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therestispolitics.com. That's therestispolitics.com. Hello

0:20

and welcome to The Rest Is

0:22

Politics leading with me, Rory Stewart. And

0:24

me, Alistair Campbell. And in our second

0:26

episode with Quasi Quatang now. So Quasi,

0:29

we entered parliament at the same time, but

0:31

I think we had a very, very different

0:33

impression of politics and what it means to

0:36

be an MP. One of the things that

0:38

struck me at the time is things that

0:40

really depressed and disturbed me about politics. You

0:42

actually quite enjoyed or were

0:44

quite relaxed about. I mean, tell us a

0:46

little bit about what your experience was of

0:48

just being a working politician. So I stood

0:50

in Brent East in 2005, and

0:52

you and I have spent many hours in

0:54

the past talking about history and politics, the

0:56

Empire, things we're interested in. And I saw

0:59

the modern House of Commons as something completely

1:01

different. And I think you, to

1:03

your credit, had a more romantic, probably less cynical

1:05

view of what what actually was going on. You

1:08

said that knocked out of him. So,

1:12

you know, crazy things like when you

1:14

had the reshuffle, and you describe this very eloquently

1:16

in your book, so that, you know,

1:18

the one man who knows more about Asia than anyone,

1:21

what will we do? We'll make a minister

1:23

for Africa, which he does nothing about. But

1:25

this happens all the time. And I think

1:27

I was very conscious of that right from

1:29

the start, that actually, you know, you could

1:31

be the world's leading expert on China.

1:33

And they would never they would never

1:36

put you in a department where you had to

1:38

use your knowledge. I mean, it's crazy. Why? I

1:40

think it's control. And also it

1:42

works in our institutions. I mean, I know people

1:44

in the foreign office who were told they were

1:46

brilliant Arabs, and they were they

1:48

were moved to Hungary or Japan. And so

1:50

it's good for you to broaden your your

1:53

horizons. Well, I've just spent 10 years learning

1:55

Arabic. Why are you sending me to Japan?

1:57

But it's it's about control. It's about making

1:59

sure that don't put someone who's too knowledgeable

2:01

in the position of power. That kind of thing.

2:03

Or it's just random. And random. So there's a

2:05

random, it's too, there's a two dynamics, there's a

2:07

randomness, and then there's a slight control. I mean,

2:09

there are people on our benches

2:11

who are fluent Cantonese speakers,

2:13

Mandarin speakers, they've never been ministers. Yeah.

2:15

I mean, you know who I'm talking

2:17

about. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely extraordinary. And

2:20

the people who were the Asian minister wouldn't be

2:22

able to name three Asian capitals.

2:24

I'm not going to say any names. But

2:26

that's... Let alone past the school of... I'm

2:29

glad I got one of the two questions. You

2:33

see, I've sometimes wondered about you,

2:35

whether, because I have read your

2:37

empire book, and it is

2:39

a really, really impressive book, whether you

2:41

wouldn't have been a better historian academic.

2:45

And whether Rory sometimes I feel is

2:47

not necessarily cut out. But

2:49

the House of Commons should be able to encompass

2:51

all of these people. Right. You know, it's not,

2:53

there's not just... Why doesn't it? I

2:55

think it's just a very demand... And we could talk about

2:58

that. It's a very demanding life now. I

3:00

think the social media has

3:02

made things a lot more sort of

3:04

hostile, much thicker skin, thickens

3:07

the skin, thins the hair, someone said to me.

3:09

And you just need to be very robust. I

3:12

think it's quite intrusive now. And even, you know,

3:14

I've been in politics in the House of Commons

3:16

for 14 years, even in that time, it's changed.

3:19

It's changed. And people I know who were MPs,

3:21

people like Ken Clark was an MP in the

3:23

70s, others, someone said to me, you know, a

3:25

busy week, you get 10 letters in the 90s.

3:27

So there's no email, nothing like that. And you

3:30

might get 10 letters. And the friend

3:32

who told me they said that in half of

3:34

them were about Palestine, even then. That was the

3:36

mailbag. And I think now there's, you know, I

3:38

get 200 emails a day, which is fine. And

3:41

we deal with them, we read

3:43

them, we have to have a response. And

3:45

it's a much faster pace. And that

3:47

has a knock on effect. I think that's why you're seeing

3:49

people, you know, they're not going to stay in the House

3:51

of Commons for 40 years. If you're getting 200 emails

3:54

a day, and you're there 24 seven, and you're

3:56

replying on Twitter, you're leaving it. Yeah, I'm out.

4:00

It's a typical decision, very difficult. And what tipped

4:02

it? So I think I just felt I

4:04

didn't quite have the sort of the energy

4:06

to do, because you need

4:08

that. That's the thing that's the 24 seven culture. I

4:11

also was very worried about what the part that we

4:13

could talk about that as well. I mean, the party,

4:16

the state of the party and a friend of mine who's

4:18

an MP said, I'm not worried about losing. I'm worried about

4:20

winning and coming back. That

4:25

is not a good advice. He's definitely down. But

4:27

we could, you know, I mean, five months, six

4:29

months is a long time. He knows what will

4:31

happen. But there's a there's a view that, you

4:33

know, the party, if it does lose, will go

4:35

through this sort of acrocytal, you know, and you

4:37

labor did it, you know, you had Corbin and

4:39

all the rest of it. Just develop a little

4:41

bit more some of the downsides of being an

4:43

MP, the public doesn't necessarily see because in some

4:46

ways the public's not very sympathetic towards this.

4:48

They don't really want to know that MPs are

4:50

having a tough time. No, but it

4:52

can be quite tough. I think it's tough. I think I think

4:54

it's rewarding as well. I mean, I would I said, even

4:56

though I'm leaving, I would do it all over

4:58

again. I think it's an incredible privilege. You

5:01

get huge access, actually helping people on

5:04

the constituency level is hugely rewarding and

5:06

representing people. That's a great privilege. But I think

5:09

in terms of the it's much more traditional. So

5:11

you know, you can't look at Twitter too much

5:13

because there's a lot of all your stuff that

5:15

people will be saying. Well, I was going to

5:18

recommend don't look at it at all. Yeah, exactly.

5:20

You have to respond to emails immediately. Or

5:23

if not immediately, I get emails after two

5:26

days. Why haven't you responded to me? That

5:28

sort of thing. I think that the debate between the parties

5:30

and also within the parties, people are just sort of fed

5:32

up with each other and quite rude.

5:34

There's something that I grumble, I think slightly

5:36

have a go at you and my book about,

5:39

which is that I worried a little bit that

5:41

there wasn't enough kind of serious policy discussion in

5:43

the tea rooms. I always thought there isn't any.

5:45

Yeah, so I was taught whenever I was

5:47

trying to stop you in the corridor to have

5:50

some earnest earnest discussion, you'd make some joke

5:52

rapidly on with you. You

5:54

say Roy, Rory, Rory, it's not as a

5:56

bad as always. I'm always struck by that. And

5:58

I have like you. Nobody actually

6:00

talks about politics in Westminster. It's terrible.

6:02

They talk about... No, they talk

6:05

about policies, but not policy. They talk about gossip.

6:07

Yes, you're right. You're right. They talk

6:09

a bit about gossip or they talk about very particular

6:11

issues, but they don't talk about policy. No, I've never

6:13

had really a conversation. Why not? I

6:16

don't know. I think it's... We really don't

6:18

talk about policy all the time. I know, but I think there's

6:20

something... I think it's a very British thing where you don't want

6:22

to be seen to be talking shop. I think it's a cultural

6:24

thing actually. So, it's like

6:26

if you're bringing up some

6:28

tax issue in the tea room, it's kind of

6:30

bad manners. People are

6:32

there with their scum. They're sipping their tea. They don't want

6:35

to hear about... I've always got that impression from you. on.

6:38

I think what works actually, and whether it's the

6:40

Conservative Party, the parliamentary party, they

6:50

do things off-site. So, a lot of the

6:52

plotting and all of that kind of business,

6:54

it never happens actually within parliament. They'll have

6:56

a beer somewhere or they'll be the cultural...

7:00

Wherever. And that's where a lot... But I think that's always been the

7:02

case. Because also, as an MP, when you're

7:04

in parliament, you're kind of on show. You're

7:07

kind of in a public place. You're watching

7:09

what you're saying. You know, there are MPs

7:11

who you think they're your friends, but

7:13

they might be saying things to the whips or what have you.

7:15

So, everyone's a little bit guarded. And I

7:17

think a lot of that conversation happens outside of the

7:20

parliament. I do like to think that in our time, there

7:22

was... Yes, there's always the gossip

7:24

stuff and the who's up, who's down stuff.

7:26

But I do think people spend a lot

7:29

of time sitting around arguing about specific issues.

7:31

In the actual parliament. I also think there

7:33

is a sense that things are changing. I

7:35

mean, I think Liz Truss is quite a

7:38

contemporary figure. Yes. I mean,

7:40

difficult to imagine in the 1970s, someone like

7:42

that becoming leader of the Conservative Party. My

7:44

model, but I may be wrong, is that even

7:47

as recently as the 70s, maybe 30% of the

7:49

time, people were jockeying

7:51

for position and oppression. But there was space,

7:53

maybe 70% to think a little

7:55

bit more seriously about government. And that sort of flipped

7:57

around. So now, now the 30%... think

8:00

about government 70% campaigning and yeah, I mean,

8:02

if you look at people like Liz Truss

8:04

is a friend of Grant Shapps, you

8:06

know, their skill, they are TikTok,

8:09

Instagram, Twitter people. So it's

8:11

all about the message and being a bit unfair on

8:13

Grant, but he's good at that stuff. And

8:15

that now counts. I mean, as you say, 40

8:17

years ago, none of that stuff existed. Yeah, but

8:19

I think that you'll be careful here because they

8:22

that is what has driven out the serious stuff.

8:24

And by focusing on that

8:26

and thinking that that is how we should judge

8:28

modern politicians. That's what I think is people

8:30

like Truss and Johnson becoming Prime Minister.

8:32

I think that's a phenomenon across the

8:34

modern world. I don't necessarily think it's

8:36

a great thing, but I just accept

8:38

it as something that's looking back. So

8:40

you back Johnson. Yeah. And you

8:42

back Truss. Yeah. Which was the bigger

8:45

of the mistake? That's a

8:48

very good question. So let me just talk

8:50

through my thinking. So with Johnson in

8:53

2019, the penalty

8:55

had reached an impasse. Theresa May wasn't

8:57

going anywhere. The Brexit thing

8:59

wasn't going anywhere. And we needed

9:01

something someone to break that mold. And

9:04

Johnson was the agent. He did

9:06

that. Roll forward to Zara 2022. Essentially,

9:09

he had two candidates, he had Rishi Sunak and

9:12

this Truss. It was pretty clear that those those

9:14

two and to be fair, they were the only

9:16

ones who had a sort of operation. I think

9:18

Penny Morden had an operation as well. She's

9:21

been running for lead over five years.

9:23

Why did you not have an operation?

9:25

I mean, Rishi Sunak got a joint

9:28

five years after. Because I

9:30

was naive. And I remember saying to Grant, I had

9:32

lunch with Grant a few months ago. And

9:34

I said, if you really actually want to get to the

9:36

top, you've got to start thinking about it from the first

9:38

day you're in the Cabinet. It's

9:41

a continual thinking

9:43

about it, planning, and that might be

9:45

unfair on them and they would deny

9:47

it. But then it's not that they're

9:49

always thinking about it. Because what happened

9:51

with the collapse of Johnson, is it

9:53

happened really quickly. You know, at every stage

9:55

during 2022, he looked precarious, but

9:58

he somehow survived. And it looked

10:00

as if... It was a tipping point. And then the... But

10:03

then it happened incredibly quickly. So the

10:05

letter came... I was having breakfast with a

10:07

friend. The letter... I saw the

10:09

tweet, Simon McDonald written the letter on the Tuesday.

10:12

By the Thursday, he'd gone. And

10:14

then we went through these rounds. And at the time, I said,

10:16

look, we can't just have a leadership election,

10:18

you know, in the next week or two. But

10:20

that's what we did. We went through all these

10:23

rounds. I think from the position I was

10:25

in, I was business secretary at the time, Sunak's

10:27

tax position that I wasn't in favor of.

10:30

So we went... We lit with epic consequences,

10:32

I mean, which I'm sure we'll talk about.

10:35

So it was a sort of binary question. Those

10:37

were the two candidates that were up and running. And

10:39

also there's a sort of convention, which was a foolish

10:41

thing for me to think that you really

10:44

got to be one of the senior office

10:46

holders to become prime minister. It's very rare that

10:48

that hasn't happened. It's usually either the home secretary

10:50

or the foreign sexual chancellor. So those

10:52

were the two people that were in play. And it was scary

10:54

to me because of the things we were talking about, the messaging,

10:57

you know, this was always going to

10:59

win that race, always. And so then

11:01

you come in as chancellor, which

11:03

is an amazing thing. No, but

11:05

you know what? The

11:07

funny thing about it was looking back, it

11:10

never felt real because the first thing that we

11:12

were plunged into was the accession

11:14

council. And the late

11:16

magistice, yeah, the passing and

11:18

all. It never felt secure for some reason.

11:20

I never felt... So

11:23

you were in for just over 30 days and quite

11:25

a lot of those first days were actually mourning for

11:27

the late queen. That's right. And

11:29

then the fundamental thing that we got

11:31

wrong, prime minister, myself, the

11:34

pace of it was absurd. You know, at

11:36

that point, having won and given

11:39

what had happened with this national disaster really

11:41

in terms of the queen's passing, was a

11:43

great moment of national reflection. And

11:45

it's been more like for 70 years. Everything

11:48

should have been slowed down. And

11:51

I remember thinking, okay, we've got the funeral on

11:53

the Monday and the mini budget was on the

11:55

Friday. Do you think if you hadn't died, that

11:58

politics would have been dominant? in

12:00

the national debate. And

12:02

therefore the usual thing would have been going on,

12:04

there would have been all sorts of debate

12:06

going on about are they going to do this, are they

12:09

going to do that. And you might have been reigned in

12:11

a bit. Yeah, so I think there were two things that

12:13

happened. And for the people who were following the markets, we

12:16

did this energy intervention, which was incredibly generous.

12:18

I mean, that was billions and billions and

12:20

billions. And the market sort of absorbed that.

12:22

And sorry, explain in terms what you did

12:24

for the economy. So what we essentially did

12:26

was we capped the energy price

12:28

at two and a half thousand pounds for households

12:30

for two years, which was hugely

12:32

generous. And this was because as a result

12:35

of the Ukraine War Party, prices were shifting

12:37

up. And gas prices had gone

12:39

up through the roof. And there

12:41

was a debate in the government, you know,

12:43

some people took a more cautious view, the

12:45

Prime Minister's view was that we should be

12:47

very generous. So that was the one big

12:49

bazooka. So billions committed to that. And it

12:51

wasn't even debated. So that was announced, I

12:53

think it was during that announcement that we

12:55

got the news that the Queen was in

12:58

grave danger in terms of her illness. And

13:00

so that was announced. And then of course,

13:02

this huge event of the

13:04

passing of Queen Elizabeth II happened.

13:06

And there was no debate about the energy

13:09

intervention. None whatsoever. I remember thinking this is

13:11

extraordinary. We've just committed 80 billion or whatever

13:13

it was, the black hole, one

13:16

of the black holes, and there was no debate. And

13:19

then looking back, hindsight is

13:21

a great thing, but looking back, everything

13:24

should have slowed down at that point. But

13:26

what we did was we just we just we

13:28

just doubled up. We just double. And

13:30

was that to do with her psychology?

13:33

She talks and she

13:36

talks about being somebody just likes to kind of

13:38

blow things up. I mean, is that

13:40

what was going on? So I mean, I've read the book and I know

13:42

her quite well. Yeah, the List Trust book,

13:44

the 10 Days, 10 Years to Save the West.

13:48

Sounds like a film, but 10 years, 10 days

13:50

to be reminded. I

13:52

think she just had this intense urgency. I

13:55

mean, you've worked with her in

13:57

a department. There was just that

13:59

intense urgency. Which I respect, but you can't

14:01

do that all the time. You

14:03

can't sprint a marathon, famously. You can't do that.

14:05

And actually, I remember one point after the mini

14:08

budget, I said, what we've got to

14:10

do now is just slow everything down. Just

14:13

be extremely calm and not try and rush and

14:15

do anything, not overreacting. But the calm had gone

14:17

because of the market's reaction. Yeah, but she inflamed

14:19

it. I mean, when she called me back in

14:22

the middle of the IMF thing, I thought, what

14:24

on earth are you going to do? This is

14:26

getting quite complicated. Let's go back

14:28

just for lessons. Just go back a couple

14:30

of stages. Tell in the simplest terms you

14:32

can, objectively as you can, what it is

14:35

that you did and what that then meant

14:37

for the currency interest rates. Mark. So there

14:39

were two things that happened. So there was

14:41

the energy intervention, which was scored

14:43

by the ABR. I think it was about $80 billion.

14:46

Correct. So that's capping the energy prices.

14:48

That's right. That's right. It

14:51

was scored very highly. And then the

14:53

mini budget, which I was announcing, we

14:56

announced $45 billion of unfunded

14:59

tax cuts. So what that means is that

15:01

you're reducing taxes, but you're not

15:03

getting any money. You're not reducing spending and you're

15:05

not raising other taxes. And that was

15:07

quite a radical thing. That was. And

15:10

the other thing that was a mistake was

15:12

that we ratcheted. She campaigned on

15:14

two things. She was going to reverse

15:16

the increase in national insurance and

15:19

she was not going to increase the corporation tax. And

15:22

that scored at $35 billion. And I

15:24

think the market knew that because she'd been saying

15:26

that all through the campaign. So it's $80 billion,

15:29

$35 billion. That's right. And then when we announced

15:31

that. So we're now at $150 billion. Yeah, when

15:33

we announced the actual measures. So there was all

15:35

this sort of personal taxation stuff, which in retrospect,

15:37

I think even at the time, we

15:39

should have delayed that for the budget. We should

15:41

have sliced it in maybe sort of spring. What

15:43

was the personal taxation? So you could be saying

15:45

that quickly. The average of the 45P rate, which

15:47

was very controversial. Right. So that's bringing it

15:50

down to $40 billion. You bank those bonuses. No, but they stuck with

15:52

that. And I don't think Labour will change that. And

15:54

then of course, we said, well, if we're going to reduce the top

15:56

rate of tax, we should reduce the standard rate.

15:58

And we took one piece. from that cost

16:00

$6 billion. So all of these things added.

16:03

So the $35 billion of unfunded tax cuts

16:05

ended up being at $45 billion.

16:07

Then you put that on top of

16:09

the energy intervention and you're spending

16:11

a ton of money and there's no... So

16:14

that's what is announced and then the markets

16:17

react in various ways. So

16:19

I put my hand up

16:21

in an interview with Koonsberg where I

16:24

don't remember exactly what words I said

16:26

but later he's gone mad, he's doubling

16:28

down, he's going to cut taxes more.

16:30

So there was that, the markets were

16:32

reacting to that and what

16:34

killed the government was the guilt market. So

16:37

the currency was doing all sorts of things. What

16:39

happened with the guilt market was... And it's sort of

16:42

complex but I might as well try and explain as

16:44

well. Well I should have thrown a plug here for

16:46

the rest of his money because they've done a very

16:48

long series on this. Have they? Yeah. Okay, I'll listen

16:50

to that. But so what happened was that there were

16:53

these funds that had borrowed

16:55

money essentially to buy government

16:57

bonds and

16:59

the government bonds were what's called long

17:01

dated so they're 20 years to redemption

17:04

and they borrowed money. And of course when interest rates go

17:06

up, the price of the bonds goes down. So what

17:08

they were holding had totally collapsed in

17:10

value and essentially they needed to be

17:13

bailed out. And what the Bank of England

17:15

said, okay, we'll open this window so you can borrow

17:17

the money and we'll support you or we will buy

17:19

back the bonds. But the window will

17:21

close on the 14th of October, which is

17:23

the day I was sacked because the

17:25

Prime Minister was terrified that when the market

17:28

opened on the Monday the 17th, the Bank

17:30

wasn't providing any support and there

17:32

would have been a massive reform. That was... So she had

17:34

to signal something that was different. Can I just sort of

17:36

just one more thing? It's very interesting because my guess is

17:38

that the

17:43

vast majority of people in the

17:45

country and probably the majority of people listening are

17:48

going to struggle to follow what you've just

17:50

said and understand it. And yet the consequences

17:52

are enormous. So how do we deal with

17:55

an interesting thing in democratic politics, which is

17:57

you make a decision which is

17:59

quite different. difficult to explain, quite difficult

18:01

to analyze, it's quite technical, but

18:04

has absolutely enormous catastrophic consequences. And

18:06

if I can add to that,

18:09

it's also something where I think I've seen Liz Truss,

18:11

and I may even have seen you as well, saying

18:14

that you didn't really understand that

18:16

that was going on. We didn't know that

18:18

was going on. Well, the bank didn't know, or if they did know, they didn't

18:20

tell us. But look, I mean- But they must know.

18:23

We can blame, we can blame, I wouldn't blame

18:25

them. I mean, I think we were responsible. I

18:27

mean, as a political leader, you've got to put

18:30

your hand up and say, I was responsible. Not

18:32

for everything, but I was responsible. And that's one

18:34

of the things in Liz's book, I'm not hearing-

18:36

She's not accepting any responsibility. There was clear, you

18:38

can't, it's like anything in life. If you drive

18:40

a car at 150 miles an hour, that's a

18:43

lot more dangerous than if you drive it at

18:45

20 miles an hour. There was a risk

18:47

with speed. And you were driving 150 miles an

18:49

hour. I think that's what we were

18:51

doing. I think that's what we were doing. And did it

18:53

feel like that? Did it feel- It felt very febrile. That

18:55

was all dangerous. And dangerous

18:57

is not the right word, but it

19:00

did feel slightly uncomfortable. And I never

19:02

thought, this is going to last. I

19:04

never thought, I just thought- And did you say

19:06

to her, this is not- Well, I said, after

19:09

the mini budget, just slow everything down. And

19:12

she said, well, I've only got two years. I said, you'll have two months

19:14

if you carry on like this. And

19:16

I actually think, and I've said this, I think

19:19

that if it hadn't been for the mini budget, there would have been other things. I

19:21

mean, it was the fracking boat that did for her. That

19:23

was the straw that broke the camel's back.

19:25

But again, there was that chaos that the

19:27

whips didn't know whether it was a three-liner

19:30

of confidence. But part of the problem is that

19:32

she was, I felt when I was working for

19:34

her is that I could already see this when

19:36

I was the environment minister and she was the

19:38

such a state defra. We could all

19:41

see as ministers and civil servants that

19:43

she was a very, very unreliable,

19:47

unstable leader. I mean,

19:49

she would, you know, she'd come in and

19:51

see me and say, I've just met a business

19:53

person and he's told me that every business can

19:55

be cut by 25%. So I'm

19:57

going to cut the department by 25%. And

20:00

you'd be like, well, can we have a conversation,

20:02

please, about the impact on the... She

20:05

didn't want to do it. Right. Or she'd

20:07

say, want you to write a 25-year

20:09

environment plan. And she'd ask three different bits of the

20:11

department to write the same plan. And then when we

20:13

presented the plan to her, she'd

20:15

refuse to look at the details. She'd just say, this

20:17

is no good. This is rubbish. Go and write again.

20:19

And eventually, by about the third time, I'd say, sexually

20:21

say, what is it you don't like about the plan?

20:23

Is it you don't... Do you think we should do

20:25

more in water and less on air? Do you not

20:27

like the graphics? And she'd say, Rory, I think everybody

20:29

knows perfectly well what I don't like about the plan.

20:33

Yeah. There was a style that was... And

20:35

I think she brought a lot of that to the top job. And

20:38

I think you can... The system can

20:40

protect you when you're a Secretary

20:42

of State. But when you're at the top

20:44

of this machine, you're

20:46

totally exposed. Just on the machine, do

20:49

you think it was a mistake that one

20:51

of the first things she did and you

20:53

did was to sack Tom Scollo,

20:55

who's the permanent Secretary of the Treasury. And

20:59

did that maybe turn the Treasury against

21:01

you? No, I think that was a

21:03

difficult decision. But I think that happened

21:05

to happen because what we haven't talked

21:07

about was the whole Treasury itself. The

21:10

Treasury is essentially almost like

21:12

an accounting function. So money comes

21:14

in, money goes out and it

21:17

doesn't have any real mandate

21:19

to drive growth. And she was very clear

21:21

about that. And that, I totally was in

21:23

agreement with her about. We had

21:25

to sort of gear the department towards more growth.

21:27

I always felt when Gordon Brown was in charge

21:30

of the Treasury that if

21:32

you have political leadership and an understanding

21:34

of how the Treasury works, you can

21:36

get stuff done. I agree. I

21:39

think that was part of it. I wonder whether you just lost

21:41

the trust of the Treasury from day one. I think it was

21:43

difficult. But then I made a very deliberate

21:45

statement that that was the only thing because people were

21:47

worried that we were going to clear everyone out. And

21:50

I said, no, it's just Tom, just

21:52

to show that we're doing a new... This

21:54

is a new chapter. But I don't think that

21:56

was what caused the whole thing to fall apart.

21:58

I think the pace of it. the fact

22:00

that it was unbalanced, we didn't have spending reductions. Because

22:02

we'd have had an almighty political route, but at least

22:05

that would have been more credible than

22:07

saying essentially we can have our cake and eat it.

22:10

So you've been disturbingly blunt

22:12

and open about the problems. I

22:14

hate it when people say I'm disturbingly blunt. But

22:17

help us understand, make your case at the

22:19

time, what would be the generous

22:21

way of understanding what you and

22:23

Liz Truss thought that you were trying to do?

22:25

What was the big idea for the British economy?

22:28

Okay, it went wrong. What was the big idea?

22:30

The biggest problem that we have, and

22:32

this is a problem that racial

22:34

reasons and across the Western world

22:36

we're facing, in Europe, is

22:38

that we have a public sector that's growing,

22:40

let's say at 5% a year, order

22:43

of magnitude. And we have growth figures that are between 0%

22:45

and 1%. And

22:48

the logic of that, if your costs are going up

22:50

in terms of the money you're spending, is going up

22:52

much faster than the money you're getting in through tax

22:54

and through the size of the economy. You

22:57

essentially have to raise more tax by

22:59

lifting up rates. And of

23:01

course that damages growth, that's the theory. So

23:03

that's the doom loop. And even I've heard

23:05

Rachel Reeves use that phrase. So

23:07

the problem is, how do you get out of that

23:10

doom loop? How do you actually grow

23:12

the economy so that you can get

23:14

tax revenues to pay for

23:16

public services? And as I

23:18

say, this is a problem that every country in the

23:21

Western world is facing. So that's

23:23

my growth is the key. If

23:26

you don't get growth, you've got a cake

23:28

and you're just simply trying to slice it

23:31

in different ways. And it's not sufficient to

23:33

pay for the kinds of services you'd expect in

23:35

the 21st century, in

23:37

a modern economy. And so your idea was, we

23:40

need to create growth. That's right. And

23:42

your theory on how to create growth

23:44

was? So the theory is that you

23:46

reduce the tax burdens to incentivise economic

23:49

growth and investment. We've just got a mixed record,

23:52

historically. It's a mixed record, but sometimes it has

23:54

my big problem with this, looking

23:57

back, because at the time I signed up to it, I made a

23:59

statement and I... I confess that. But we

24:02

were thinking about this is that you can't

24:04

just reduce taxes willy nilly without showing some

24:07

restraint on the other side of the ledger.

24:09

And we should have done this at the same

24:11

time. So what Jeremy Hunt came up with in

24:14

the November his statement on basically the spending envelope

24:16

should have been put together with the mini budget.

24:18

And then and then I think cut

24:20

taxes, but also cut spending more dramatically. Yeah, and

24:23

you're not you're not cutting spending it again, it's

24:25

a difficult thing to explain, you're

24:27

reducing the rate of growth in the spending. When

24:30

you were making that statement in standing

24:32

at the dispatch box, was

24:34

the part of you feeling this is

24:37

nuts? It was kind of at the end, I just thought,

24:41

let's see, that was what I

24:43

would because I thought, what

24:45

were you what vibe were you getting from across from

24:47

Labour and from behind you? It was kind of they

24:50

were kind of quite surprised. I mean, it was it

24:52

was it was a real and again,

24:54

it was the sort of style that we you know, it was

24:56

it was a very, very bold statement.

24:58

And people like really? Wow.

25:01

Oh, God. That was the

25:03

reaction. Why didn't you why didn't start being

25:06

that mean? But you knew this trust very

25:08

well. And I knew her very well. And

25:10

I concluded she was manifestly unsuitable to be

25:12

Prime Minister. She was a person

25:15

ultimately lacking in prudence and seriousness.

25:17

I wouldn't trust her to run

25:20

the country. And you you she was really, she

25:22

was a really good friend of yours. Why couldn't

25:24

you see what I could see very clearly in

25:26

2016, which was that she was silly. She wasn't

25:28

a serious person. Well, look, I think I think

25:30

I don't agree with that. But I think I

25:32

think there were definitely agree with the unceded to

25:34

be Prime Minister. I don't know if you have the right

25:36

temperament for it. And I said that, because you got to

25:39

have a very cool temperament. You know, when

25:41

when things and things do go very badly

25:43

wrong, you need to keep an even and

25:45

even temper. And you must have seen that

25:47

she was at the very least an eccentric

25:49

person. I think you're I think the temperament

25:51

and what I've learned is temperament

25:54

is probably the most important thing. It's

25:56

more important than almost an experience,

25:58

actually, because what was extraordinary. But it

26:00

was extraordinary about her. On paper, she was the most

26:02

experienced, she'd

26:06

been in cabinet for what, eight years from 2014?

26:09

Yeah, but you say she'd made her reputation doing the stuff

26:11

that ultimately isn't what politics and government is about. You can

26:13

say that, but in terms of the CV, she

26:15

had held those posts. She must have been able to see.

26:20

I'm just pointing out the obvious. What I would have

26:22

said to you at the time is, yeah, she's been

26:25

in government for a long time, but she learns nothing. And

26:28

I would have lectured you to, bored in the

26:30

thing, of all I'd seen in Defra,

26:33

of her making red-clothes and cap and strafing

26:35

decisions. No, but I think you would have

26:37

said, oh, come on, Rory, I know. That's

26:42

the thing, you're in this world

26:44

where you've got to make quite

26:46

snap, almost binary decisions. And

26:49

I knew that there were candidates

26:51

that I liked that weren't standing. And

26:53

there were three essential candidates, Penny

26:55

Morden, Liz Truss, and Ruchis Zunag. And

26:58

I made the calculation that Liz

27:00

Truss would be better. And somehow you always imagine, well,

27:02

like with Boris, it was the same. You always think

27:05

they're going to be reined in or they're going to

27:07

be something. I never thought about that. Right.

27:12

But ideologically, I was very much where she was,

27:14

but then you don't know what people are going

27:16

to do. Maybe you do know, and I didn't

27:19

see it, but you don't know how they react.

27:21

And actually, the funny thing about her book was

27:23

that both her husband and her election agent said

27:25

it was going to end badly. I mean,

27:27

there's a bit in the book. They probably know better than

27:29

most. Yeah. And the husband said, it's all going to end

27:31

in tears. Well, thank you. Thanks for telling me. And

27:35

then the election agent, your own

27:37

election agent, saying to you, well,

27:39

yes, you should stand for leader, but it would be

27:41

better if you came second. And I thought

27:43

that was just remarkable. I mean, if my election agent had

27:45

said that to me, there'd be real crisis of self doubt.

27:47

What have you made of her on

27:50

the tour with this book tour? Just no

27:52

self reflection, no acceptance of responsibility.

27:55

I'm too arrogant about the way

27:57

the two things. other

28:00

conspiracy theory stuff. I mean we've talked about

28:03

history all our lives, by adult

28:05

lives. Conspiracy theory, whenever someone

28:07

says this is a conspiracy, this is a deep

28:09

state, I just turn off because

28:12

human beings don't work like that. They don't

28:14

smile enough. Do you think she's been manipulated

28:16

by these hard right people in America? I

28:18

think her view is, her problem, her issue is

28:20

to try and sell these books. So she's

28:22

trying to generate noise to sell books. They'll go very well. No,

28:25

it's not a great, you know, J.K.

28:27

Rowling doesn't need to, you know, you

28:29

can rest quite a night in

28:31

terms of the book sales. But I think

28:33

that the point she's trying to, when she went to

28:35

America, there's very much more

28:38

of a market for that sort of grievance politics,

28:40

which I don't like. You know,

28:42

it's a conspiracy, it's the deep

28:44

state, they're against you because you're

28:46

white, or they get against you because you're

28:48

a conservative, or they're against you because you're Christian.

28:51

And I think she's trying to feed into

28:53

some of that. So when she said they

28:55

should abolish the UN, I mean, at

28:58

that point, I was like, you've been foreign

29:00

secretary, how on earth can you publicly say

29:02

that? And I was, I was concerned. I

29:04

was, I was upset about that. Well, sorry,

29:06

you said there were two things. So that's

29:08

the conspiracy theory stuff I don't buy. And

29:10

then the second point was, that the strongly

29:12

was people very close to her saying, this

29:14

isn't going to end well, which was, which

29:16

was interesting. You chose to support her, not

29:18

Rishi Suna. What was it that concerned you

29:20

about Rishi Suna? So Rishi Suna, I'd been

29:22

energy minister. And we'd had all

29:25

sorts of tussles about tax. I

29:27

mean, the thing that I, and I was just in Aberdeen

29:29

last month, you know, the, the so-called

29:31

energy profits levy, which I know is

29:33

very popular, and many of your listeners

29:35

will appreciate that, I think will have

29:37

very damaging consequences to the North Sea.

29:40

And you already see this with the

29:42

SMP green tension, the SMP realize that

29:44

if they do anything to harm the

29:47

oil industry in the North Sea, lots

29:50

of jobs, and there'll be lots of bad economic

29:52

impact. And I thought that was wrong.

29:54

And I argued against that. And actually Rishi, temperamentally,

29:57

I think is much better placed, very

29:59

cool. very calm, very

30:01

rational. And I've always personally got

30:03

on with him. And how about as a communicator and

30:05

a charismatic leader and somebody who can really... He's not

30:07

quite that. I mean, he's not, he's not, you know,

30:10

he's okay, but he's not gifted in

30:12

that way. Very analytical, very bright. And

30:14

what I was really impressed with about him

30:16

was his temperament. And that comes

30:18

from all sorts of things that comes from,

30:20

you know, his Hindu faith, his family, you

30:22

know, he's a man of means, you know,

30:25

can't be coy about that. He's got, he's

30:27

wealthy. So he's got that sort

30:29

of stability that comes from that, that he

30:31

projects his problem. And this

30:33

is the problem for the party is that no one really knows what

30:35

he's about. And that's why

30:37

I think we're struggling. Or one

30:39

of the reasons why we're struggling. So you're on top

30:42

of all the Boris and the Liz and all that

30:44

stuff. You're not standing at the election. Can

30:46

you see? Well, first of all, can

30:49

you honestly hand on heart, stand

30:51

up before the British public and say, do you know

30:53

what, after the 14 years, the conservatives should definitely come

30:56

back after the next election. And

30:58

can you see any way that

31:00

Keir Starmer won't be Prime Minister? So my view

31:02

on this is that there's a pendulum. We've got

31:04

first pass the post, the two main parties, and

31:07

there's always a pendulum. And when

31:09

it goes, it goes. And I think we

31:11

can well be at that point. I don't think

31:13

it's impossible for the Tories to win. But

31:15

I think it's unlikely. But actually, even if

31:17

we had the most charismatic leader ever, I

31:19

think the pendulum when it swings, it swings.

31:21

And I think people have said, we've had

31:23

enough of these guys. Let's

31:26

let the other people. I can

31:28

see why they think that. I don't think that I'm going to

31:30

be campaigning for the Tories and all the rest of it. But

31:32

I can see why a floating voter

31:34

can think, actually, we've

31:36

seen that. Let's move on. You

31:38

said you're worried about the Conservative Party after

31:41

the election. What are your worries? What happens?

31:43

I mean, you've seen this. I mean, you've

31:45

been fighting these battles. You

31:47

know, what happens when parties lose is

31:49

very simply one faction says

31:52

we weren't right wing or weren't left wing enough.

31:54

And the other lot says we got to be more left

31:56

wing at the centre or we got to move to the

31:58

centre. And it's a very. debate, it's a

32:00

silly debate. And it's very nasty, because everyone

32:03

will be blaming each other. My

32:05

own view is that all the leaders since

32:07

May have contributed to this in their

32:09

small ways. In their big and

32:12

small ways. But then of course

32:14

the Sunakites will blame the Trust sites, the Trust

32:16

sites will blame Rishi, the Borisites, do you see

32:18

what I mean? There's all that, that factionism, but

32:21

actually they're all responsible. Because Rishi Sunak,

32:23

if we do lose, he can't walk away from it

32:25

because he's been leader for two years. He

32:27

can't, he can blame the other law up to a

32:29

point. But he took the leadership and I

32:32

was very struck by the fact that he said, oh, he inherited

32:34

a mess. I mean, can you imagine with the Church of thing,

32:36

I've inherited a mess, you know, in 1940. You

32:39

get on with it, you don't blame the other people. It's

32:41

actually just a disagreement with Alistair there. Alistair actually I think

32:43

probably would have said that Rishi's approach should

32:45

have been to be much clearer about

32:47

it. Yeah, I think his only opportunity

32:49

was actually to say, I've maybe not

32:51

say inherited a mess, but just say

32:53

we will be doomed unless we admit

32:56

that terrible things have happened under the

32:58

previous judgment. But then the problem with

33:01

that is you're essentially trashing your brand.

33:03

You are? They would have. For

33:05

the moment, they're all trashing the brand anyway. Yeah, I

33:07

think there was a middle way. I think he could

33:09

have distinguished himself from the leaders, but he needed a

33:11

positive vision. Okay, Quasi and a sentence. Take a quick

33:13

break back in a minute. Now,

33:20

Quasi, over the years, you and I have

33:22

had many, many disagreements about Brexit, but honestly,

33:24

you cannot possibly say that it's going well.

33:26

I can't say, but you see, what

33:28

I don't like about the sort of

33:30

remainder position is this idea. And

33:33

I don't think it's your position, but some people

33:35

have this, that if we stayed in the EU,

33:37

everything would be. No. We'd be

33:39

dealing with exactly the same problem. No, I think we've made them worse. We'd

33:41

be dealing with growth. We'd

33:44

be dealing with the size of the public

33:46

sector. We'd be dealing with environmental change. But

33:48

we've made them worse. It's not clear to

33:50

me that they are worse. I mean, if

33:52

you look at Germany, our growth is exactly

33:54

the same. We're facing exactly the same. But

33:58

has Brexit delivered? the things

34:00

that you've noticed. No, I don't think it's been perfect at all.

34:02

I don't think it has... I think we've made mistakes.

34:06

It's one of the mistakes that you imagined a world that

34:08

didn't exist. I mean, it struck me that quite a lot

34:10

of the Brexit campaigners

34:14

were saying, you know, European growth is sluggish,

34:16

so we need to connect ourselves to kind

34:18

of rapidly growing economies in China. And

34:21

one of the problems is the whole world's

34:23

changed. We're now talking about decoupling from China.

34:25

We're worried about the security risks, the trade

34:28

risks about too big. And

34:30

suddenly it feels as though we're in a new

34:32

world where it might be smarter to be close

34:34

to Europe. I think that's partly right. I think

34:36

there's a phenomenon about referendums. You basically have everything's

34:38

binary and polarized. If we'd had this debate, and

34:40

we probably did in 2014, I

34:42

would have been a sort of mild Brexiteer and

34:44

you probably would have been a mild Romania. The

34:46

positions were much more nuanced. But when

34:48

you get into this sort of binary, you know, the

34:50

red team versus the blue team, all

34:53

the positions become harder. So people

34:55

that I knew were kind of

34:57

moderate remainers became extreme remainers.

35:00

People I knew as moderate Brexiteers who

35:02

wanted the customs union, you know, people

35:04

like Dan Hannon were quite happy with,

35:06

they were just interested in the sovereignty,

35:08

but they became hardline Brexiteers. So the

35:10

positions hardened. And so of course, you were

35:12

in this crazy world where you know, Brexit was

35:15

either 100% right, or zero, you know, 100% wrong. And

35:17

there was nothing

35:19

nuanced, there was nothing balanced in that

35:22

conversation. I'm 110%. I was

35:24

actually pushing for the customs union. That's

35:27

right. Can

35:30

I finish him with my final thing? You're

35:32

associated with something very, very, very dramatic, which

35:35

will stay with you for the rest of

35:37

your life. It will be in your obituary.

35:41

And you know, without being unfair to Alistair, I

35:43

guess, in some ways, I guess the Iraq war

35:46

may feature like that analysis a bit, right? I

35:48

think the three election wins. I

35:51

think the good Friday. Just

35:58

reflect kind of psychologically. how

36:00

it feels. You committed yourself to public

36:03

service. This is something you desperately have

36:05

wanted to do for 20-25 years and

36:07

there's been this incredible catastrophe

36:09

where your dream of being chance sort of

36:12

blew up in your face 30 days there.

36:14

A lot of people in the country, some

36:16

listening to this, who will be very very

36:18

angry with you and even though you've been

36:21

apologetic and you've been nuanced or explained, they

36:23

will feel he's not apologetic enough, he's not.

36:25

Absolutely not really. But that's like in any

36:27

political thing. I mean you mentioned Iraq, it's

36:30

exactly the same. There are people who are

36:32

still fuming about that but I don't think

36:35

time, I think the new government, if

36:37

there is a new government, I think

36:39

the growth, the problems of growth, a lot of the fundamental

36:41

problems will still be around and I

36:44

think people will look back and say okay they

36:46

screwed up the delivery but actually

36:48

we get what they were trying to do. I mean in my life

36:50

we'll move on, that's one of the reasons I think we

36:52

should probably leave politics and do something else because I

36:54

think I don't know what Liz Truss is trying to

36:57

do. Who are the

36:59

greatest historians? What in the world?

37:01

Yeah. Who are the historians that have really

37:04

kind of impacted upon you? So I like, I

37:06

mean lots of them are you know I consider

37:08

friends, I mean I love C. Baghmanthi Puri, he's

37:10

a great sort of journalist actually of history. I

37:12

think he's a very

37:14

colorful historian. I used to

37:16

read, any people I was reading this film very

37:18

active. I was reading as an undergraduate,

37:21

Neil Ferguson, Andrew Roberts, right

37:24

wing, C. Baghman, he's not

37:26

really any wing but on the left you've got,

37:28

I mean there's a guy called, what's

37:30

his name, Tim Schneider. Do you know him? Yeah,

37:32

he's my colleague. He's a colleague, yeah, he's very

37:34

good. Back

37:36

in the day, P. Thompson, does anyone read him

37:39

though? I mean I think I had

37:41

big issues with that but he's a great historian. Oddly

37:43

the people you've chosen are

37:48

provocateurs. They're quite

37:50

journalistic in nature. I mean they're not actually

37:53

people who when you read them you think

37:55

they're doing a very nuanced balanced

37:57

on the one hand on the other. They're

37:59

taking making very strong positions. That's true. I mean,

38:01

that's true. You know, Neil Ferguson's like Empire to

38:03

the good. No, no, no, that was my book.

38:05

Andrew Roberts is like George the Third, a genius

38:08

and a hero. I remember, I mean, there's that

38:10

lining, John Maynard Keynes said, you know, words have

38:12

to be a little wild because they're the first

38:14

battalions that storm, you know, the powers of thought.

38:16

You're definitely a little wild. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

38:18

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you

38:23

just dream. You're so… you

38:26

admire, your kind of intellectual and your political style,

38:28

that you are a bit wild... Armstrong.

38:31

hawks. ... yes, you like

38:33

these provocateurs and partly as a politician, you're a bit

38:35

of a provocateur. Yeah, so I

38:37

hadn't made that connection but I mean,

38:39

I like, I think that was, again

38:41

looking back at our experiences as MPs

38:44

when we came in in 2010, all we

38:46

were talking about was how long was the collision going

38:48

to last. I'd go on radio programs. And

38:50

then when we weren't talking about politics, we

38:53

talked a bit about tuition fees. And

38:55

then there was this whole sort of debate about austerity,

38:57

which was a kind of slightly artificial debate. Yeah, it

38:59

wasn't. But generally... Totally exactly. Well,

39:02

actually, what, I mean, you say that, but

39:04

what George Osborne did was what Alistair Darling

39:06

said he was going to do, he won

39:08

the election. It wasn't it, wasn't it? No,

39:11

no, no. Basically

39:13

where we were. And

39:16

actually what I wanted to do, and maybe

39:18

you're right. I did want to change

39:21

dynamics and change the mould, break the mould, all that

39:23

sort of stuff. Have you got another book in you?

39:25

Yeah, I've got lots of books. I mean, I can't,

39:27

I didn't have enough time to write them. I mean,

39:29

I want to write a book on the

39:31

Emperor, which is called Master of the World on the Congo. I'd

39:34

like to write something on politics, not

39:37

just about my crazy experience. Politics on the edge.

39:39

Now, where have I heard that? But

39:42

also looking forward, I mean, I

39:44

find, you know, in a way, I'm

39:46

sad to leave the House of Commons because I think this is going

39:48

to be the most interesting period. You know, I

39:51

feel I'm walking, because you left just before

39:53

this incredibly interesting period. And I

39:55

feel I'm going to do it. Interesting, one way. Well, yeah.

39:58

It's laid the door. do get

40:00

in. How they respond to this

40:02

crisis that we're facing, and as

40:04

I keep saying, it's a global

40:07

crisis. In Britain, we've

40:09

got particularly dramatic features, but it's

40:11

something which is pretty

40:14

commonplace across the world. That's interesting

40:16

to me. Well, as we're moving

40:18

towards the end of our

40:20

conversation, I want to finish in a

40:22

way by thinking about political

40:25

leadership and political judgment. Izaebah

40:28

Lin praises people like Bismarck and

40:31

FDR and Churchill for seeing

40:33

things that other people can't see,

40:36

for not accepting reality as it's given to

40:38

them and imagining a new world. I

40:41

guess you and Liz Trust thought you

40:43

were doing this, but unlike Churchill, Bismarck,

40:45

and FDR, you miscalled it. You

40:48

didn't call the future right. What do you

40:50

think you've learned about political judgment from that,

40:52

about the difference between ... Were

40:54

they just lucky, the Bismarck's and FDR's Churchill, or

40:56

did they have something that Liz Trust lacked? I

40:59

think with Liz and what we were

41:01

trying to do, compared to those

41:03

other leaders, it was way too ideological.

41:07

You lost sight of the practical deliverability of

41:09

it. When Rob Butler said

41:12

politics is the art of the possible, I

41:14

think that is a very important phrase.

41:16

I also think the

41:18

judgment issue, when things go

41:21

wrong, the Churchill

41:23

keep buggering on the radio, and having

41:25

a measure of calmness is

41:27

really important. You look at someone

41:29

like Antoni Eden, he was totally

41:32

brittle and very, very volatile. That's

41:34

how they describe him. I

41:36

think having the temperament just to see things through

41:39

and be calm. David Cameron was

41:41

very good at this. Whatever else one says about

41:43

him, he did have a good temperament. He was

41:45

not very excitable. I think that those things of

41:47

judgment and thinking about politics is the art of

41:50

the possible. Absolutely fundamental. Our

41:52

last seven prime ministers list them in order of

41:55

achievement and contribution to the

41:57

country. Well, I

41:59

think Blair probably... Is Blair the first of the

42:01

last seven? I mean, he was there the

42:03

longest and probably had the most impact. Contested

42:06

legacy, but had the most

42:08

impact. I think Cameron was up

42:10

there. I think Boris is in a space

42:12

of his own. I think he had

42:14

phenomenal skills, but

42:16

he had flaws, quite deep flaws.

42:18

And then the others were

42:21

perhaps less. I think

42:23

Gordon was a great chancellor, but I don't think he

42:25

had the temperament for being able to control too much,

42:27

I think, from what I hear. I

42:29

respect fame, though. He's a great mind and

42:32

powerful intellect. But I don't think

42:34

temperamentally he was right for the job. And Theresa

42:36

May and Liz Truss? They

42:38

didn't have the temperament, I don't

42:40

think. But that's,

42:42

you know, it's easy to say that with hindsight. But,

42:45

you know, of course, I feel strongly that the difference

42:47

in those two is that Theresa May had a form

42:50

of moral character that Liz Truss lacks.

42:52

And it's interesting, you don't take moral

42:54

character very seriously. Well, I

42:58

think that's a bit harsh. I don't. You don't believe

43:00

in virtue. Yeah, I mean, all that stuff, the virtue

43:02

and these are the goodies and these are the baddies.

43:04

I think that's a bit simplistic. I think there was

43:07

a lot of virtue in some

43:09

of the baddies that you think. And I think there was a

43:11

lot of vice in some of the goodies that

43:13

you I wouldn't just characterize them in

43:15

that sheep and goats way. I

43:18

don't think Liz Truss went in there thinking,

43:20

I'm going to destroy everything. I think she thought she was

43:22

doing good. Similarly, I think Theresa

43:25

May was was a little bit more cunning

43:27

than many people thought. And actually,

43:29

even Boris, you know, for all his exuberance,

43:33

he genuinely thought he was a force for good. I

43:35

don't think he still does. Yeah, I think

43:38

he does. And actually, we haven't even talked about

43:40

him. But, you know, it wouldn't surprise me if

43:42

he comes back in some shape or form. Absolutely.

43:44

Definitely over my head. Well, how are you

43:46

gonna stop it? I don't

43:48

know. But dead body. No, it can't happen. But

43:52

anyway, so that's where I disagree with you. I don't think

43:55

they can be easily categorized as good people or bad

43:57

people. I think it's always a mix. Well, look, thank

43:59

you. so much, Sklazy, for all your time. It'd

44:01

be quite amazing. But just my final question, I'm going back

44:03

to an Eaton entrance

44:05

exam question. I think it's

44:08

a brilliant one. It's 2040. And you're

44:11

the UK Prime Minister. Explain

44:13

why it was both necessary and

44:15

moral for you to employ the

44:18

army to fight and kill violent protesters in London.

44:20

That's a lunatic question. Is that what you would

44:22

have said? Yeah, I would have. I wouldn't have

44:24

put it as bold as that. But I'd have

44:26

said that that's an absurd question because we don't

44:29

kill protesters in London. It's amazing. You found this

44:31

out. I'd forgotten what we were doing at 13.

44:34

I don't remember that question. Yeah. But these

44:36

are quite grown up questions for 13 year

44:38

olds. And I am impressed by how quickly

44:40

Kwasi did his numbers. Yeah. And he didn't

44:42

even have to go to the OBR to

44:45

say that. Kwasi,

44:47

thank you. You've been really frank with

44:49

us and we're really grateful. Thank you

44:51

very much, Aled. Yeah, thank you very

44:53

much. Thank you. Very interesting conversation. Well

44:58

then, Rory, what do you think of that? Well, I mean,

45:02

I think the first thing is you get a sense

45:04

that he's very clever. But

45:06

I think I also get the sense

45:09

of the ways in which his

45:11

cleverness has a limit. I mean, I

45:13

never really quite get over this problem.

45:15

I don't quite get how, when

45:18

it was so obvious that Boris Johnson

45:20

and Liz Truss would

45:22

be catastrophic Prime Ministers, that his sense is,

45:24

well, I can see that with the benefit

45:26

of hindsight, but it wasn't obvious at the

45:28

time when he and I had joined at

45:30

the same time, spent years working with them

45:32

together. And I also wonder, I mean, one

45:35

thing that struck me is, I mean, yes,

45:37

he apologizes, but quite doesn't really. Yeah, I'd

45:39

worry that if you were listening, he's like,

45:42

yeah, I got it all wrong. I blew up the

45:44

economy. But who knew? And we make mistakes in politics.

45:46

And then he was like, yeah, it's a bit like

45:48

the Iraq war. I mean, sometimes people make the wrong

45:50

calls. But I guess that doesn't really

45:52

work for people, right? I don't know what people will

45:55

make of it. Because I mean, I was surprised how

45:57

frank he was. He wasn't very defensive. And he wasn't

45:59

doing this. I mean, Liz Truss has gone

46:01

around all the studios sort of blaming everybody

46:03

about herself. He was accepting

46:06

some responsibility. I think she gets the lion's

46:08

share. You get the sense of, you know,

46:10

you've talked lots about dealing with Liz Truss and how difficult she

46:12

is. You get the sense he

46:14

was going along with something he didn't really

46:16

believe. I thought the most fascinating thing was

46:18

when he was describing how he

46:21

was feeling as he stood at the

46:23

dispatch box and could tell that Labour

46:25

would sort of go, is this for real?

46:27

And then every time he sort of looked

46:29

that way to his own side, they were

46:31

going, is this for real? And

46:33

he sort of knew. You got the

46:36

feeling he knew the whole way through this was a car crash. And

46:38

yet he couldn't stop the car. Yeah,

46:41

well, probably because he bought in, hadn't

46:43

he, early on to a particular vision

46:45

of the world, which was that what

46:47

Britain needed to do was radically cut

46:50

taxes in order to generate growth. And

46:52

he's obviously still thinks that's right.

46:54

He thinks they did it too quickly. But

46:57

basically, he says the problem in the

46:59

world is a lack of growth. And the

47:01

only real solution he's coming up with

47:03

in Britain, I guess, is tax cutting.

47:05

And that's interesting because there would be

47:08

other people on his side of the

47:10

party who would argue, I

47:12

think more convincingly that actually, if you

47:14

wanted to do growth that way, what

47:16

you'd need to do is

47:18

be much more thoughtful about getting

47:21

rid of regulations, encouraging

47:23

investment, creating a good

47:25

ecosystem for business. So if you're on the

47:27

right of the Tory party, what you'd probably

47:29

want to say is that growth comes from

47:31

business. And what you need to do is

47:33

make it easier to set up a business

47:35

easier to hire people, easier

47:37

to invest, easier to do infrastructure that actually

47:39

cutting taxes isn't really the root through to

47:42

that. I think I was surprised

47:44

how sort of warm he was about Keir Starmer. He's

47:46

nice about Keir Starmer. He's not very, I

47:49

remember this, he's always been quite good

47:51

at making friendships with Labour. He's

47:53

quite lighthearted and cheerful. He's a funny

47:56

person because he's somebody who

47:58

generally my experience. talks a great

48:00

deal more than he listens. But

48:03

he's got this incredible memory. So you

48:05

get the impression he's not listening. But

48:07

actually, he remembers almost everything that you

48:09

said 30 years ago. I mentioned many

48:11

encounters over Brexit. And they

48:13

weren't just in studios, like bumping into and having

48:15

arguments. And I always got the feeling he wasn't

48:18

taking anything terribly seriously. It was all the bit

48:20

of a game. And yeah,

48:22

no, why you do? I remember doing the people's

48:24

vote thing every time I was in the studio.

48:26

Why are you doing this? Why are you trying

48:28

to stop? Is it gonna happen? Just get over

48:31

it. Move on. Look, you know, we won, you

48:33

lost. Move on. It's fine. It's gonna be fine.

48:35

And that was always his thing with me when

48:37

I was very earnestly trying to discuss with him

48:39

in 2014, 2015, his argument.

48:42

And I think you get a bit of this in the interview. When

48:45

I'm trying to argue against the rightward lurch, trying

48:47

to make the cases settle ground, he

48:50

says, you don't understand our right wing voters.

48:52

You don't understand the party base. People are

48:54

much more euro skeptic, much more right wing

48:56

than you want to give them credit for

48:59

being. And again, that worries me because

49:01

that's a little bit not about standing on principle.

49:03

It's about saying this is where I think the

49:05

public is. And therefore, that's where I'm gonna go

49:07

give you another glimpse just to sort of finish

49:09

of, of course, he sent

49:12

me a WhatsApp just as he left the

49:14

studio, which went,

49:16

Victrus, Causa, Deus,

49:18

Placuit, said Victor,

49:21

Cattoni. So the victorious

49:24

cause pleased the gods, but

49:26

depressed Cato. And I don't actually know

49:28

what the reference is. I mean, he's

49:31

presumably this is somewhere in the back

49:33

of his enormous capacious memory is some

49:35

reference, I guess, to Caesar's triumph. Who

49:38

is God and who is Caesar in this?

49:40

So I think in this story, Boris Johnson

49:42

is probably Caesar and the victorious cause is

49:44

probably Brexit and that pleases the gods, but

49:47

it depresses Cato, who in this case is

49:49

Rory. But you know, that's a really interesting

49:51

indication of quasi, who

49:54

is, you know, comes from this extraordinary background, right? I

49:56

mean, you know, he, it's true, his father was an

49:58

economist, his mother was alive, but I imagine His

50:00

grandparents lived in relatively

50:03

straightforward conditions in Ghana. It's been an

50:05

incredible immigrant success story. Then he got

50:07

this King's scholarship to Eton, went on

50:09

to Trinity College, Cambridge. What did you

50:11

reply? I sent back a little note

50:13

saying, Victorics

50:17

Kowsa, Nick Daze, Placuit, Nick Cattoni. Do

50:19

you not really speak to each other

50:21

in Latin? I mean, honestly, this is

50:23

just... The idea

50:25

is you do... I got grade A

50:28

O level Latin, but what

50:30

does that mean? So I said the

50:32

victorious cause pleased neither the gods nor

50:34

Cato. So neither you nor... So

50:37

I'm basically saying this Brexit was not actually... Everybody

50:39

lost. Yeah, Brexit was... It was a fuck up

50:41

for everyone, which is kind of what I said.

50:43

Thank you. Thank you. Right,

50:46

Jolly good. Well, thank you, Quasi, if you're

50:48

listening, and homos and upwards. And I think

50:51

thank you also for making that because I

50:53

had real reservations. You did, I remember. Well,

50:55

my reservations are that I like us interviewing

50:57

people and leading who we admire and want

50:59

to promote. And I think both of us

51:03

were very troubled by what Quasi did. And

51:05

I felt that that might lead to a

51:07

slightly difficult interview where we won't bring out.

51:09

So in some ways, tribute to him for

51:11

being relaxed enough,

51:13

open enough to make

51:15

what could have been a very touchy interview work. And

51:18

I think it's given people a chance to... I

51:21

imagine most listeners like us

51:24

will profoundly disprove what he did. But you

51:26

get more of an insight into some of

51:28

the strengths as well as the weaknesses of

51:30

that generation of conservative politicians. Anyway, thank you

51:32

and goodbye. Bye.