 750 ,000 euros in cash in a brief case, was arrested, but she's claiming that as a European member of parliament, she should have been immune from arrests. She's challenging the legal process. How did the money get to the father? So the claim is that her partner was somehow working with Antonio Panzeri, who clearly was corrupt. She panicked and was trying to get the cash out of their flat and that she wasn't herself proposing to benefit from the cash. But there is an extraordinary number of wiretaps, the Belgian police have been all over it. And a lot of these wiretaps have been shared with journalists, and the story is just going to keep developing.

16:09We've talked about this before. This has been run for months. We have mentioned it before, but I do think it's worth remembering because when we talk about threats to democracy, it's this sort of cash in people's flats. The third person also, I think, had 250 ,000 euros in cash in the sun's flat. Then it turns out that the sun who had 250 ,000 euros in his flat was a business partner, the judge who was investigating the case. Oh my God. This is the European Union. I know there's somebody who writes to me every single week on the back of our podcast and picks something in our in our podcast that says, do you still want to rejoin the European Union?

16:42Now, what about this one? Laura Rutherford, is it time for a total rethink rebuild of offstead? And how would you do it? Now, I'm imagining this is because of the awful conduct in the case of the head teacher who ended up taking her own life in the middle of an offstead inspection. Now, I think in general, inspection of schools, good thing. I think the culture of offstead has got a little bit out of control. You just hear from too many teachers and headteachers who are under massive stress anyway because of cuts and all the rest of it. But who find that the offstead experience has become utterly horrific.

17:19Now, how you get that balance right, I don't know. But I thought that the responsive offstead saying that they're going to get the inspectors in for a day's training on the back of this didn't feel to me adequate in the face of what the the coroner's findings were pretty awful. It is awful. I think a lot about this because in prisons, I was trying to get the prison inspectors to be more modeled and offstead by which I mean getting the department of justice, mostly justice to take the inspection scores as a way of measuring themselves. And I did think that certainly in Cumbria, they were unbelievably stressful when people got a negative report.

17:53They often felt it was deeply unfair. But it was also very important for parents to be able to have some kind of sense of an independent person coming in and looking at how school was performing. And often if you read the reports in detail, both for for education and for persons they were really helpful. And I do think in government in general, you need independent inspectors because it's impossible really. We don't have the for government, though, anyway. We need them. We don't have the right to rush me. National audit office. I suppose they do a bit. And one of the sad things is often they do these national visits, just another astonishing account of the Ministry of Defense which yet again it's kind of billions of pounds over budget and crazy bad procurement.

18:30And it's about taking the time to follow up on those stories because they do so much like the first time. That was interesting on the way to save money on defense, wasn't it? Yeah, very interesting on that. I think people will enjoy the first time. That's my third plug of him the so far this week. Okay, I understand. Lose more questions. Quick break.

18:52This isn't ad from BetterHelp. At the moment, we're getting advice from everywhere. You just have to go on TikTok. Could be Alice's cold plunges. Could be my attempts to meditate or the digital detox that I'm doing in Colombia. But of course, one of the things that we know is that it can be incredibly valuable to talk to another human being, somebody who's actually been trained as a therapist to work through these ideas calmly, objectively and professionally. And as the largest online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a very diverse variety of expertise.

19:28They've got over 5 ,000 therapists in the UK. They've helped more than 5 million people globally and you can join a session literally at the click of a button. Change therapists anytime. So obviously not about fixing you, but it's about hearing yourself clearly, maybe for the first time. So talk it out with BetterHelp. Our listeners get 10 % of their first month at betterhelp .com slash rest politics. That's better H -E -L -P .com slash rest politics. This episode is brought to you by eBay. We all have that piece. The one that's so you, you've basically become known for it. And if you don't yet, fashionistas, you'll find it on eBay.

20:05That Miumu Redmother Bomber, the Cousteau Barcelona Cowboy Top, or that Patagonia fleece in the 2017 colorway. All these finds are all on eBay, along with millions of more main character pieces backed by authenticity guaranteed. eBay is the place for pre -loved and vintage -session. eBay, things, people, love. It's the Smuckers Uncrustables Podcast with your host Uncrustables. Okay, today's guest is Ruffer on the Edges. Please welcome crust. Thanks for having me. Today's topic is round with Soft Pillar We Bread. Hey, filled with delicious PB &J, are you talking about yourself? And you can take them anywhere.

20:46Why do you invite? And we are out of time. Are you really cutting me off? Uncrustables are the best part of the sandwich. Sorry, crust.

21:00Ben, does criticism from the public get to you if not, did it once? How do you deal with it? Now, be serious, fellas. That presumably was a time when criticism public did bother you. I know that you're now more robust about these things. I think I've always been quite robust. Come on, how was it during the Iraq stuff that must have been pretty horrible? It was horrible, but it wasn't horrible because of the criticism, it was horrible because of what was happening. Right. I don't think it does get to me. Maybe it should more than it does, but I don't think it does. And when you go on Twitter and people are just saying, just incredible, unless it doesn't bother me.

21:32It really doesn't bother me. I've never ever blocked anybody on Twitter. I think I've blocked one person on Twitter, but I haven't. For many years. It was a far right guy in my constituency who was making some pretty terrifying kind of nationalist threats. I could be wrong about this, but I always think if somebody's threatening to kill you, the last place they're going to threaten is on social media because the police have got a pretty good place to start looking for a suspect. Now, I sometimes, I don't think it does get to me. I had a big round the other day with one of our kids and about politics.

22:01And when he says things to me, that gets to me. If Fiona and I have an argument, that politics, that gets to me, but a random stranger doesn't get to you. No, not really. And I guess the other thing, I know you're finding weird because you've told me, is this at the moment, because of the podcast, people constantly stopping me and saying nice things. I don't feel any different about it than I did when people were more like, it's a same thing, I'm pleasant. It only gets to me if I feel physically threatened. Yeah. I was standing outside of shopping mall with my kids last week. And a Frenchman came up to me in the street and said, basically, your country is shit.

22:39You should be ashamed of yourself. You're a terrible politician. Everything about this country is shit. And I got really angry. You said I was going to party at all. I said 15 minutes, shouting at this man, in him shouting at me. You shouting at him. Yeah, because I got really angry and I kept saying, you know, how would it feel if I went to your country, went up to you randomly in the street and said, your country's shit. He said, well, my country's not shit. He said, your country. Oh, God. Was he delivered here? Yeah, he lives here. He works here. Yeah. And I said, well, you hit as you can imagine.