The Friday Take Episode 2
Summary
Join hosts Matthew McPherson and Nick Forbes in the latest episode of Fit For Purpose's Friday Take as they delve into the pressing issues of government reform, railway nationalization, by-election surprises, clean air zones, party conferences, reshuffling, and the power of fear and hope in political campaigns. Get ready for a thought-provoking discussion that explores the challenges and potential game changers in today's political landscape. Tune in for expert analysis and insights that are sure to keep you informed and engaged. Don't miss out on Fit For Purpose's engaging and informative podcast episode!
Timestamps
(00:00:43) - 60% public support for nationalisation of railways, need for modernisation and reform.
(00:04:18) - By-election results worry Conservative Party, particularly Selby.
(00:08:18) - Social media, Brexit, and negative campaigning concerns.
(00:15:28) - Oxbridge vote not against green policies generally.
(00:17:46) - Low traffic neighborhoods can benefit politicians electorally. Cars represent freedom and people are resistant to traffic changes. "Net zero" is exclusive language that excludes people. Making homes more energy efficient is supported.
(00:20:23) - Politics: fear and hope shape campaigns, climate change reframed as positive change.
(00:24:37) - Party conferences are old-fashioned and risky. Labor's conference sets policy agenda for the coming year, including the manifesto. Purpose Coalition members align with Labour's values.
(00:27:18) - Growth must be responsible, sustainable, and inclusive.
(00:33:25) - Keir Starmer's reshuffle delayed, with risks involved.
(00:34:01) - Reshuffles in Newcastle require strategic planning.
(00:37:43) - Andrew has excelled in cross-party collaboration, proposing innovative policies like designating land near stations for housing.
(00:40:58) - Government restructure can disrupt project delivery.
(00:44:31) - Good chat, enjoy summer; Forbes & McPherson return.
Transcript
Matthew McPherson:
Good afternoon Nick. Where abouts are you?
Nick:
Hello! Well, I'm down in London at the moment. It's a very hot muggy day down here. And I'm off back up to Newcastle this evening, so I'm very much looking forward to the blast of cold air that hits you when you step off the train at the station.
Matthew McPherson:
You're looking forward to the ever smooth train services from London.
Nick:
Well of course now it's a nationalised service on the East Coast. It runs to perfection most of the time.
Matthew McPherson:
Nationalised by Jeremy Corbyn of course.
Nick:
Well, along with many things that he might not have nationalised, but we're in the argument for nationalising them.
Matthew McPherson:
Well, that's all you need to win an election, win the argument.
Nick:
Well indeed. Actually in all seriousness, about 60% of the public last time there was a poll on this said that they supported nationalisation of the railway. And it's really quite an odd thing to have the track that... ticketing companies, the train operating companies, and the rolling stock companies, all as different entities without being joined up. One of the things that I know we're moving towards is the Great British Railway concept. It's not exactly British Rail, but more like the sort of London franchise model for transport, where there'd be an overall contract and then everybody would expect it to require the same livery, the same timetables and so on. And you know, one of the things I think is a real challenge around railways, and I've plunged straight into railways before we've talked about the events of the last week, It's one of those public services that just doesn't really change according to changing needs and circumstances. So most of the rail journeys that we have now are the rail journeys that we had pre-COVID, for example. And we're used to standard five-day a week service with different services at weekends. And I think it was a question around whether we need some fundamental reform of the system in order to make sure it is modernised and continues to be fit for purpose for the future. given so much change going on in society.
Matthew McPherson:
One of the things I think is really interesting is the way that the people's views of the railways don't cross those normal, traditional, conservative Labour party lines. I was in Newcastle yesterday and I was chatting to my taxi driver and he was a huge Leave voter, always voted conservative his entire life and yet said, you know, no, I'm very much in favour of nationalising the railways. I think it's a very interesting and it's an interesting way in terms of people's political views that it crosses that. what is normally quite a big party divided life.
Nick:
Conservative Brexit voting taxidriver in Newcastle. That's quite a rarity, surely.
Matthew McPherson:
Well, you know, since the days of Boris Johnson, maybe less.
Nick:
Anyway,
Matthew McPherson:
She ween.
Nick:
so, we, well, do you know, since we last spoke, one of the things that has occurred in politics, which everybody was sort of looking to as an indication about what's the direction travel, what's the next election looking like, now it's the three by-elections that were held last Thursday. And I think if anybody's looking for certainty and clarity and a sense of... absolute definitively this is what's going to happen, they're probably a bit disappointed now, aren't they?
Matthew McPherson:
Certainly, I think things are all up in the air, especially after you would think looking at the news on Friday morning that Richie Sienak could swept the board and won all three.
Nick:
Well, it's remarkable, isn't it, how these were three by-elections, two of which the Conservative lost catastrophically. And yet the media coverage is all about Labour's failure to win Oxbridge and South Ryslip, which... I think probably we're genuinely down to some local issues on the doorstep. And we can maybe talk about some of those because I think quite relevant in terms of a policy agenda around Net Zero. But do you think people will be going into the summer recess happy ahead of party conference season? Was there something in each of the by-election results to please all of the parties? Or do you think the Prime Minister is still really in a difficult place?
Matthew McPherson:
Well, I think there was certainly something in each of the by-elections for all of the parties. The Conservatives are obviously absolutely overjoyed at holding on to Uxbridge and by 450 votes. It's not very much, but they were certainly overjoyed by it. I think actually though, if you look, and I wrote about this in my Sunday take article on the website last week, I think for me the most significant result and the one that should worry the Conservative Party the most is that result in Selby. I mean, this is rock solid. North Yorkshire, countryside, wealthy commuters to both Leeds and York. I mean, I've got family in Tadcaster, which is part of the constituency, and it is proper true blue territory. And some people have made the mistake of saying, well, Labour held Selby from 1997 until 2010. It was a very different seat. It was a much more Labour seat, and actually that new seat has been recreated and the boundary changes. But the Selbian entity seat, the... Kirstama and the other Kier, Kier Maver won last week, is you know much more traditional Brexit voting rock solid conservative North Yorkshire territory, Rishi Sunak's backyard and Labour didn't just win it but they won it by 4,000 on one of the biggest swings we've ever seen. Now of course as I said that's not necessarily an indication they can hold that seat in the general election. We saw the mid Staffordshire by-election in 1990 did Labour absolutely nothing to win it in the 92 election and they didn't win it in 1997. So you've got to always take these by-elections with a pinch of salt. But I think for me that was the most significant of the three results. I think the others were very much expected, particularly Somerton was very much expected that the Demi would do well there. They'd be working it for a while. There was specific local circumstances. But in terms of Selby, for me, that was the one that should concern the Conservative Party the most.
Nick:
I think that's probably the general view within Labour too. You can't deny it was an absolutely stunning by-election result. And hats off to Kim, the new MP there, who ran an absolutely brilliant campaign. I was chatting to a friend of mine who's a Labour Party member in Selby and she was saying he's such an amazing campaigner. Why he's beyond his years. And... she's normally a bit cynical about young people putting themselves forward in politics but she was absolutely full of praise for it, genuinely full of praise for him and I think that's... a really good thing for politics that somebody with youth and enthusiasm is coming in and will want to have an impact and make a difference. Of course on the boundary changes the seat nominally becomes more winnable for Labour and I think the, in a way, what happened in Uxbridge. I think there's a danger of people overinterpreting this in terms of what it means for the future. And I think you're right, I think Selby is probably the most significant of all of those in terms of by-election results. My personal take on it was that I thought people were, on the whole, voting against the party that they liked even less than the one they voted for. A sort of, plague on all your houses but a particular plague on yours so I'm going to vote for you the other lot kind of thing. against the establishment, whatever people perceived the establishment to be at the time. And I think that's really problematic for the current government in the general election because they cannot escape the fact that they are the establishment figures, the government of the day, will be held to account for delivery or not delivery of promises. And I think it feels to me as though people have made up their minds that they want to change.
Matthew McPherson:
Do you think Labour has an expectation management problem?
Nick:
It's one of many problems Labour has. I think. You know, we saw this a bit in the 2015 general election. A lot of Labour figures were very confident that Labour had won the 2015 general election because they were looking at Twitter. And Twitter was overwhelmingly supportive, lots and lots of support. But of course, what you don't realise is it's just an echo chamber and a bubble of people who are like you. And so you just don't see the other side, the other people's support. And it was a bit like that actually in the Brexit referendum, because I remember being at the Count in Newcastle that night and thinking, well, I thought we'd done really well with the Remain campaign. Where the heck have all of these leave votes come from? than you would have predicted based on the conversations we've had on the doorstep. So I think you've got to be really careful about over predicting on the basis of particular results. I also think, before we move off the by-election, I think the Uxbridge one was quite interesting because it was genuinely about a local issue. And
Matthew McPherson:
Hmm.
Nick:
whether that locality was represented fairly or not by the parties, it was clearly a significant motivating factor on the doorstep. And I think that tells us a couple of things. Firstly, Labour needs to learn from that because that was an entirely predictable political attack on Labour that just wasn't predicted in the by-election and could have been and the outcome could have been different. So in a way, good for Labour to have learned that lesson now rather than have to learn way in the general election. But the other thing that I think is perhaps a bit more worrying is that it shows that negative campaigning, divisive campaigning, dog whistle campaigning and culture war type campaigning, it can be electorally successful and I think that's a worry in terms of the tone of the next election which I think will be really vicious and nasty and not very pleasant at all.
Matthew McPherson:
think on Uxbridge, this is one of those really interesting issues because it actually only affects about 10% of cars or people with cars within that constituency. Yet most people when they were polled about this, there was some interesting polling from the new government, actually said that they were very concerned about having to pay £12.50 to drive their car. There wasn't that understanding that it was only applying to certain cars and it was It was one of those policies that people thought would affect them when actually for the vast majority of people just wouldn't.
Nick:
And it's one of those policies that you have to question whether it's sensible. to put something like that in place given that it's inevitably going to be a temporary measure even if it's in place for a decade because at some point we'll have cars which are pretty much emission free and there'll be no need for the EULAs. Same with clean air zones and this was exactly the battle that I had in Newcastle over the category C clean air zone which doesn't include private vehicles thankfully because that would have been an absolute nightmare. But there were a number of roads in Newcastle which triggered the requirement for an intervention. Client Earth took the government to court saying that you need a plan to do this. The government came, basically wrote to us and said the only solution here that you can use is a clean air zone. Even though we pointed out that there were lots of other different solutions that were less costly, less disruptive, less politically difficult. But no, it was a real sledgehammer to crack a nut kind of issue and I suspect the same is of the EULAZ. And you know, you must have known this from your time in political offices, anything to do with traffic and transport generates the most extraordinary amount of correspondence and negativity. And it's usually the fear of change rather than the change itself that causes the real issues. Because the opposition often melts away once a scheme has been introduced. But my goodness, nothing gets people's gander up quite as much as proposing some minor changes to the roads around about where they live.
Matthew McPherson:
Yeah, that's very true. And, you know, it's something which, you know, I have family in Newcastle where there's not that understanding of exactly how a scheme is going to work. Perhaps it hasn't been, you know, you have that they're complicated, you hear about how they work in other cities, but not necessarily how the fact that they're different between different cities.
Nick:
Mmm.
Matthew McPherson:
There can be that fear that it's going to apply to everyone. And actually, you know, for people who, you know, for a lot of people, that is a huge amount of money, 12 pounds 50 to be spending. every single day if they need to use their car. And I think there's a very big difference between a clear air zone that applies to the city centre, so in Newcastle it applies very much, it's a very contained city centre area isn't it, compared to one that actually goes right out to the suburbs and I guess that is the fear that what people are concerned about with ULEs.
Nick:
to minimise the issue because the issue in Newcastle, the clean air zone was triggered because there were a number of roads including the central motorway, the stretch of it that runs just north of the Tyne Bridge, so the bit that's usually congested in rush hour, that was the bit of road that was... the major trigger for the clean air zone. Well, of course, it's only a problem twice a day in rush hour. There are different ways of dealing with rush hour. And actually, it's better to have traffic on those major roads rather than taking detours through residential areas and bringing pollution to residential streets. But there is, and I don't know whether you find this about the difference between Newcastle and London, but I notice when I'm down here in London. I often get choked up with the air quality, which just doesn't happen back in Newcastle. And quite often I end the day with a sort of tickly throat and a slightly tickly nose and I'm almost convinced that's down to extra pollution in the environment.
Matthew McPherson:
I noticed it in particular when I first moved down. Actually, if you're ever wearing a shirt, you can often see it on the cuffs of your shirt. It'll show up. I actually saw a really interesting and thoughtful interview about this with Emily Thornberry, who was talking obviously about the result and the disappointment with the result. And she was saying how she's just been diagnosed with asthma and undoubtedly down to the fact that she's lived in London and been diagnosed quite a bit later in life. And actually
Nick:
Mm-hmm.
Matthew McPherson:
that's... that is a London problem and it's probably going to be a problem for still a very long time to come. And it's, what I think has been very interesting to move on from those by-elections is there has been a real push to sort of end the green agenda that we've seen over the last week since those by-elections. There's been talk of number 10 dropping some of those green policies. Do you think that's a route that Labour are going to go down now?
Nick:
No. And I think it would be a mistake to interpret the Oxbridge by-election result as a vote against green policies generally. I was saying earlier, people always object to traffic and transport changes and I think you can't really extrapolate from the particular issue about the ultra-low emissions zone in London to saying that means there's general opposition to all net zero policies because I just don't think that's true and I think it's a bit of a danger that the Conservative Party kind of overreacts to this. And of course there are some who are waiting in the wings who have been actively looking for a cause to champion a reduction in support. for net zero and green initiatives in the Conservative Party. And I think we saw a bit of a wobble with Kia and Sadiq over the last weekend, but I don't think that means that Labour is in any way going to water down its approach to net zero, its commitment to using that as a way of rebalancing the economy. Or, indeed, wanting to clean moral high ground for improving health because the flip side of not having an ultra-low emission zone is, so how many children are you prepared to see die then?
Matthew McPherson:
really interesting polling out about this actually and there's a perception I think, particularly in those red wall voters for example, don't care about green issues. Actually was some polling out yesterday from More in Common done by YouGov which said that actually that's the opposite of that is the case. Red wall voters care more about you know the impact on temperatures, families, jobs, the impact on the country than actually voters at large. I think there's a lot of confusion about what people actually care about when it comes to this. And swing voters, again, it all sits in this poll, swing voters do not think that the government is doing enough on green policies. So
Nick:
Yeah.
Matthew McPherson:
I think it's going to be an interesting debate, but it's certainly not the vote winner that some people think it might be or hope it might be.
Nick:
Well I saw a bit of research not so long ago that said that councillors up for election who have campaigned for low traffic neighbourhoods or similar type schemes in their local areas aren't disadvantaged to the ballot box. And in fact in some, I think it was Labour, it actually has a slight advantage to them electorally. And I think the specific issue about traffic issues is because... Cars aren't just another mode of transport alongside other types of transport. Culturally and symbolically they represent freedom, choice, the ability to do what you want at a particular time. And so I think part of the reason why there's always such backlash on traffic issues is because subconsciously people feel it's that threat of choice and threat of freedom at stake, rather than simply switching from one type of transport to another. And we have to understand that culturally if we want to make some serious changes to our transport infrastructure. But I agree with you, I think... particularly if policies around net zero, because frankly most people don't really know what net zero is and what it means, and there's a danger that becomes part of that sort of exclusive language in politics that people use as a way of talking to each other in shorthand, but cutting a lot of people out as a result. But I think it was presented as reducing household energy bills, better insulation, better energy consumption, ability potentially to offset some of your energy bills by generating your own through a micro system at home. All of those kind of things I think are the kind of things that people will just say well that's a no brainer, of course we'll go for that.
Matthew McPherson:
One of the things that I think actually Ed Miliband has done a really, really good job on as Shadow and Kier as well as Shadow Climate Change and Net Zero Secretary is to tie very closely together. We can see this at conference last year, the idea of Net Zero and cheaper bills. And that is something that no politician has ever been able to do successfully. It has always been seen as you can push for Net Zero, but that means higher bills, weaker energy security. actually he's tied those two things together and that is a very impressive achievement and that's beyond political lines you know anyone who cares about the environment you know whether it's on the conservative side you've got people like Zach Goldsmith or on the Labour side where you've got people who are genuinely passionate like about it like Ed for example. Tying those two things together has been a very impressive achievement.
Nick:
The two big opposing forces in politics are fear and hope. And virtually every election campaign, you can see the division line between the party that's campaigning for fear because it's running a negative campaign about issues, or the party of hope. And the pendulum swings. Sometimes people are feeling anxious, and therefore fear wins. Sometimes people are feeling more optimistic, and hope wins. And for such a long time, The climate change in the zero agenda has really been the preserve of people who've campaigned to stop things happening. Don't take as many foreign holidays, don't fly as much, don't use essential heating as much. follow this particular type of diet, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And it's, I think it's felt negative and a bit preachy to a lot of people, which is why I think the genius of what Keir and Ed have done is reframe it as this can help your lives get better. This can help future generations save money on their energy bills. This can save household running costs. And that, that I think capturing that sense of hope and a sense that it's a positive change rather than it's a negative change that's reducing people's freedoms is a really important political game changer I think.
Matthew McPherson:
Yeah, absolutely. No, I completely agree. So we had to buy elections, and
Nick:
it.
Matthew McPherson:
then MPs have gone off on holiday for six weeks.
Nick:
Well, they've gone to their constituencies, haven't they?
Matthew McPherson:
I am being facetious
Nick:
I'm sure from many
Matthew McPherson:
but
Nick:
of them that's a lovely holiday.
Matthew McPherson:
there is of course always this perception every year that MPs go on holiday for six weeks of the year, they basically are in recess for the same time as the school summer holidays. Of course we all know that's not true and most MPs, not all of them, will be out working incredibly
Nick:
Hmm.
Matthew McPherson:
hard in their constituencies doing surgeries and visits and all the rest of it. But I always
Nick:
other.
Matthew McPherson:
think it's worth putting that myth to bed, the idea
Nick:
Oh
Matthew McPherson:
that
Nick:
absolutely.
Matthew McPherson:
they go off and do nothing for the summer.
Nick:
Yeah absolutely. Although I bet there are a few party leaders who are really quite grateful that they haven't got the constant scrutiny and clamour of Parliament and their groupings within Parliament to deal with over the summer. That must be a nice sense of light relief to just actually be able to get on and do the job rather than having to worry about the people on the benches behind you, which is often the lot of a leader. Particularly so at the moment on the Conservative side I think.
Matthew McPherson:
Yeah, well, certainly he has Rishi Sunak has some very restless back benches. And we kind of now, so we're going into the summer recess. We kind of now have this long break over the summer of parliament. We're back for a couple of weeks and we've got a couple of purpose coalition events actually in parliament when it
Nick:
It
Matthew McPherson:
returns.
Nick:
used to be called Silly Season, you know. You're far too young to know this, but Silly Season was from the Queen Mother's birthday to last night at the Proms. It's basically when most of the national press took leave of its censors, and you've got all sorts of weird and wonderful stories about singing acorns or whatever it might happen to be.
Matthew McPherson:
But it just happens all year round now, doesn't it?
Nick:
Well, I think, you know, silly season has turned into a silly year, really. And of course we no longer have a Queen Mother, although we do have Last Night at the Prom. So yeah, silly season, it's that time of year when there's no main political news, or less political news, so all sorts of other human interest stories are found and promoted.
Matthew McPherson:
And we're already starting to see over the summer that rolling in to the conference season, which I think is going to be probably the most important that we've seen of this parliament. I mean, it will probably be the last set of party conferences before the next general election. Could there could be one more, but, but we don't yet know. It's
Nick:
Yeah.
Matthew McPherson:
going to be very important for Labour. It's going to be very important for Rishi Sunak as his first party conference. What do you think? parties are going to be doing over the summer in order to start preparing for that season.
Nick:
Well, party conferences, in many ways, they're quite an old fashioned thing. Because in modern political terms, they're really quite risky. Because certainly for Labour, the opportunity for people to get up and attack the party and get national coverage for doing that in the party's own conference is really quite great. And there are always. complaints that Labour is stage managing it and... that it's just a PR fest. Actually Labour's conference is always the most important event of the calendar, partly because what Labour Party Conference does is set the themes for Labour's internal policy discussions for the coming year, or the coming two years. And that means that this year's conference won't just set the policy agenda for Labour, it'll basically set the outline of the manifesto for Labour. And I think that's going to be really interesting. confident that that's going to be mainly based around the five missions that Keir announced back in January. You and I have been working with quite a lot of our members around events at Party Conference. There's definitely a very strong interest in having a presence there this year. We've got some great organisations with fantastic stories to tell, whether it's about apprenticeships or skills training or getting people into the workplace from disadvantaged backgrounds or helping their local community by reinvesting some of their profits. There's some great stories there. think, will find themselves in really strong alignment with the values of labour and I hope that the work that we can do over the next year or so is about demonstrating to labour that our members can be part of a potential labour government's delivery programme too.
Matthew McPherson:
Absolutely. And actually one of the events that comes to mind most looking forward to is the one that we're doing an association with Aldermore Bank around growth and going for growth and how banks can help support SMEs. And one of the things I think that's really important in those missions is that growth has been put front and centre. There's been a perception since Liz Truss had her six weeks with the economy last year that growth is something that you can't do, that it's not important, that we don't focus on. Well, actually, Keir Starmer's put it front and centre and said, yes, we absolutely need to go for growth and boost jobs and productivity. And I think it'll be a really important part of the conference. I think every organisation needs to be thinking now about their contribution to that growth mission. And of course the other missions as well.
Nick:
And certainly in the labour context, what does growth look like that is responsible and sustainable? Because there is sometimes a backlash from the left of British politics that growth is exploitation of people and planet and that we should be moving towards a more circular economy. And we should be less obsessed with growth and more obsessed with sustainability. And I'm not saying that those arguments are wrong or misfounded, I think they're quite important ones. But with a growing population and in a global context where international trade is going to be increasingly significant now that we're outside of the EU trading bloc. making sure that we have a clear commitment to growth which also addresses our social challenges, our inequalities, our poverty levels in some parts of the country, I think is absolutely essential. And it feels as though we've allowed over the last decade or so economic growth and social policy to be seen as different things. Whereas actually,
Matthew McPherson:
Mm.
Nick:
they're the same thing. They're just two sides of the same coin. Creating more and better jobs and building more and better homes is good for everybody.
Matthew McPherson:
Yeah, absolutely. And it'll be a very key part of the Labour Party conference and what organisations are talking about. And all of our events actually going to tie very closely to each of those five missions. And I think that's going to be important for organisations to think about when they're talking to Labourers, how do they link in with those policies and those missions. One of the things that we might get before...
Nick:
I'll just point you though, because I know champagne flows freely at Conservative Party Conference, but I don't think
Matthew McPherson:
or not
Nick:
I've ever
Matthew McPherson:
anymore.
Nick:
seen... Well, I've only seen a bottle of champagne at a Labour Party Conference, unless it was a raffle prize.
Matthew McPherson:
What do they drink at the Labour Party conference? Is it Diet Coke and orange juice or...?
Nick:
depends who's watching. If you don't care, press echo. If you're trying to be up there with a display of proletarian links, probably beer.
Matthew McPherson:
Well, I think there'll be a lot more money spent on the Labour Party Conference hospitality this year than there might have been in recent years. Back to the, maybe back to the prawn cocktail offensive.
Nick:
Well, it's nice for Labour to have something to celebrate, although I've been in this circumstance myself actually, when I've been through leadership election campaigns, that all my evidence and data was telling me that I won, I was fine, but you just don't believe it until you see the fine results. There's always a superstition around it. And so that's going to be one of the interesting things about the Labour Party conference this year. To what extent does Labour set out a really clear direction of travel now? Got the missions? There might be some other stuff as well. And how much does it risk almost creating its own tack lines by doing so, so far ahead of a potential general election?
Matthew McPherson:
Hmm.
Nick:
And that, I think, is going to be one of the interesting things to watch. And I...
Matthew McPherson:
And we've seen this already with the childcare policy that Bridget Phillipson set up almost entirely, you know, government said, thanks
Nick:
Thanks.
Matthew McPherson:
very much, great idea, we'll take it up ourselves. And
Nick:
Yes.
Matthew McPherson:
that is a big risk for all opposition parties to be to be putting forward these policies too far in advance, and then discover that the government of the day decides to take them as their own.
Nick:
I think there's also something really quite important for me, which is a sense that government can actually change things for the better, which is a belief that we've sort of lost to a large extent in this country recently. And that's, regardless of where you are on the political spectrum, that's worrying if you believe in democracy, because the idea that actually democracy is not much worth it because it doesn't really improve people's lives is very, very dangerous.
Matthew McPherson:
kind of, they're all the same type attitude
Nick:
They're
Matthew McPherson:
that
Nick:
all the
Matthew McPherson:
some
Nick:
same,
Matthew McPherson:
people
Nick:
why
Matthew McPherson:
have.
Nick:
should I bother? Yeah, that complacency, I think, opens up fertile ground for the far right and fascism.
Matthew McPherson:
And before we get to conference, there's probably one key thing that we should touch on.
Nick:
The Bobby
Matthew McPherson:
Reshuffles.
Nick:
movie?
Matthew McPherson:
Well, have you
Nick:
Well,
Matthew McPherson:
been to see it?
Nick:
I've seen it. You haven't had anything, have you? It's great.
Matthew McPherson:
I haven't been to see it, I haven't.
Nick:
It's a
Matthew McPherson:
It's
Nick:
fantastic.
Matthew McPherson:
not really my thing.
Nick:
Well, I wasn't entirely sure it was going to be my thing either, but it's a terrific critique of modern social structures as well as being
Matthew McPherson:
Interesting.
Nick:
very funny. Yeah, it's
Matthew McPherson:
Is it a very
Nick:
very...
Matthew McPherson:
political movie then?
Nick:
Yeah, it is. It is.
Matthew McPherson:
I mean, you can't help but walk, uh, with walking around London, but see all of the enormous advertising. It has been everywhere. I think I've seen planes with it on. I've seen buses. I've seen a Barbie themed ice cream. That's quite extraordinary.
Nick:
Oh yeah, well and without giving any plot twists away, because I'm sure you'll want to see it at some point, it sends Mattel and previous incarnations of Barbie up something rotten. It's very, very funny. As well as being quite profound. So yeah, and various of my friends are doing the sort of two films in one go experience. and you know Oppenheimer and then Barbie. Barbyheimer or Oppenbarber or whatever it's
Matthew McPherson:
Watching
Nick:
called.
Matthew McPherson:
them back to back I hear.
Nick:
Back to back, exactly. Which maybe we should do at some point over the summer now that we've got a little more time on our hands.
Matthew McPherson:
Well, certainly.
Nick:
So, well, I jumped straight into Barbie before we got into reshuffles. Although there
Matthew McPherson:
Well,
Nick:
is a reshuffle.
Matthew McPherson:
I mean, it feels like we've been talking about Keir Starmer's reshuffle for at least a year. It feels like there's a question of when will it actually come? Is it going to happen? Is it going to... I mean, I suppose for any opposition party, you're probably asking yourself the question, why would I have a reshuffle when I'm 20 points ahead consistently in the opinion polls? It becomes quite a risky thing to do,
Nick:
I
Matthew McPherson:
especially
Nick:
think.
Matthew McPherson:
given Keir Starmer's previous experience of reshuffles, which it's fair to say haven't always been. the smoothest and people have ended up having to take extra jobs and all the rest of it.
Nick:
It looks easy from the outside, but it's so difficult on the inside. Even at a council level, when I did reshuffles in Newcastle, it was a bit like playing three-dimensional chess because you could have a really good idea about where you wanted to get to. But as soon as somebody said, actually no, I'm not prepared to do that, the whole plan starts to fall apart. It's even more complex at a government level. And of course... I think what Keir will be wanting to do is, well ahead of the conference season, make sure that he's got the right people in the right shadow portfolios, so people playing to their strengths, and he'll want to make sure he's got his best communicators on the significant important issues. Which to be fair, actually, I think he's more or less got at the moment. You know, Wes, who's obviously launched a health campaign with us, Bridget on education and childcare. Angie on opportunity and that plays very much to the purpose coalition agenda around improving social mobility and Johnny Reynolds on growth and I think you can see some really strong performers there but there are more people I think who are capable of doing more and so we may well see a bit of tweaking and a bit of changing of the team over the summer just so the people are playing properly to their strengths.
Matthew McPherson:
Who do you think we might see enter Shadow Cabinet for the first time?
Nick:
for the first time or again because that's different.
Matthew McPherson:
I suppose either.
Nick:
Well, people are talking about Hilary Benn making a comeback, which would be lovely. Hilary is terrific. He's got a very dry sense of humour. One of his fashion things is he always wears Doc Marten boots.
Matthew McPherson:
I remember meeting him actually at Labour Party Conference last year and what a lovely man he is. He is just,
Nick:
He's a genuinely lovely
Matthew McPherson:
um,
Nick:
man.
Matthew McPherson:
uh, and, and offered to, to help put a roller banner up, uh, with me, which is, uh, not the kind of thing you'd normally expect
Nick:
Well,
Matthew McPherson:
a shadow
Nick:
he
Matthew McPherson:
secretary
Nick:
doesn't
Matthew McPherson:
to do.
Nick:
have the advantage of being very tall, so he's quite handy when it comes to putting banners up.
Matthew McPherson:
Absolutely.
Nick:
Yeah, I think... I think there are a few people to watch, not necessarily directly into the shadow of cabinet, but I think what happens to Alison McGovern will be really interesting. I mean, of course, Alison's a friend of ours. She's done a lot of stuff with the Purpose Coalition over the years and is a terrific advocate for our kind of agenda in Parliament. So it's great to see that she won this election, will be continuing in the new parliamentary seat. And... has frankly dealt with some really nasty and hostile politics in her local Labour Party which I think she deserves a lot of credit and payback for because she's held a nerve and stayed with the party and I think she may well find herself in a, not necessarily a shadow cabinet role but a serious large shadow ministry role. And then of course there's the new generation of the 2019 intake. There's some really great candidates there. Flo Etolomi, for example,
Matthew McPherson:
Yeah, certainly very good.
Nick:
who is absolutely terrific. Some of the people elected by-elections. Sam Dixon in Cheshire. Sorry, Chester. Andrew Weston, actually, who is making a terrific name for himself in house building.
Matthew McPherson:
He certainly is. He's he's and what I really think Andrew has done incredible job on is that cross party working. It's something that the public want to see in a huge amount of work with Simon Clarke, probably, you know, not politically aligned in any way. But on those key issues like house building, actually, what I think is really interesting about Andrew's been doing is coming up with some of those quite interesting new policy ideas. So things like could you designate? all of the land within a mile of a station to be available for house building, which is one of his proposals he's put forward to sort of build homes where people need them. I think he's been doing a terrific job and obviously used all of his local government experience like you have to be able to put forward some of those policy ideas.
Nick:
And I think we'll see. We've already seen a good number of people with significant local government experience be selected in parliamentary seats for Labour. I think we'll see more of that. That means that although the PLP might currently lack government experience, the benches are being significantly strengthened with people with local government experience. That sort of pragmatic, problem-solving approach where... delivery is more important than straightforward party politics I think is really welcome within Labour.
Matthew McPherson:
Do we think that Keir will use the reshuffle as an opportunity to align those shadow portfolios and the roles there to those new government departments that were formed by Rishi Sunak? We've obviously seen reports that Lucy Powell is keen on taking the shadow science job, but do you think he'll use it as an opportunity to do that?
Nick:
I honestly don't know. I think Kei will probably want to keep climate change and energy as a really strong focus. So I don't think that will be wrapped up into a sort of business and industry ministry. I think he'll want to keep that focus. I think... I don't think we'll see a return of international development as a separate department. All sorts of issues and challenges about it going in with a foreign office. But I think that reading the runes, although that's not terribly popular within the international development sector, I think it's been done so why on Picket is probably the
Matthew McPherson:
And
Nick:
view within London at the moment.
Matthew McPherson:
we all know as well, reorganisations of government departments, when you get into government, are, you know, there's one thing renaming a department, but actually changing it. I mean, I was chatting to somebody from the new science technology department and they were saying that they only just got their office. This is about a month ago. And they'd only just got their office. I mean, this department was established in February. That's, that's an awful long time to put civil servants, you know, on hold on pause whilst they work out new structures. and all the rest of it.
Nick:
And of course, anything like that, any restructure of government, there's a hiatus period where everybody sort of looks internally at where they're going to end up and as a result, the losers focus on delivery. It's one of the big mistakes that George Osborne made when he became Chancellor back in 2010 because he announced that he was going to review all of Labour's infrastructure projects and funding. What that did was, for about 18 months, put on hold a lot of major schemes that meant that had a huge ripple effect all the way down the system. And so people were laid off, critical skills were lost, momentum was lost in terms of particular schemes and it took another three or four years to get back up to previous delivery levels. So one of the things that we'll have to think really carefully about ahead of the election and particularly in terms of... what the government structures might look like the other side of the election is yes, reform government to make it work better, but do it in a way that is going to be least disruptive to delivery because the crucial time to establish credibility to deliver is in the first few months, first year or so really of an incoming government. And if you don't do it then, you really lose the opportunity. And that's why I think although there's a recognition of major reform of the civil service is needed, there's a bit of a question about how to do it and when to do it in terms of the parliamentary cycle.
Matthew McPherson:
We've got a lot to look forward to then. Conference, over the summer, reshuffles. It's gonna be a busy couple of months,
Nick:
the top
Matthew McPherson:
and
Nick:
and then you
Matthew McPherson:
certainly
Nick:
can.
Matthew McPherson:
we have a huge number of purpose coalition events in the next couple of months.
Nick:
We do, and don't forget, you've got to watch the Barbie movie, that's worth looking forward to as well.
Matthew McPherson:
I will take your advice.
Nick:
From the autumn onwards, we're ramping up the Purpose Coalition work, particularly in terms of purpose for labour. where we'll be organising a series of round tables around the missions and associated policy themes. Because there's just so much really interesting stuff happening in our members at the moment, there's some really exciting stuff that's worth sharing on a bigger platform and we'll be working out how to do that at conference and in the months beyond as well.
Matthew McPherson:
Well, I'm very much looking forward to it. Hopefully get a break over the summer and then straight back into it.
Nick:
Yeah, any plans to go anywhere nice?
Matthew McPherson:
Well, I'm off to Italy in a couple of weeks time, which
Nick:
Oh
Matthew McPherson:
will be very
Nick:
lovely.
Matthew McPherson:
nice.
Nick:
Very nice but very
Matthew McPherson:
And then,
Nick:
hot.
Matthew McPherson:
yeah, very hot at the moment in particular, going back to our point on green policies and then somewhere else in the UK at the end of the month, but I'm not entirely sure where yet, but no, looking forward to it. What about you, Nick?
Nick:
Well, do you know, normally we'll be heading up to Scotland this time of year, but we've got a big holiday planned in the autumn going to Canada. So this August, it's gonna be mainly day trips out. But that's great because in Newcastle in the Northeast, there's so many amazing places to do day trips to, whether it's Lindisfarne or the Durham Dales or Barnard Castle, might go and get my eyes tested. So, yeah, great summer to look forward to.
Matthew McPherson:
Well, have a great time and we will do another podcast very soon.
Nick:
Well, good to talk to you and have a good summer. And the Forbes and McPherson show will be back online in September.
Matthew McPherson:
Thanks Nick.
Nick:
Take care.
