280. Starmer’s Labour Landslide - 3:30am update

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0:50Welcome to the Restus Politics election night special with me, Rory Stewart. And me, I was the Campbell. And here we are three in the morning. So, a couple of things just happened. One of them is Keir Starmer has just taken a seat, which is important because you can really, basically in the modern world, only be primers for an MP. Are the great news tonight. So far, your nephew has managed to take the seat of Rushkiff. And, apart from petheats, your nephew, it's such important news that was the seat that was controlled by the Conservatives on the 10th part from the early 1970s. And you got decent majority.

1:20Safe Conservatives see it from 1950. So, actually, people haven't been talking much about Rushkiff, but it's a good root in to the story of the night, which is essentially a story of labour taking and astonishing majority. It's not the end of the night. You don't know exactly how big that majority is going to be. But there's no doubt it's going to be one of the largest swings on record. And labour is going to come out with a very, very comfortable majority. Tell us a little bit about how you feel. Well, I think it's going to be the fourth biggest majority ever. If the exit polls are right. I think the exit polls are wrong.

1:54Yeah, here's my prediction. I think, actually, it may be bigger than your 97 majority. I think the tourists will do worse than the exit polls. Well, I think reform will do worse than the exit polls. Well, it's gone up. When the exit poll came out, he said majority 170. I think it's already looking like 179. Just as we're talking, so now I just have to three thoughts. And 179 is what you had in 97. So this is, and that win in 97 was kind of record breaking in every dry match. Yeah. So this is extraordinary. But the big difference, one of the big differences is that when you did it in 1997, you did it with a big share of the popular vote.

2:34So 97, you came in with 43 .2 % of the popular vote. Labour could do it this time on maybe 35, 36 % of the popular vote. I think it's definitely going to be under 40. The other thing people haven't, you know, we both said earlier today that we've fed up talking about opinion polls. But the thing about the polls is not being getting much tension. It's actually the fact that Labour support has been not diving, but steadily falling a little bit over the last few weeks. And interestingly, I think that is to do with, although we both agree, the Tory campaign has been terrible, they did land their messages on tax and the supermajority thing.

3:10Now as it happens, the supermajority, which is a load in nonsense, and I think was about suppressing the vote, it seems to have shifted as many people towards reform as a way of stopping Labour as it has the Tories. And I think one of the stories that's developing tonight, in just how many seats that Labour are winning, it is reform who are going to come second. Yeah. And so let's step back and look at the reform story. So when the results come tomorrow morning, we'll know for sure that reform has got remarkably few seats. We don't know how few. Oh, they've got one so far. They've got one so far.

3:44I think Nigel Farage is pretty nailed on. But doesn't really matter even if it's two or whether it's 12. Well, I think it matters if Farage gets in. Yep. But in the big pitch, yeah, is they could well end up with getting, you know, a lot of votes, millions of votes across the country, and they'll get for a few seats. They'll almost certainly get almost twice as many votes as the Lib Dems, for example, or maybe third more than the Lib Dems, but they will get far fewer seats than the Lib Dems. But what we're seeing in a lot of these results so far is Labour coming in, Labour taking the seat, but Labour taking the seat often on not a very high percentage of the vote.

4:23They're not getting 60 % of the vote. They're getting high 30s, low 40s, and being pushed by reform. And when the Conservatives are holding seats, so we just saw North East Cambridges Steve Barclay's seat, 35 % swing against the Conservatives, 27 % swing in favour of reform. He's just holding on, but they're losing these enormous majorities and holding on by a few thousand. Again, that's reform kicking in. So reform is a big part of this whole story in explaining sometimes why the Lib Dems are taking seats, why Labour's taking seats, why the Tories are losing majorities, but it's not necessarily translating into them having seats in Parliament.

5:04What did you think when we were talking to Rachel Rees early in the evening? What did you think of what she said in response to my question about how would a Labour government tackle the rise of the far right under Farage? Was such a good question, and you asked it twice, to be honest, she pivoted away from that question pretty quickly. I guess you were hoping that she was going to say what you feel strongly, right, which is the big strategic choice, which is... What is? You can't out for Farage, Farage, Farage, Farage, Farage. Yeah, and what she actually talked about is closing borders and showing that we can control borders, which slightly sounded as though she thought...

5:40That's fine, no, I think that's okay, but I think this is going to be... We shouldn't get away from the fact that the big story tonight is a landslide, Keir Starmer becoming the fourth leader of the Labour Party to lead the party from opposition to government. I mean, when you think how many Tory Prime Minister we've had in the last few years, there have been more Tory Prime Ministers than there have been Labour Prime Ministers who have gone from opposition to government. So it's an amazing achievement, but I do think two of the issues they're going to come up on the rails pretty quickly. One is how do you deal with this rise of the radical right?

6:15Do you learn from France and Germany and some of the other European countries you've handled it pretty badly? Do you try and go a different way? And then the second issue that I think it's going to come up in the rails is electoral reform, because you're looking at a situation where Labour has this massive majority on probably possibly less of a share of the vote than Jeremy Corbyn got. Almost stories of me. Almost certainly. Because the smaller parties won't do so well. Almost certainly Corbyn probably got into the 40s and that's probably the end of the mid 30s. The Lib Dems having a share of the vote that is actually roughly on the par with when they were getting absolutely smashed, second time rowing Nick Lake, and reform having millions of votes as you say in one, two, three, four seats.

7:01So I think that is a debate that's coming and it'll be really interesting to see whether your friend Ed Davie who I thought it made a very nice acceptance speech today totally and keeping with the positive, lively nature of his cab fare, which you so despised. And I loved the way he called out his wife, but he did it in a such a genuine way. So did he care to be fair? I think you can always tell with a couple really do love each other when they don't. You can see quite a few in politics who don't. But I think that PR issue is going to come down the track pretty quickly. This extraordinary imagery that we saw of everybody walking to vote and when they walked to vote, you saw Kierstheim walking with his wife, you saw Rishi Suna, walking with his wife, and then you saw very oddly Nigel Fryer sort of marching.

7:45I love it. It's an awkward way. I like it. It's walking to the golf club. It was very, very beautiful. For dinner. Yeah. Why is he starting to wear those jackets, sort of, that just come down to his belt? It's very, very, very awkward. Yeah. Glad to see George Galaway's been knocked out. Oh, and Paul War. Paul War came in. He was a very good guy. George Galaway knocked out having taken 10 ,000 pound donation from Andrew Tate's brother. Yeah. Yeah. So a guy who is currently under investigation, unless I'm getting strong, I'm probably going to get the podcast. No, I'm not going to use dubious. Yeah.

8:17And also, by the way, talking to Andrew Tate, I hate talking about Andrew Tate. But as you know, I go into lots of schools, particularly at the moment, where we haven't decided yet, by the way, how we're going to get our books onto this. How are we promoting it? It's going to be quite difficult. So, why do we? It's that difficult. I think they're not constrictors. It gets later than the night. They're going to take a focus off and just bring them on. I saw what I might do is just read the primary school book to Nadine Dorees for a bit. That'd be good. That would go that one. So for people who weren't watching the channel for the thing, the backstory here is that I also got a slightly scratchy standoff with Nadine Doreus close to the beginning.

8:48I think your presence calmed me quite a lot. Good. I'm because I think a few years ago that would have been the over the top. Don't you dare call me SACES? Don't you dare start? But anyway, forget her. I think that one of the other questions we've got to talk about is kind of where you genuinely where you think the Tory party goes because some of your friends and also some people from the same wing of the Tory parties you have lost. It's short. It's right hand man, Robert Harrison, who's lost. Yeah. Jelene Keegan looks like she's done key. She looks like she's in trouble. So if I go back to the people who worked with me on trying to get the customs union through so much closer relationship with the EU, so voted for Brexit but we want a soft Brexit, it was people like Alex Shorke who organized that whole thing.

9:43Jelene Keegan and Alex Shorke were corner sense of my leadership campaign. They've gone on to be cabinet ministers. They represented the centre left and the Conservative party. They've lost their seats. We don't know Jelene Keegan's lost their seat. We just know that the Liberal Democrats are saying that she's lost their seat. Yeah, exactly. And it will be an amazing victory for them to share because she had a very, very big majority. 20 ,000 class. So I'm keeping my fingers crossed on that. But looks like Simon Hart possibly the chief whip who again's from my part of the parties in trouble. So if you look at Rishi Sunex cabinet, almost all the centre left of the cabinet looks like they might be of Batlosa seat.

10:20The right are pretty safe because a lot of them are holding pretty pittelhose and SX seat. It's pretty safe. Mark François was the ERG guy first to win. So I think we talk often about whether the Conservative party will tilt the right because of the success of reform and percentage terms. But there's another thing which is that members of Parliament are very, very influential in choosing who the next leader is. Yeah. And if the members of Parliament increasingly Brexit voting right wing people from that part of that and we've lost, remember we'd already lost 21 of the more lefty conservatives because we went against Boris Johnson.

11:02We lost some more before that. Had Heidi Allen and people on the show who left even before we did. Yeah. You're really looking at a party that's very different. Okay, all right, quick break. Back in a minute.

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12:29There's going to be an awful lot of blame gaming going on within the Conservative Party of the last, now let's take them all. Of the five prime ministers of the last 14 years, where do you think the bulk of the Conservative Party will order them in terms of blame for this defeat? I think unfairly many Conservative Party members will put it on Rishi Senak. What do you think? Oh, I think the problem lies with Boris Johnson and this trust. And I think Alan Johnson made the point very, very fluently when we were talking to him just an hour ago. It's great former Labour cabinet ministers said, listen, if the problem had been austerity, they would have kicked the Tories out in 2015.

13:15If the problem had been, you know, broke Theresa May and staffed him with a kick mount in 2017. Or even 2019, you've got to look at the truth. Something's changed between 2019 and today. And it's not my part of the party. It's since it got taken over by the Boris hard Brexit and then irresponsible Liz Trustwing that they've been really punished in the polls. So, Sunak presumably is going to resign pretty quickly. And of course, people won't want that. They'll be desperate, he will, but they'll be desperate. He stays as long as possible to try to stabilize the party, have an orderly leadership transition.

13:51I mean, he said, he said in interviews that he will stay as an MP, regardless of whether he wins or loses. Do you think he will? Well, David Cameron, I was talking to Quasicor St. early this evening, said to both me and Quasic, he would always remain as the MP for Whitney and it was the greatest honor of his life and he was often about three weeks. Tony Blair always said he'd be off. Right. He was said he'd be off. So, I think Rishi Sunak went staring. And why would he be honest? I mean, he doesn't look happy in the job. I still believe he triggered the election at the worst possible moment because he had some Freudian desire to get out of the job.

14:28Well, do you think the turnout is an issue, isn't it? I mean, do you think we'll ever get to a place where we rebuild this sense of sort of civic, the importance of civic engagement. It's very so it because every single seat so far has had a lower turnout. It's so sad. Because we're, you know, we're recording this for you in the morning. And although we're doing, you know, I'd said flatter ourselves maybe slightly better than an anwere to come this time in the morning. One of the things that's a bit unfair to me, but I'm increasingly, they keep putting makeup on me. I now look a little bit like Joe Biden going into the second hour of the debate.

15:08But one of the things I've been doing is endlessly doing historical research. So 1906, which was the last time there was a really dramatic swimming swing against the tourist. The tourist basically had been in since the 1880s. It's like I'd never be shifted and then shift the liberals. Huge opportunity. Something that should inspire Kirsta because that was the moment where this amazing radical government came in, brought in the old age pension, reformed the House of Lords, you know, potential stuff. But that was achieved on a turn out in those days, like 87, 88 % of the vote, even under that show you were, you know, at 80%.

15:44We're now dropping down sort of 60%. Well, I think one of the reasons, I think one of the reasons that that's happening is because this debate in particular, this election in particular, the polls have been the center of discussion. And all the polls have been saying, I mean, pretty accurately as it turns out, labor are absolutely walking this election. But it means that there's been no sense of jeopardy, no sense of risk, no sense of this is exciting. And I think it's just turned people off and then you have the supermajority strategy and so forth. By the way, we just heard that Jeremy Corbyn is one quite substantially.

16:22So he's back as an independent, one gallow eight, gallow eight out, Corbyn in. Yeah. So I, and with with Corbyn and Leanderson does demonstrate that in some constituencies, it's still possible for the personal vote. Yeah. Flip against. Absolutely. Well, I was really interested in that Leanderson vote, that you had a guy there who was a liberal Democrat standing now as an independent. Yeah. Why was he not standing as a liberal Democrat? He was nearly 7 ,000 votes. Some extraordinary story going on there. Yeah. Because the actual constituency just to sort of fill the explainer on that, this was a constituency which Gloria del Piero, who was a Labour MP, took in a very narrow victory against the Lib Dems in 2010, built into a decent Labour majority.

17:05And the person who ran her office, her Labour office was this man Leanderson, who was kind of Labour activist. He's on the right journey. Where's he going to end up? He's affected the Conservatives, took the seat for the Conservatives, and now it's affected to reform has taken seat now for reform. Yeah. And the Lib Dem vote is vanished. So that's another interesting thing because normally the story would be that reform next the votes from the Conservatives or Labour. And in this case, it partly looks as though they've stand on the votes from the Lib Dems, which is the most confusing thing you've ever seen in your life.

17:34We said right to the start of the night that even though the overall picture is pretty clear, Labour landslide, tourism, real trouble, reform doing reasonably well, SNP and a bit of trouble, there would be some unusual results. And so I think Jerry McCormon was totally unexpected, but the majority may be 7 ,000, Galloway gone, but another independent has beaten Jonathan Ashworth. In Leicester, Jonathan Ashworth would have been a member of quite a senior member of the cabinet. I think the situation there is really, really complicated because you've got Israel Gaza and a lot of people who are being angry with Labour about that.

18:12You've also got kind of quite, I think you've got quite a lot of India Pakistan stuff going on there. I don't know whether that's playing out for him as well. So complicated seat and clearly he's fallen foul with it all. I wonder as well whether it's one of those situations where the polls were showing he was pretty safe. So actually because he was one of the key campaigners, maybe not there on the ground too much. Well, famously that's what went wrong for Chris Patten, not to mention the story of Chairman and Bath. The other one who I think is absolutely certain to have gone is Tangham Devonair.

18:40So actually that means that Keir's time, if he was planning to put his shadow cabinet into the cabinet, as the cabinet, he's got two gaps to fill in. He's now got to reorganise and rethink. Yeah. Okay, so let's just as we finish before we go back into the maelstrom, you must be feeling incredibly happy. I know you're not expressing thatness, so it's retailing the money, but if we start getting into the micro details and see the word from the trees, this is phenomenal. Oh yeah, we said in the podcast a while about that, it's just three years since after the Hartley Pool by election, Keir's time came round for a cup of tea at my house and was very, very low and I wasn't helping too much.

19:23And just remind people what happened to Hartley Pool. So lost the by -election, lost the by -election. A labours seat was lost to the juries under Keir's time as the chair, with Boris Johnson and Charles. And that was a moment of my god, if Labour can't win back Hartley Pool from this awful, wretchy government. So I think to have, and I think I've said to you before that he made this pitch at the time, he said, I've got to do this in three stages, decontaminate the Labour brand, then show the toys around for government to govern and then set out a positive alternative. Well, you've got to hand it to, he's done it.

19:58He's certainly won. I would say he did the first two bet on the third one. I still don't fully see the possible time. I keep, I keep, well, handing, hospital passes to Labour, Labour shadow minister, saying excited us and give us a vision of the future. And I also thought they've got to get very quickly from campaign mode into government mode. We've interviewed quite a few of the shadow cabinet tonight. And fair enough, it's still the election campaign in their heads, but they were still going straight back into turn the page, you know, end the chaos. It's now all about delivery. And the only way they're going to deal with Farage, who by the way, somebody just told me there's one 21 ,000 for him, 12 ,000 for the Tory.

20:38So that's a pretty big win. So Farage, the eighth time of trying has got in, perseverance, you've got to hand it to him. And he will be whether we like it or not, Farage is a very, very, very effective communicator. I think you'll hate Parliament, though. Well, let's take a break and we'll be back in six hours time. Thank you very much.