Is Rishi Sunak a Populist? | Alastair Campbell meets Beth Rigby (Part 2)

[Music] thank you look at the look at what's happening now do you think we should see that's a populist what are your points Sola Braven is his Home Secretary and he doesn't mind when she does all this random nonsense uh if he did mind he wouldn't have it there and he wouldn't let it do it so I think he's basically if I can use a phrase that's fairly well known on that side of the political aisle I think he's trying to have his cake and eat it he's trying to he's trying to be the sort of serious grown-up guy in the room but he's allowing this stuff to happen and look you if you watch his if you watch him when he first became prime minister and it was so obvious to me that we're going to try and do this narrative Johnson was a you know terrible human being suddenly Liz trust was an aberration the grown-ups Are Back In Charge soon I can hunt and since then if you watch his conduct at Prime Minister's questions he's not that far off what Johnson was like you know Lefty lawyers what's a lefty lawyer we have lawyers you know lawyers take cases lawyers defend people they prosecute people a lefty lawyer a lefty lawyer is somebody that doesn't believe in all this anti-whope stuff he's still on the woke thing I say in the book I haven't got a clue what this work stuff means anymore it's just everything that somebody on the right disagrees with you're woke you know but you you so I think he is good I think he has got populists okay taking more if I take a more benign view put it to you when you and Tony Blair and and brown when you went into number 10 in 97 you had such a huge Landslide you could do it the how you wanted you could put whoever you wanted in cabinet but but but do you not see him more as a politician who is constrained totally so so it's not he might not want so whatever I don't know if he does or doesn't but he might not want someone but he's had to do a deal yeah is that what Rory because Royster thinks he wants to get rid of her but listen the other thing that the other thing is that you used to sit back I can remember back in 1997 and let's be honest the the majority was bigger than we expected okay I can remember him being in Sedgefield on the night of the election we were watching the Telly Tony hates watching the Telly right but the Telly was on in the background and it was like we watched Nutella he was good I remember it was when Michael Forsyth went in Sterling and it was like labor gain labor gain labor gain labor gain labor gain attorney what the it's your intake can you remember well I'm I am a I am a professional pessimist I I went I say in my diaries that on the night before the election I'll never forget this my son Callum phoned me up and he said are we going to win and I started crying because it was the we he said we are we going to win and I thought my kids haven't neglected and haven't been home for months and all the rest of it so at least he feels part of it and that was the first time but he still loves me and that was the first time I I sort of allowed myself and I said yeah we are we're absolutely gonna destroy them um but even then I didn't think it was going to be that big I thought three figures maybe maybe but I'd gone through the whole campaign telling everybody we can lose this and you have to do that you have to think you can lose otherwise you stop doing this you were so far ahead in the polls I don't care I mean I you know I won't and I because I've just done the local elections uh you know 1995 I mean Blair you were you were like 25 points ahead at that set of local elections I mean I know it was insane you were like at 54 and how could you have thought because you have to think that otherwise you get complacent and I can remember once we were in a hotel in Luton right it's a tough campaign we're in a hotel and the Daily Telegraph phoned me up and said we've got a poll tomorrow I can't remember the number it was a ridiculous number your 38 points ahead in the polls or whatever and I said that is a rope poll if I were you you're going to absolutely destroy your own credibility if you even run it our private polls show nothing like that at all this is a lot closer than you think and they you know so you have to think like that but and the pointy maker was well about you know we felt we could do anything the point I'm making is that I remember Tony saying to us the majority will make people think that we're going to ride rush out every ride roughshod over everything we can't we've actually got to be more careful not less careful and that's what I think so amazing about this lot honestly I was talking the other day to um no it was a civil servant who was telling me about you know it was somebody who works in the justice department and said that you know Rob however bad you think it is is worse these people no seriously these people are terrible and the special advisors they they treat all the civil servants like they're vile they don't know anything they think politics is a game and one of the things I'm proudest of actually and I do say in the book by the way politics isn't just elected politician you know civil service is part of government is important campaigning political parties they all matter but we were very very conscious of that I'm very proud of that no civil servant who ever worked for me ever came out and and says some of the things that the journalist said at the time but none of them but yeah and there was an inquiry into Rob there were eight separate um charges of bullying two were upheld by tolly the KC that investigated it and and he was forced to resign so yeah yeah but the culture is I mean what was right uphill until then look I don't know Rob that well but you know you heard the story so often so repeatedly you must have been hearing them the whole time and it's a culture and so when you go back to the look Johnson was terrible in so many ways and it does come from the top the one thing you know about and I've seen this with Tony you know the culture comes from the top so when that part let's take part again okay none of the people who worked for me worked for Jonathan Powell worked for any of us none of them would have dared have a social event inside Downing Street at the best of times let alone during the minute the middle of a pandemic which would not have happened because it's unprofessional it's wrong and so that's a culture and that comes from leadership and I think if you if you're sunac at the moment and okay I'm not pretending he's as bad as Johnson but you know he is letting these people lose he is letting soda Brahman say what the hell she wants about all this policy stuff I know I just wonder whether that stems from political Authority because he's a guy that lost the leadership race with the members for sure he became prime minister because Liz truss crushed and burned correct um he was then appointed by the party and so you know not you know how well I'm not saying it's not difficult for him but I tell you what the one thing I I honestly think that if he you get strength in leadership by standing up to people not by pandering to them okay now you don't do it willy-nilly the whole time and I accept Tony had massive Authority through a majority he was popular in the country all that stuff but I honestly believe if sunak actually just stood up and said I mean even rhys-mogg said yesterday there's no way we can change the leader again we're toast if that happens so he's actually got more Authority and strength than he realizes I think for now and he's got these people all Noises Off the whole time anyway I really honestly believe if he were to come out and say look we got in a mess because of populism that's why we're in this mess now I'm not going down that road I'm sorry sowella you just you just pushed it too far you've got to go go and live on the back benches and we'll see where you end up well let's go back to polarization populism and brexit because um in a recent interview I did with Jeremy Hunt I challenged him about the economic effect of brexit and this was on the back of the office of budget responsibility after the budget they said there will be a long-term hit to the economy it will be four percent smaller and he said I don't accept the figure and he said I don't accept the figure because they're external externalities that we can uh bring about that will make that figure less damaging and there's lots of brexit upside and I and do you think he believes that I don't know if he believes that or not but he doesn't it's not my job to decide whether it's my job to ask the questions but but part as journalistically part of the difficulty for a journalist is we're not there to make the argument we're there to observe the arguments and challenge the politicians but starma has basically cleared the pitch it's like let's not talk about it let's just not talk about brexit let's forget it even happened that we could have taken a different approach politically could there have been a different approach in terms of post-brexit trading arrangements or something which there could have been um the conservatives for their reasons of sovereignty Etc they chose not to take that route and then starmer Justice chose to zip it what's going on what's going on is that I was thinking of Harold Wilson now I'll tell you what's going on I'm going on um do you know what we yes well that was a good one um he was a real operator um no I'll tell you what's going on is he doesn't want brexit to be at the center of the election debate yeah and I completely understand that he he doesn't want he's he's absolutely uh I might wish he hadn't have dived in so quickly but he's absolutely saying we're not revisiting the referendum but I so that's fine that's that's his position and and he's entitled to do that but I did this speech did last week about Europe I I actually made the point I think that I quoted Wayne Gretzky the ice hockey player he said I skate where the puck is going not where he's been right the puck was over there the puck was over there and it was one of the people and the pup was over there and it was we're gonna make it work and the puck was over there and it's like there's going to be lots of upsides we hold all the cards blah blah blah the puck is now over there and people think in the main the thing is a complete show and labor are kind of here make brexit work and the point I made is I think that you can try and make brexit work but you've got to be honest about the fact that it is damaging us and it honestly Jeremy Hunt this is back to your point about have we got the grown-ups back in charge Jeremy Hunt knows that that is not true he and what's the point of having the obr the obr was set up by a conservative government to give independent analysis of what's Happening inside the treasury so if he doesn't believe it why is he why has he got them in there right they are analyzing his numbers so I think that what I want labor to do and I actually think this will be politically sensible popular and it will help them deal with the inevitable questions you guys are going to throw them through the whole campaign about brexit I think if they were to say uh and this is not exactly what I want but let me just say I think this is what they could do we accept the result of the referendum we accept that we're not revisiting anytime soon not least back is what by the because the Europeans wouldn't have us until we settled on this nonsense anyway however the brexit has delivered in the trade the TCA the training Corporation agreement all that stuff is not working as promised it is doing real damage to our con the economy to our society to our culture to our standing in the world those bits that are doing that damage we are going to have to revisit and that will involve some sort of discussions negotiations with the European Union so all you've got to say you said in an article on May 11th you said I understand his reasons for not going farther what are his reasons for not going further because he thinks he'll get killed by the conservatives if he does they're going to try and kill him anyway no it's the reason I gave that he doesn't want brexit to be the dominant Narrative of the election campaign he wants it to be about this law I've got to go and we can be better is it because if he thinks that if there's any perception of his backsliding he might jeopardize winning back parts of the country that were very pro-brexit and already have suspicions of him because he was Mr people's vote and have a second referendum I I think yeah there's a little bit of that you see I mean I write a chapter in the book about the people's vote campaign and how that imploded and and what have you I don't I don't look I go to the red wall I I hate it's one of those things that's become a kind of Monolithic view right I was up in Burnley last weekend when we won the title you probably know about that it was a happy day for the world and you know honestly if you listen to the way that a lot of our media talk about places like Burnley and accrington and Blackburn it's like you're walking around the place and they're all in their clogs and they're all wearing their flat caps and they're all saying if you ever touch my brexit I'm gonna absolutely they're coming up to me and saying what the is going on this is a disaster you know it's it's the same as here it's like this we're doing an event on the podcast in Harrogate tomorrow we're going to talk about the north-south Divide you know it's there's so many mythologies there's more poverty in London there's more wells in London but there's also more poverty the north is not some sort of Monolithic part of England that's all sitting there desperate for brexit they're desperate for the same as everybody else they want the cost of living crisis sorted they want the public service is fixed and they want the country to stop being feeling like it's completely stuck and that's why I think that brexit is part of what's made us stuck but Care's right not to want to you know I give him this he's I I wished it took us a long time to persuade the labor party to back the people's vote campaign they did in the end probably pay a price um because Johnson managed to get the election brought forward lib Dems and the SMP fell into his trap labor had to follow and he and he won the campaign on get brexit done but that turned out just to be another set of Lies well I'm going to ask you one more question on this and move on because when you talk to labor politicians now it'd be starmer or Reeves or David Lammy and you asked them about what would your brexit policy you say that you want to fix some of the harms caused economically is not revisiting a customs Union is that a Norway style deal is that the single market and they basically say they're going to make incremental changes if you like around things that are kind of low hanging free but they're not going to fundamentally revisit the relationship do you number one do you disagree with that number two do you think it's because this electoral cycle it's just politically impossible to do it look I think the Customs Union is incredibly difficult because it doesn't you revisit freedom and movement but look I say in the book it's quite something just think about this when we fought the referendum it was a red line for both remain and leave we were not leaving the Customs Union the single market now yeah yeah so they break the promise on that we leave them and now it's a red line that we don't even think about going back into it that's what I mean about The Madness of our political situation but so no but there's loads of stuff you can do look at there's not a single scientist or researcher who doesn't know that we've got to get back into Horizon somehow yeah we've got to get into that we've got to get back into Erasmus somehow we've got to revisit some of this stuff we've got to repair the cultural damage that's done we've got to get better trade relations we've got to be able to sort out the stuff at the border that is stuff that I think can be done but it's not being done in part because we've got ideological stance on the in the Tory government where they refuse to say that anything is going badly and then you've got the French in particular look I know macron and macron Johnson lied to his face right lied to his face and that is going to take a lot of repairing so they once you get powers like that I feel they genuinely can't trust you that's very very difficult they could sort out this boats thing they could sort it out with Goodwill on both sides but there's very little good will see that's making some he's trying he's trying but look at what he did in Northern Ireland I mean all that Ballyhoo I remember I'm not sure I watched the Odd Squad he's right yeah well The Windsor framework yeah and you've got the helicopter following the car treatment right oh yeah massive historic moment I'm thinking I'm thinking I'm going to believe this when I see it yeah right and look what's happening well actually I thought I and I was a bit I felt over cynical on the news at 10 that night because like because it was framed as this massive success and I said it's only a success if he can sell it to the domestic well it's a change of success if you can get the institutions up and running that's the only success and it hasn't happened so I think he's trying but you know he's not succeeding and I'm not buying the soonax thing I'm really not I'm just like you know and fancy you know you pick your first game of the season to go and watch Southampton you watch them get relegates I mean that is cool it's bit me that was a bit was that mean sorry was it sorry okay and the hoodie wasn't the hoodie thing I mean wear a jacket or where you know I I I I don't mind the hoodie okay come on okay all right now um

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Length: 18min 20sec (1100 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 18 2023