The Conservative Party Is FINISHED For Good. Here’s Why. | Aaron meets Peter Oborne

we're learning more and more every day about the Reform Party and the ra bigotry and racism it's horrible and yet have you heard a squeak from sunak a proper British prime minister would have denounced farage by now and said this is unacceptable our country will never wear this this is unri and starm has been pathetic it has to be fought this is the Battle of our lifetime look what's happening in France look what's happening in Germany it's not going to happen in my Brit and he' single out farage the UN unacceptable face of British politics you've had nothing from either starma or soona in this general election Britain's conservative party is the most successful political organization in the western world ever for the best part of two centuries it has been the default party of governments in the UK it's the equivalent in British politics of Madrid it is historically speaking anyway addicted to winning but that might be about to change there's a general election here in the UK in July and if the polling is to be believed then the conservatives are in line for a historic hiding some polls put them below 20% some polls even put reform led by Nigel farage ahead of them so on the ballot in July isn't just a candidate or a set of policies or a Manifesto or even a potential prime minister but a whole ideology a whole tradition and history a whole way of doing politics in short British conservativism is at a crossroad and some people think that means that this election is the most important perhaps for a century after all it's not very often that one of the major parties collapses we've seen it once before with the liberal a century ago could we see it happen once more in July well today's guest thinks that's a distinct possibility and he should know after all he is a conservative with real pedigree to match Peter oborn is a former political editor at The Spectator and a former Chief political commentator at the Telegraph and he thinks that the conservative party isn't just headed for collapse but it's about to be replaced by something very different Peter oborn welcome to Downstream thank you very much for inviting me we've wanted to get you on for a very long time because you've been saying very interesting things about the conservative party for a very long time and for a very long time you're a bit of a siren Voice who who may have been interpreted as being wide of the mark because you were saying there are big problems in the conservative party but of course electorally they were flying high now they're not how do they go from this high water mark of of 2019 incredible performance to where they are today regularly polling below 20% it's the longest story but you have to start before uh9 uh the election it was what happened in um the summer when provoked by Dominick Cummings Boris Johnson effectively split the Tory party between the he got rid of the So-Cal One Nation wing of the Tory party in uh I think it was early August uh and the traditional story about the Ken Clark the Roy Stewart The Dominic grieve the gaulk and and after that somebody this beautiful analogy I forget who made it you know the toy party flies on two Wings which balance each other and thereafter the Tory party was flying on One Wing and uh it was in doomed to crash uh and it duly has I mean I it's going to be I do think it's going to be the worst result the T party has ever had and I think it may well be the end of the conservative party I I I quite take quite a if you look at the if you analyze what has happened so 2019 they brought in a a load of MPS who you will have noticed there been a large number of personal catastrophes people who've behaved in per person you know been fraudulent or caught up in wretched dealing or ignored public standards and had to leave or been stripped of the Whip and it was one being one scandal after another this is because they the usual sort of methods were abandoned if you look who Boris Johnson brought in as his party chairman was um uh you know just some some some sort of financial fixer with you know public p man who fixed stuff he didn't know anything about politics he they knew about how to get money and uh I I I I don't actually think now that it's uh retrievable I think it's very unlikely that the conservative party as it existed from 18 you know let's say you can see it arriving in starting to take proper modern form in about after the First Reform Bill First Reform and then uh as it carried on until you know the early 20th century 21st century I think that's gone so we looking at almost 200 years of History down the dra well you know life moves on doesn't it I mean but I think that this it was the most greatest and most successful political party in the Western World over the last 200 years uh people writing how is how you can save it I'm not sure you can I think it's you know doomed but partly because you can't see any figures of any caliber joining it now and they're not left they they were kicked out and is who's going to bring back what's going to intensifies Roy Stewart to come back into it you know the next J Ken Clark or I I think that um and you can see what's going to happen to it in the short term that it's going to it has already been to a very large extent captured by the far right and there's going to be a battle for it in the next um you know after the election well Tim Montgomery blamed um A procession of what he called Napoleonic leaders which is to say there's nothing wrong with the institution it's just just so happens that several bad leaders have been at the top and if that hadn't happened this could have been avoided but from the sounds of it you're saying something quite that's a very it's a very shallow analysis because it you know what produces these uh bad leaders and and you have to look at the structures which produce those leaders and it's a story which goes back is connected with movements in society you know which is the collapse of Civil Society public the public realm um and the Tory party is a manifestation of that in certain ways that the you can see it being captured by big Finance money um it used to have enormous uh it stretched beautifully out into across the country as a whole to institution women's Institute these these SMY see conservative organizations it it Artic it was the it reflected the um writing you know the analysis of the great of Oak shot the great conservative philosopher there are very few conservative philosophers or political thinkers of great moment and that was really it's it's Burke and Oak shot and Oak shot's great Insight was that politics uh didn't matter very much or shouldn't matter very much that most people wanted to get on with the ordinary business of their lives whether it's running a school or owning a training a race horse which he was he was fond of or um playing a role in your local community pursuing your own objectives but you need in order for that all that to go on you need to have uh a party which keeps eyes of ordinary life and it has been captured by a collection of people who who want to in use politics to make for for for to make money uh and that's what Johnson was the most egregious example of this so he he encouraged a culture where very rich men wanted access to the conservative party in order to sell their products or regulate get secure S soft regulation for their businesses and to um get contracts secure social position I mean whatever it was get and suddenly it lost this connection this deep profound centuries old connection with society as a whole is that I don't I'm not suggesting you're saying it's new but how new is it when you look at somebody like I believe it was Lord Feldman was alongside David Cameron and he was very much you know he was his his partner in crime and I think he becomes the chair of the party 20056 Lord Felman I don't want to say anything he brings huge amounts of money into the party no look this is true that and I don't by the way I don't want to suggest that Lord Feldman did anything remotely improper but um he does there was a uh a trend towards this uh the financialization of British politics going back not all that far but it went back it start sort begins in the thater era Tony Blair did a lot because what he in order to eliminate the trade unions as a source of political power and influence he he set up his private fund you may remember um quite disgusting in my view just morally disgusting because you are politics is really about serving the common good it's not all enabling the interests of a small collection of people who can buy it and Blair did that um and it was hailes of brilliant Innovation actually it was disaster for British politics Cameron then tried to copy Blair so he he'd seen somebody called lord Levy do this for um for Blair and he brought in t figures such as Feldman and uh and and all they is I'm not blaming people like Feldman but they don't they don't bring any Rich understanding of political Traditions or the importance of Association and so forth they see their job as to bring in money which they do well but you have to look at the motives and um huge sums of people who invest huge sums of money into the British politics are looking for a return these aren't they're not doing it from the out of the goodness of their heart and was there a moment in the last few years for you where you thought actually decimation is coming not like a know labor get a a poor result in 2019 they get 32% but we're looking at something you know it's not implausible the tourist get half that's not going to happen but it's not implausible the Tes get half that on July the 4th they could get 20% around margin of error up or down did you ever think that was possible say in 2021 or 2022 or I think I'd come to I think if you read what I wrote at the time I think was my analysis that it was finished by then because the um for various reasons one was the economic model which of brexit which Johnson promoted couldn't work you know that deal secondly he was so corrupt in terms of his dealings on on the public in the public sphere he corrupted the institutions of the British State and it was becoming unworkable and so I and then and this this led first of all to the Deep Administration of Johnson uh after he lied to the house was I mean a lot of people lie but to to actually it was so well documented that it was set out and the commons voted on it and established that the British prime minister had lied it was obvious what was happening there and he had and eventually he had even the Tory party realized that he had to go and then you got this uh series of PE inept Prime Min two atep one I mean terrible Prime Ministers one after another so I think it was I think it was all uh inevitable from about 20 21 onwards if it wasn't already because as I say the Damage Done when Johnson and I don't think no political writer writes it because nowadays political writers don't describe politics they are part of factions and they're there they're client journalist generally speaking there to express the point of view and of the people in part so with Johnson in part at apparently his Heyday political journalism became a sort of form of decoration and so you didn't get serious political journalist in the political journalism or analysis in the conservative papers and so the fact that the party had split in in in 2019 and then it had embarked on a it was now then led by a leader who was trying was actually smashing up the party quite deliberately U wasn't reported in fact Johnson was hailed as some sort of great man it is true that the um conservative papers was a problem you couldn't read this anywhere because uh the guardian was inpt his political reporting was incap seemed didn't really understand what was happening that all the papers had back Johnson to be Tory leader all the right-wing papers Murdoch rir Express uh and the telegraph they all backed him to be leader they then all backed him in the 2019 election they and then and they all backed him as he got into trouble and then they were still backing him the day he was kicked out of parliament kicked out says he he he lost that key vote and forced to leave so the Tory papers had returned my colleagues in the political press had transformed themselves from sensible people trying to understand how power works and what was being done with it as being propagandist for a particular wing of the conservative party which it was already obvious at that point wasn't conservative there's nothing conservative about Johnson at all he didn't understand the why institutions matter that's a conservative idea he didn't understand or hated even due process he was hostile to the Civil Service and the which is the Civil the memory of the British State really and he didn't like that um and so and he was very hostile to the rule of law he he exploited the monarchy quite extraordinary in a conservative to light of the queen I mean quite extraordinary thing to do and so we had a it wasn't a conservative government it was a revolutionary government which was trying to smash the British state it was doing what Lenin might have wanted to do you know that's what it was doing and cheered on by the the so-called Tory press it was a weird period And by once you saw all that happening it was clear the whole Enterprise was doomed and the party was doomed by then yeah it's interesting and there are there are arguable parallels with what's going on in labor now I'm not suggesting for one moment that labor is heading for these kinds of polling numbers in several years if ever I'm not suggesting that for a moment but this idea that actually the timeline we're now in was discernable from the summer of 2019 um and the early years of the the the Johnson government but there simply wasn't the space within the British media landscape to have the conversations about where this might end I mean I do see certain parallels potentially with labor and starma because for the reasons you've said the people that should be passing political analysis or in in fact just representing a particular faction which is favorable in align with the leadership there's a book coming out from a gentleman called Simon Cooper um I probably mispronounced that I think it's a Dutch name Flemish name and it's about the demise of the good chaps theory of of States good yes I'm aware I was reading a review of it today and it made a lot of sense to me yeah and he wrote he wrote an article in the Ft weekend last weekend and he said you know the British State and I think basically this aligns with your your argument just a moment ago effectively British conservativism um in the postwar period in the Democratic period is really built on a a public sphere of public duty Common Sense decency which is really an outgrowth of the second World War Mass mobilization of people into the military and so on Collective memory of trauma can the conservative party ReDiscover that good chaps theory of government is that just simply now you you said you don't see the Personnel at the top of the party but in 5 10 15 years could it come back or is it yeah I I I I read a review of it and I thought it made according I agreed with the analysis some of the analysis in the review I think that his timelines were wrong actually the he he makes out that good chaps the starts in I think the mid mid 20th century it actually starts way before that it's developed by oddly enough really the good chaps idea which is that people are honest that's what it means you can trust them it begins uh really in the mid 19th century under gladston um long period Chancellor when pal paliston was prime minister and two great civil servants northcut trellion devot created the modern Civil Service which was based on honor and decency this is what Cooper was talking about in his book or is talking about which I looks terrific to me and um they brought in this idea that what had happened in the 19 18th century as described brilliantly by namia in the structure of politics of the accession of George thei absolute master class in how politics actually works he showed it everybody who went into British politics in the 19 in the 18th century was basically out to make money and that was what it would they looked it was very weird if you any other reason and this you can see this happens across a lot of the world and then thanks to um I think uh the power of really of Evangelical Christianity huge factor in gladston um understanding of the world um but also industrial competition states which are bent find it very hard to compete so much money is funneled off so if you look at the reason why the two countries which went straight as it were adopted codes of public honesty in the late 19th century were Britain and the Germany and they were emerging as the two major Global Powers at that point uh and and so that is where you get that code and the conservative party in turn izes it and the old wigs the old aristocracy which you know and their voices like trol up the novelist who were hostile to the new Arrangement and wanted everything to be fixed in favor of an elite they were they they were gradually marginalized and the conservative party with a few bumps along the way became the most public voice of that but also the labor party accepted it and another wisdom about the conservative party it also understood that it didn't it was unhealthy that it should rule all the time and so you get this underappreciated Premiere called Baldwin in the uh 30s who's 20s and 20s who understands very quickly that you have to bring the organized working class into politics and he uh is really the Midwife to the rise of the labor party and he dedicates his political career one historians I think mock him for being boring boring but that's only because they aren't interested in what he actually did he dedicates his uh political career to to to to spending off the far right and the far left he's he's terrified of bushism this is just after 1917 and he's terrified of fascism we got the rise of Hitler and musolini and what he does then is to bring in labor as a mainstream political party approv as part of British height establishment and then of course he when labor fails uh temporarily in 19 well splits in 31 he sort of rescues it actually with McDonald and then he sees off or he doesn't allow the fascist Elements which are always up there under the surface in brison to seize the Tory party in the 1930s he gets a rotten press partly the church hated him wrongly I mean it's you he gets a rot and press but I I I that that is the embodiment of the wisdom of conservatism and that's what we've totally lost what because the forget the current generation of conservative leaders do not understand uh what Baldwin was on about and so you get idiots like sunak I mean very Sinister people actually like sunak who go you see it's very one of the most frightening things which happened in British politics ever was Sun's trip totally unreported as far as I can tell by the client press to visit Maloney for a political event just before Christmas last year where they spiting the great replacement Theory I mean this is very dark stuff and you saw obviously he still getting on with Maloney look at that sort of extraordinary meeting they had um just a few days ago uh and so you get a conservative party which now there is a that is now driven by weird strategists I think who just think of where where do we get the next vote and not what do we stand for this is interesting on the point of um strategy because the person who's apparently leading this so-called non strategy by the looks of it but alleged strategy Isaac lavido is a protege of Linton Crosby yeah but there doesn't feel to be any continuity with the professionalism of their campaigns of of yester years so I can understand your point of they thinking tactics not strategy short-term responsive um thinking rather than long-term 10 15 years what are we doing what are we for but that doesn't necessarily explain the amateurishness of it or does it well I think it is almost impossible to exaggerate the damage uh Lyon Crosby who was a very Suave intelligent person has done to Britain via the conservative party which I think you'll find if you look into very unexplored figure because anything here's here's a rule of political British political journalism anybody who's genuinely important never gets written about because he or she is too dangerous to inspect and so I'd love to know more about who was financing lon's uh campaigns you know in you know he he ran Johnson's No Deal y you know he he was behind that hard brexit we had and it was just getting rid of Mrs May that was very much with the help of the very able strategist of of Linson who by the way is a very civilized person I I I know him I mean whereas Isaac levido like Isaac leido to um to uh uh to to to Linton it's a bit like should we say Tom Baldwin to um alist Campbell you know sort of minor version sort of min mini me yes and I think that's what you got going on I think clearly Levy though there's been there's been anxious briefing from people close to levido I'm told that he he was against this date for an election but nevertheless to bring in these very crude divisive Politics the soall culture wars as a way to try and res rescue the situation for the conservatives um has done enormous damage to Britain this is the other thing which is upsetting it is ultimately it is the duty of a Statesman of a pol who who aspires the high office to bring the country together but conservative party under these the wedge politics kind of adopted by by Linson which he' already tried out as you know in Australia very with great success these wedg strategies about creating divisions where none previously existed and I can see they they have been the the Linton Str the Linton Crosby strategies have been politically very successful and he's also know known how to avoid losers but uh they've been to us as a nation they've been a total in my view they've been a total Calamity I've only ever received letters um threatening civil action as a result of alleged defamation twice one was from Majid noaz when I mistakenly called him a terrorist I meant an EXT a former terrorist I meant former extremist he was correct I I apologized I paid the expense of the letter fine and I I was in the wrong that's fine I I should have been more um thoughtful in my words another time the only other time was Linton Crosby when I said that he had traded in I think is islamophobic tropes in the Canadian election um when they were campaigning against Trudeau and I in that in that on that occasion I had used my words very carefully and what was interesting is I think about a week or two subsequence that tweet I got a you know um an email and a letter saying this is defamatory please delete make an apology blah blah blah blah and I said I see there's no problem here if you want to take this any further please be my guest and they never did but I got the sense that I was dealing with very professional serious people I think he is as I say I do think he has been the most accomplished political strategist of our age I just think he's done a lot of harm while he's been doing it but the point You' said about don't write people don't write about the individuals that matter I mean that really that really is so true the minute I've even said a tweet about him which is in no way defamatory I think can be held up very clearly even that got an email letter I wonder how often that happens but anyway um I suppose the counterargument to this is well if you look at the polling right now yes the Tories are doing very poorly let's say 19 20% depending which day it is but reform are doing very well and if you look at where the Tory votes are going some are staying at home some are going labor but the largest number of people who are no longer voting Tory who did in 2019 are going to reform doesn't that fly in the face of your analysis that actually dealing in the culture wars isn't advantageous somebody like farage would say actually they're not doing it properly they're not serious enough about ending um Net Zero about being hard on migration and actually your read on it is the wrong one what would you what what would you say to that I don't think that parage is playing culture wars I think he's deadly serious I mean I I think that uh the people who advised linon sorry Linson who ad advised the conservative party was to use them in order as a as an election an election Gambit I think that I was slow to realize this I think you can see now that farage and the Reform Party are a prototype I think you would be very careful to about the word fascist because it has certain meanings above all the use of political violence in the street and also unhelpful comparisons with the 1930s but nevertheless what you have here is uh faraj is you can you can connect him to a a a a group of European movements I think that's is's a conser part of a a conservative movement not a party including Leen and Orban and and the afd and so on and what they're really doing fundamentally is is is is running the great replacement Theory which is a book by French int far right intellectual about 12 years ago wasn't it and it mean it mean Western culture is under threat a western civilization our life under threat from these Sinister immigrants um who've come to you know challenge our way of life and um it it prays on fears which people have and again the job of a um a proper politician a responsible politician looked like Edward Heath in 1968 when he sacked Enoch pal it was a Enoch pal was a prototype for farage very Sinister uh openly racist and uh the conservative party in 1968 dealt with dealt with far dealt with with pal farage openly admires uh pal and so you've got the return of pal in through another means with his Reform Party which is if you look at the Tweets we're learning more and more every day about the Reform Party and the ra bigotry and racism it's horrible and yet have you heard a squeak from sunak a proper British prime minister would have denounced farage by now and said this is unacceptable our country will never wear this this is unb faraj was even claiming to be British you know British values so this is the opposite of the great Multicultural Traditions welcoming of immigrants a and and decency which our country stands for and always has stood for that's what Heath did of in effect in 1968 when he dealt he killed off Enoch Pal's career overnight and and starm has been pathetic what you I'm really shocked that the incoming labor lever hasn't made a speech saying this is revolting it has to be fought this is the Battle of our lifetime look what's happening in France look what's happening in Germany is not going to happen in my Britain and he'd single out farage the UN unacceptable face of British politics you've had nothing from either starma or sunna in this general election nothing I've seen anywh have you well I think St was asked today about verage and I think he basically gave no comment you know exactly no comment right focusing on the election and the the issues that matter to people and did you have you noticed the coverage in the political papers and so they're all playing with leaving aside the guardian but playing with him you know the telegraph pretty well backing him almost deranged political commentary from the telegraph pretty well backing him spectator on the day that on the week that he came back as leader of a form had four articles about farage not one of them criticized his islamophobia his easy tolerance of racists is bigotry not one Charles Moore Douglas Murray I'm me memories in this week's spectator you've got Toby Young endorsing farage in The Spectator Now The Spectator is is you somebody call it the Bible of the conservative movement and so they really do you got they want this merger don't they with the far right it's like the it's like the national front merging with the conservative party it's horrible and it's exactly the opposite of what the founding fathers of conservatism were about you remember Edmund Burke you know they all praise Ed but what what was his his career founded on but you know he was attacking the Bigg of the British Empire you know the Warren Hastings case he was standing up for the rights of you know what you know people who weren't just exploitative Brits you know he was he had a wide generous moral compass you know and uh this narrow sectarian bordering on white supremacism sometimes we're now getting from the far right of the from the from the mainstream conservative party and reform has is it's an extraordinary moment so that there's that big historical sweep which I love by the way talking about you know the incentives for people entering politics in in 18th century Britain talking about Burke and Oak shot and I I I can see all of that and I can see this huge deviation from its historical Origins that's now taking place in British conservativism but to Anchor it in 2024 is it possible even for the conservatives to dismiss farage like Heath did in 68 with with um Enoch pal because I mean they're polling you know it's one poll hard theme of the Tories they're looking at winning several seats he has farage has an incredible presence in the media incredible far more than Powell ever did and I I I just wonder I I appreciate that's the historical analogy but it feels like we're we're we're seeing something an order of magnitude bigger and so as a political challenge for starma 2 doesn't that make it a little bit different or am I over am I am I buying the whool Aid with farage I think one of the problems I again return to the uh nature of contemporary political discourse is that it's about sort of narrow arguments about strategic advantage and how do we get these votes and so on um it's not about looking ahead or actually asking what do we stand for what are our actual uh values and that is to my mind it much more important and if you go back to I talked about Baldwin I was talking about Edward Heath talking about the early sorry the early creators of uh the Tory party like Peele I mean they really people who put that careers on the line for major major issues so um I I I I can see that strategically there is this argument now coming from two different places one is from these strategists these invisible creatures inside political parties um who saying look if we're going to get more votes at the election we need to form an alliance with reform and then you get the ideologists who now see who now want to move the conservative party away from being this broad Church which has broadly speaking existed existed for nearly 200 years to being a a a movement a conservative movement uh with with analog with with with friendships and common purpose with the the far right in Europe but I I I I mean and I me to me it seems you may be right that actually and my fear is that after the general so let's move on to in a few weeks time right you got the 100 seats or something maybe less and um you know there's there a battle uh but for for who's going to be the next Tory leader um it may take several years because you will see there's a probably soel braan will emerge as the leading candidate for the far you know for the great replacement Theory as it were and you'll find there may be somebody there'll be somebody maybe Penny or hunt way to survive electorally and there'll be a little battle and it and the and that battle is very important because it's a battle for the title Deeds of the conservative party effectively the conservative party has gone in terms of its deep roots in Civil Society up and down Britain you know Scotland the north manufacturing industry agriculture really doesn't exist in a serious way anymore but but but it it still exists in our history this has been the eminent party of government for 200 years it's still got the name a a and it's still got the legal structure the danger is that after the fourth or fifth of July you're going to get a farri movement led by let's take as an example rman seizing control of the conservative party which has no real connection of conservatism as we've known it for the last 200 years it will be Mar the equivalent of mar Le Pen's party or someone and it'll delude the bo voters so for people who most people very sensibly take little interest in politics they won't know that the the party has you know they canvasing under a conservative name is really somebody deeply unpleasant with file views which can Trend towards fascism in due course I mean you remember fascism doesn't come on knock on all saying we're fascists they say we're nice people who share your concerns you said that they've got no anchor in society This Modern conservative movement and I mean that's that's in inarguable you know I've been going to places like godl Ming or farum or Wickham or small small um small town large Town um conservative seats the so-called blue wall across the South and it's very clear to me that the conservative party has collapsed even the people who are still planning to vote for them hate the they now hate the conservative party because they're not right-wing enough or because they've just not executed very well in office you know they people will say I'm you know my DNA is effectively conservative I will vote for the conservative party even if they get zero seats those people actually dislike the party more than anyone in some cases there's nothing worse than a disappointed romantic and I think many of them felt quite eager about the conservative party you know relatively recently whether that's thater or whether it was brexit and that's obvious to me and again the relationship of the conservative party to the institutions of of British Civil Society The National Trust rnli rspb I mean it's astonishing the Tor party goes to war with the National Trust amazing I I and led by the I've also noticed it's quite fascinating if you read The Daily Telegraph which I do with growing sense of Amazement it also attacks the middle classes yeah there's a category of people called middle class remainers which the telegraph has it really got it in for I mean they actually hate their own readers it's it's extraordinary thing and uh yeah and they're attacking they're running a campaign against the national trust where are we yeah yeah it's it's and that is I think and you can see their flation you see with reform and that's really serious but the the part of of of Civil Society where they do still have Roots is what you just said there which is the media so that's the part of conservative let's say small C conservative British Civil Society where there is still that connection with with the party the largely conservative party and you're somebody who's obviously been in that world you were Chief political commentator the telegraph you were political additive The Spectator you criticized both um Outlets a few moments ago have they changed yeah or have you changed I'll explain what has happened and I would argue that I haven't changed very much more or less I stand for exactly the same thing which I did when I was the political columnist you didn't have we know had nothing as vulgar as political editors in those days they were called political correspondent because it was a political editor edits nothing at all he writes it's just a sort of inflated non non meaningless phrase to make people appear grander than they really are um but I would argue that I was um when I was at The Spectator my anal my values are exactly the same as now I believed in the rule of law Trashed by the conservative party I was a strong monarchist am tr you know mocked Michael go he Le leags priv privy Council conver conversations with Queen Elizabeth and so on they uh they um they have been captured all of these groups the conservative party but also the newspapers have been captured by the super rich it's very horrible there was a connection between the major the times the telegraph only a generation ago the Daily Mail with civil society with its readers and he did represent them the pap if you look at the ownership of the papers now Murdoch was the precursor of this who's never been British as far as I know and how many how much British taxes does he pay you know it's doesn't really have you got to ask whose interests are at heart does he have at heart and well and the telegraph is getting order and order under the ownership of the Barkley Brothers actually attacking its own readers and you I tend to see the newspapers having fallen under the um control of a small group of very rich uh men I can't see any women involved in this process who um have their own reasons for wanting to own newspapers namely to ex you know to exercise political control achieve their their ends and you know 30 million or 40 million on on a media Outlet can actually be a very good investment if you can change policy in the direction you want it I think that's true um and it's not new but I I I I agree that it's it's clearly intensified since let's say the early 2000s but I mean you were at the you were at the telegraph when the Barkley brothers were there and also when they had The Spectator that's an amazing Story by the way it's like succession now youve got the kids fighting over the scraps and crazy story you were there then was it obvious to you then or did it take you a it was because I resigned from the T sure but you were you happy for period under them or did you see it getting worse or because obviously you know Murdoch comes to the UK I think in' 69 with news the world yeah Murdoch uh yes by the times in the 80s you know it's not it's not a holy new phenomenon yeah and also I think that you have to trace the history of this Murdoch became super powerful under Blair thata kept him at U at arms length and uh in my view for instance she would she hard she went down to the sun once I think talked to once I think uh and this decision by the Blair government incoming Blair government in 1997 to to fly all the way to Queensland and sort of pay a bence basically do that cap to Murdoch in in in '96 I think it was attending a meeting of news Cor in crazy and then if you look at the period after that the unlimited access given to Mok Executives in dining Street or Mok whenever he wanted to go this created a new kind of politics uh a document quite a lot of it in my book analy to Campbell by the way and it was new uh John Major had not tolerated this and that's one of the reasons they set up destroying him I suspect because he wouldn't uh play play play their game and so you got something very new with Blair which was then of course adopted by Cameron and I can explain to you how that happened too it was which was something very new emerges where the the the prime Parliament is effectively replaced by the media in 1997 you know the the conventional uh role played by Parliament I.E to uh where announcements are made on the floor of the house they go to the front page of the sun rather than made in the Commons and series of pathetic speakers have allowed that to to happen the government is is accountable to the uh to the uh to the papers more than to their own MPS who the figure at this moment in history of the chief whip is GRA massively diminished he's that you look back to those early TV dramas about politics the big big man is the chief whip suddenly the big man becomes the Press guy the aliser Campbell whoever it is now that becomes the new model of it the the they are taken into government suddenly you get the Press editors sitting alongside cabinet fantastic moment in early new labor when what's her name Rebecca uh Brooks I think she's the editor of the uh Sun she sits next to the cabinet in Party Conference speeches she doesn't sit with the journalist she's brought inside and the News International parties become sort of must attend obviously Cameron now Cameron to do him Justice tried to resist this uh when he first appeared but it led to political disaster he had an emergency moment in 2007 when his poll rankings collapsed and he brings in he solves it by bringing in Coulson the uh former editor of the news of the world as his press adice and that changes everything but he he constructs policy in order to please the news the Murdoch press rather than to do the conservative thing I mean one classic example of this is treatment of Muslims um policy towards Muslims until 2007 was just look at what Cameron would saying and doing he was saying you shouldn't use words like islamism we should treat the Muslim Community with great respect s ofari his was made a cabinet minister Shadow cabin cabinet uh Minister and uh and then suddenly you get kson and it gets harder you get Murdoch I don't want to trib mson is the symbol of all this you get it's done for Murdoch and they start to turn on the uh on the on minorities Gove is given control in Michael Gove who's who's really another very interesting phenomenon Gove he's absolute disaster from start to finish as a cabinet minister but he always gets written up as absolutely brilliant the most when saw the political obituaries written in he was the minister for Murdoch right that's all he was really and so you can't do anything wrong you just written up as as as as a genius because whatever he does is you know is regarded with enormous Acclaim and so that is what happened like a new structure was created for British uh politics and the relationship with the media and again I return to Baldwin it that they tried it out in 19 early 1930s when the uh when the the big big uh media guys bubble Beaverbrook tried basically to take over politics and and Balwin made this and they ran they formed a new political party and try to run against the uh trying to run against the conservative party and and and bwin made his famous speech you know power without responsibility is the prerogative of the Harlot that famous speech and he said clear out get out of the way another reason why Churchill hated bullwin because of course Beaver Brook was his mate but it's uh it's um it was a ma massive moment and Cameron could have done that it's fascinating Miss and you look at missed opportunities in modern politics after the phone hacking he could have used that to really take on Murdoch but instead of which he did that well the Tory party did that deal and you know there was never leveron too and obviously they had to respond to the public outrage at you know Millie dier but they they it was sorted through backstairs dealings with the big big Proprietors that's interesting a genealogy of Tory collapse and you know that that alternative timeline of like you say the the phone hacking inquiry and and Cameron maybe not hiring Coulson I mean that I think that's that's quite an alluring argument the point around Murdoch and Gove maybe my memory doesn't serve me but I think I'm correct in saying that the first interview with Trump after he became the president was in the times conducted by Michael go who's a British politician you know he used to be a journalist but he's and with murdog in the room yeah precisely and I I think that was one of those moments where I thought what on Earth is going on exactly and that was a big moment we're talking about the movement away from conventional conservatism Buran conservatism two this new very populist dangerous white supremacist conservatism I'm trying to be very careful with my language the conservatism of Donald Trump and Murdoch of course was you know through Fox News was a massive figure in in bringing about Trump in 2016 and then and nobody ever could s you know all these pompous people who write for the times you know it's not an issue for them well these you know these worthy journalists who Express these important died thoughts on the column Ops and so on you know have you lost friends um saying the things that you've said because obviously like I said this is your former employer with the Telegraph and with the spectator there must be many people who think Peter you just you've you've got this completely wrong this is just how ideas and parties and politics develop things change people change and you're not responding to the times changing yeah well I have lost a few friends yeah i' quite but I got some I've mean there are friends and friends aren't there I mean one other point about the media will right as the is it basically aren't any friendships they're all scratching each other's back aren't they you know telling each other how wonderful what a wonderful column you've just written darling this is the media world yeah and that's how it operates and then if you fall out of favor you're dumped you know that's it's brutal politics has got a bit too much like that too and so you've got to bear in mind there aren't any friends uh it's about in the end of the day and so because also there's this unspoken agreement which I really find it really annoys me it had did do right from the start that you would never criticize one of your colleagues you know there's a sort of standoff wasn't there no paper would ever criticize another paper and no journalist would ever expose the rotten practices of his or her colleague and that continues and so again that's when they all came together on on phone hacking it's a massive criminal conspiracy at the heart of Fleet Street they all joined together and then when Alan rbridge went the new editor whoever the editor was just obviously they just laid it alone obviously that Guardian decided for whatever reason he was going to leave that alone after Nick Davis and Alan Ras went and all the other groups all came together you know to protect Murdoch as as the guardian I'm afraid so you've spoken highly of of Russ Brer Nick Davies phenomenal um so what do you make of um his replacement Kath finer you don't sound particularly well you know because this is the paper that the left well what is tragic about I don't know whose decision it was but as Edis said I would have thought you had some role in it is to just not to leave phone hacking alone as a subject of interest and you know it's not gone away if you've been reading Nick you know there's this if you read Prospect under Alan brbd yeah Nick Davies made it worth reading you he really has and it was a very interesting piece of Journalism written by Adam rusbridger the other day and it was based he read Nadine Doris's book now I haven't read that I don't suppose you have I saw in a charity shop on Saturday that's a different question but it contained a one nugget of information uh uh from Nadine dory's about the appointment of the next BBC what was it the the ofcom chair and some skull dug something irregular had happened inside dining Street and Alan rasb just said right did this happen and he and he and he went on this Quest and it's a most almost perfect piece of political journalism because you know he gets fobbed off he gets fobbed off and gradually your picture emerges of how Britain has been run under the conservatives and it involves uh somebody called s Robie Gib who's a governor of the BBC I used to know him as a sort of rather indifferent um producer he's now a governor in the BBC who estab in charge of bias now you know and uh and this whole world there's somebody else called douge Smith you've never heard of douge Smith nobody prob but douggy Smith uh basically makes all the decisions about patronage he hasn't even got a apparently a role in government now what what he exposed is this extraordinary World which we now live in and have been living in for the Last 5 Years ever since Johnson became uh prime minister and I um and of course it does never none of this would ever get written about in the times or the telegraph or the mail it's just you have to get and the guardian lost given up the Ghost in This sort of stuff he doesn't want to touch media because the stories are so harrowing and uh so you don't you you really have to go to sort of non-mainstream media to understand what's happening in this country you've said the guardian doesn't want to go near Media stories you said earlier that the guardian's political reporting it's political desk isn't very good I I wholly agree I wholly agree I think it's a balling it's got a bit better lately peera has made an improve that's true that's true I'm thinking really over the last sort of really the last no but there was a long period when they did basically they had made no effort to expose the story scandals no and I couldn't understand why not that's what they should have be pipper C who of course played a major role at the mirror she was excellent at the mirror and gone to the guardian she has improved things a lot I I buy that but I suppose the question is you're saying that the guardian and we're not putting the boot in the guardian but the point well no I am I'm just saying it should have been so much better well yeah here's the thing so you're saying that there's this big rightwood shift in the whole of the British media you've got this one outlier which is the guardian and yet you're saying on the media on the phone hacking on a political reporting it's been quite weak and I I just wonder why is that that look I I I never worked for the guardian I probably I do occasional head columns for them but that's probably the last time I'm ever going to do that I'm sure I'm sure but I um I uh I don't know how it works I can't give you any insight into the innards of the Guardian I just wonder about the whole like you said the media culture of sort of fatal comp where people don't scrutinize or hold one another to account and that clearly that clearly goes beyond political ideology or maybe there are just very high costs there are very high costs for the guardian to quote go to war with the telegraph the SP spectator the times I I I don't know I this is all spec speculation what what does worry me looking ahead um because I was around when Tony Blair became uh prime minister and basically the media went on strike all of it I mean you couldn't write a negative word about Tony Blair for about five years until the IR at War it's very very hard so when was what these dates are like 96 97 to 202 right well when he was in power and actually a little bit before because the writing was on the wall that he was going to get and um and I hope that we don't go into a period of uh media sick of fancy towards starma I suspect that we will you um but not but we Al I still remember and I'm scared by the Sick of fancy towards Johnson for so long as prime minister is it possible that the liberal Democrats just become sort of the center right party like people like Cameron we've obviously criticized Cameron but there was a Cameron prior to 2007 who's more in line with the the kinds of conservativism you're talking about Rory Stewart for instance could could they become that sort of censor right party I don't think so I think Cameron's busted Rory Stewart I think he's got this very unhealthy relationship with aliser Campbell I wish it wasn't so I he's rather he's rather overwhelmed in those conversations it's very bad for Rory and uh he because he is he I think he was one of the most interesting figures in modern conservative political history you know I thought he was a fantastic cabinet minister very wise and sensible so there's no realignment where you see sort of labor on the center's on the center right and they're the opposition party look I I I think it's too early to see what's lies ahead in for the lib Dems their historical role I don't think that's they they don't know what they stand for really at the moment it's a series of empty stunts which are much praised in the political press but apart from that final question you've just said this is a irod defining election people always say that about elections but I think that's absolutely true with this one when was the last time we had a general election as momentous as the one we're facing on July the 4th 2024 yeah I I it's much more extraordinary all that 1997 did was to reaffirm the fer consensus so it wasn't really a very important 19789 that was important it was it ushered in the era of neoliberalism I think this election so I think this election reminds me of 29 you have a a a new you a new labor leader coming in it's Ramsey McDonald then um and why I say 29 you get is we he with the Ramsey McDonald no fault of his faced a double problem one of which was immense geopolitical instability and secondly um economic collapse again you know which started in the United States and that economic collapse forced the split in his party and he was rescued by Mr Baldwin um who CA who sort of basically ran his government for him for a while and then took over um but I think uh I I I think that sta uh because he has not had the courage or the or or that he's been too strategic he could have he could have won this election with a fantastic Manifesto to uh challenge the imera opposed imposed by the mainstream press he could have taken on Murdoch he could have um said we're going to Europe we're going to have a commission to look at the how brexit's gone that's what he should have done we're going to have a big commit and see what we should do you know momentous step taken by this country uh how long ago almost 10 years ago we're going to and and taking on powerful interest instead of which he's he's played grandmother's footsteps he's not really B he's sort of done been so sort safe and also he said we stand for he should have really powerful speeches about the far right about islamophobia and so on but he hasn't he's just trying to offend as few people as possible so he won't have a mandate uh to uh Governor so every time he does something serious he'll be accused of uh he has a majority but not the Mandate he'll be accused of betrayal and lying and of course we know how he won the labor leadership through a whole pack of lies about what he stood for and then he actually fought the manifesto on the opposite I mean literally the opposite of what he told the labor members five years ago he's fight and then I dare say in government he'll try and retrace his steps but he he doesn't he's not going to to have a lot of automatic support he's not made the the arguments you know um for why labor government is necessary and that's I think an awful pity and he'll come to regret it Peter obor thanks for joining us here on avara media thank you very much

Channel: Novara Media

Views: 162,018

Keywords: socialism, politics, Novara Media, Novara, current affairs

Id: TADeOmCVo_s

Length: 63min 22sec (3802 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 23 2024