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For more information, visit teacherluke.co.uk.

0:48

Hello listeners, welcome back to Luke's English Podcast. This

0:51

is episode number 888. And it's an episode

0:55

of the Rick Thompson report. It's been a

0:57

while since I did one of these episodes.

0:59

So there's probably people listening to this

1:01

who don't know what the Rick Thompson report is. So

1:04

let me just explain the concept for

1:06

you. So the Rick Thompson report, this

1:08

is where I talk to my dad, Rick Thompson.

1:11

And he tells us about what's going on in

1:13

the UK. He gives us a kind of report

1:16

about what's happening in the UK at

1:19

the moment. And that usually means

1:21

in politics. In fact, normally, we

1:23

talk about British politics in these

1:25

episodes. So that's what you're going

1:27

to get from this episode. My

1:29

dad telling us about what's going

1:31

on in the UK in politics

1:33

at the moment. And it's a

1:35

busy time in British politics right

1:37

now because we're about to have

1:39

a general election. That's where everyone

1:41

in the country gets to vote

1:44

for members of parliament. Those

1:47

members of parliament take

1:49

seats in the House of Commons, in

1:52

the Houses of Parliament in London, in

1:54

Westminster in London. And

1:56

depending on how the votes are

1:58

cast, it's a very good time to vote. depending on

2:01

which members of Parliament, from which

2:03

parties win the seats, you

2:06

might get a completely different arrangement

2:09

in Parliament, which means

2:11

you might end up with a completely different

2:13

government. At the moment the government we have

2:15

in the UK is run

2:18

by the Conservative Party, so we have a

2:20

Conservative government. The Prime Minister is called Rishi

2:23

Sunak. The Conservatives have been in power since

2:25

2010, so that's 14 years and it's a

2:27

long story.

2:31

You can go back and listen to

2:33

previous episodes of the Rick Thompson report

2:35

because we've probably covered

2:37

most of what's been

2:39

going on, certainly since about

2:41

2015 when there was an election. Brexit happened,

2:43

David Cameron

2:49

resigned and then we got a number

2:51

of other Conservative

2:53

Prime Ministers. As I

2:55

said, it's a long story. Go

2:58

back and listen to the old episodes of the

3:00

Rick Thompson report. Here we are now, Rishi

3:02

Sunak, the current Prime Minister,

3:04

has called a general election.

3:07

Just to give you a bit of information about that, a government

3:10

in the UK is allowed to stay

3:12

in power for a maximum of five

3:14

years and after that five-year period a

3:17

general election has to happen. But the

3:19

Prime Minister has the right to call

3:21

an election any time they want and

3:25

that's normally done for strategic or

3:27

tactical reasons. For example, the

3:29

party might decide this is the

3:31

right time to call an election because the

3:34

public seems to like us at this moment. Maybe

3:37

things are going quite well right now

3:39

so we should call an election now

3:41

because people, you know, might

3:43

vote for us more now. So it's

3:46

often tactical. It's a question of choosing

3:48

exactly the right time to call an

3:50

election. Also, when an election happens the

3:53

party has to organise

3:55

a lot of things, the campaign has to

3:57

be well organised, they have to choose all

4:00

their... candidates to

4:02

stand for election in those

4:04

different constituencies. Constituencies

4:06

mean small areas

4:08

of the country. Each constituency is

4:11

represented by one member of parliament

4:13

who sits in the House of

4:15

Commons. That's

4:17

the way it works, though each constituency is

4:19

represented by a seat in the House of

4:21

Commons. Whoever

4:24

wins the vote in that constituency gets to

4:26

sit there and represent their party. Number

4:30

of seats is counted. For example,

4:33

you might have Conservative seats or

4:35

Labour seats or Liberal-Democrat seats or

4:37

Scottish National Party seats or

4:40

other parties. The

4:42

party with the most seats

4:46

has to have an outright majority. You

4:48

have to have a certain large enough

4:50

majority. They have the right to

4:53

form a government. The leader of that party

4:55

becomes the Prime Minister. That's

4:59

the way it works. Rishi

5:02

Sunak has called an election. Why did he call

5:04

it? Why did he call

5:06

it now? Who's going to

5:08

win the election? How

5:12

do the public feel about the Conservative Party

5:14

who've been in power for 14 years? What's

5:17

the general mood in the nation? What are

5:20

the Tories? The Tories, that's the Conservatives. What

5:22

have they been doing? What kind of government

5:24

have they been? The opposition

5:27

party is Labour. The leader of

5:29

the Labour Party is Kia Stama.

5:31

What are the chances that Labour

5:33

are going to take

5:35

power and we will have a Labour government

5:37

with a new Prime Minister, Kia Stama? What

5:39

are the chances of that happening? What do

5:42

Labour want? What are the challenges they face?

5:44

What's going on? That's the idea. My dad

5:46

is going to tell us all about this

5:48

stuff in this episode. We're going to start

5:50

in just a second. Before we do that,

5:53

I've just got two things to tell you.

5:55

First thing is premium subscribers. Have you noticed

5:57

P61, the first part of a new premium

5:59

series? available now and in fact by

6:01

the time you listen to this P61 part 2

6:03

might also be

6:05

available. It's going to be at least a

6:08

four-part series. The idea in this series

6:11

is that I am dealing

6:13

with phrasal verbs which came up in

6:16

the previous episode of this podcast, number

6:18

887, where I did that walk and

6:20

talk, walking along next to the River

6:22

Seine, talking about health and diet. A

6:24

number of phrasal verbs came up while

6:27

I was talking. I used, I

6:29

think I've counted 28 phrasal verbs

6:33

and that's what I'm helping you to

6:35

learn in various ways. There's going

6:37

to be information, important information about phrasal

6:39

verbs, how they work, whether

6:42

they're idiomatic, whether they are literal,

6:45

separable, non-separable phrasal verbs, a

6:47

sort of overview about

6:49

phrasal verbs with in fact 18 phrasal

6:52

verbs, that's in part 1. Part

6:54

2 is going to be a vocab review of

6:56

all the phrasal verbs I used in episode 887

6:58

and then in successive parts there's

7:02

going to be pronunciation drills, some

7:04

other exercises, more practice for you to

7:06

do so that you can really learn

7:09

useful phrasal verbs which will make your

7:11

English sound more natural and

7:14

you'll be able to express concepts in

7:16

the ways that they are

7:18

commonly expressed in English using these

7:20

slightly tricky but

7:23

very frequently occurring bits

7:26

of vocabulary, these phrasal verbs. So

7:29

P61 part 1 is available now

7:31

for premium subscribers just check your

7:34

podcast list and

7:36

you should see it there. If

7:38

you are a premium subscriber don't forget

7:40

you can manage your account by going

7:43

to teacherluke.co.uk slash account that's where you

7:45

go to for example add LEP premium

7:47

to a podcast app on your phone

7:49

that's the best way to do it.

7:51

If you are interested in Luke's English

7:53

podcast premium if you want to sign

7:55

up and you want to know more

7:57

just go to teacherluke.co.uk slash Premium

8:00

info, okay? Second

8:02

thing is I just wanted to remind you

8:05

I'm doing a stand-up comedy show in Paris,

8:07

which is where I live, and

8:09

that is happening on the 19th of July.

8:12

And I'll be doing 30 minutes of stand-up at

8:14

this show, which is why I'm telling you about

8:16

it because I want to invite

8:19

my podcast listeners to come, if you can.

8:21

Obviously I know that most of you don't

8:23

live in Paris or near Paris, so it's

8:25

not really feasible for you to come. But

8:27

anyway, if you're in the area, come

8:30

and enjoy the show. I'll be doing 30 minutes

8:32

of stand-up comedy. Friday, the 19th of July, the

8:35

show starts at half past eight in the

8:38

evening, and I'll be

8:40

doing the show with my friend Charles

8:42

Pellegrin. I'm doing 30 minutes. Charles

8:44

is doing 30 minutes. The

8:46

venue is called Au Soleil de la

8:48

Bout. It's at number 32, Rue Mola, in

8:52

the 18th arrondissement of Paris. So

8:55

come on down, enjoy the show, say

8:57

hello. And hopefully I'm

8:59

going to record a live episode of

9:01

the podcast in the room after the

9:03

comedy show as well. Hopefully

9:06

I'm going to make that work so

9:08

you could come and join and be part

9:10

of the audience for that as well. Okay,

9:12

so that's my comedy show. It's called Same

9:14

Difference, Luke and Charles, Same Difference, 19th

9:17

of July, 8.30 p.m. All

9:19

the details for that show

9:21

can be found at teacherluke.co.uk

9:24

slash comedy. Okay, right, so

9:26

let's get started with this episode of

9:28

the Rick Thompson Report, all about the

9:30

upcoming general election in the UK.

9:33

Let's now hear what my dad has to

9:35

say, and here we go. This

9:39

is the Rick Thompson Report

9:41

with Rick Thompson. Hello,

9:49

dad. Welcome back onto the podcast. Thank you

9:51

very much. Thank you for inviting me. It's

9:54

a pleasure, of course. It's a

9:56

tradition to start these episodes

9:59

with a very quick... weather report. How's

10:01

the weather? It's

10:03

going to be the longest day in a few

10:05

days as we record this, but

10:08

we haven't had a summer yet. It's been

10:10

a very weird year here in England.

10:12

It's been cold, very, very wet earlier

10:15

on. Just generally, chilly, everybody's complaining about

10:17

it madly. We haven't had a summer

10:19

yet. We hope it'll turn up sometime.

10:22

It's better than having a heat wave though,

10:24

isn't it? I suppose it is. Other parts

10:26

of the world are having really horrible heat

10:28

waves, so I shouldn't complain really. It's very

10:31

traditional English weather with the clouds scurrying across

10:33

the sky, but a fair

10:35

number of showers as well. Okay.

10:38

Right. Do you remember,

10:40

dad, the last time we did one

10:42

of these Rick Thompson reports? It

10:44

was a long time ago. What was it about? Well,

10:48

the last time that we did one

10:50

about politics was in

10:53

October of 2022. Do

10:58

you know what that was about? Was it about

11:00

a certain Boris Johnson? No,

11:02

actually it was about his predecessor, Liz

11:04

Truss. About the

11:07

Truss 49 days as

11:09

prime minister after

11:13

she blew the economy. Yeah.

11:16

And then as well as that, we

11:19

did one about the

11:21

coronation of King Charles as well. It

11:24

was you and mum. It was a Rick and

11:26

Jill Thompson report. But anyway, this is the Rick

11:28

Thompson report. All right then, dad. So

11:30

why are we doing another one of these? What's

11:33

going on? Well,

11:35

elections and in our country here

11:38

in the UK, we are just

11:40

a short way away from a general

11:43

election. I know

11:45

there's another one in France and there are one or two others around.

11:48

And this is a particularly interesting one, I think,

11:50

in the UK. And

11:53

it's a bit of a surprise in the

11:55

same way that Macron surprised everybody by

11:57

calling an election. Our

12:00

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak surprised

12:03

everybody, including everybody in his own

12:06

party, when he suddenly decided to

12:08

have an election on July the 4th. And

12:13

when he didn't have to, the

12:16

five years is up. You

12:19

can't be in government for more than five

12:21

years here in

12:23

January next year, so most people thought he'd

12:25

just kind of hang on and

12:28

hope the economy improved and hope something would

12:31

turn up to improve

12:33

their standing in the opinion polls. But

12:36

no, he called an election

12:38

and surprised members of

12:40

his own party were astonished. They wondered why on earth

12:42

he'd done it, and nobody quite knows

12:44

why. Anyway, there we are.

12:46

We got an election and surprise election

12:49

coming up on July the 4th. At

12:53

the moment, it looks like the

12:56

currently ruling Conservative Party led

12:59

by Rishi Sunak is going to get a real

13:02

beating. The opinion

13:04

polls have been consistently shown that

13:06

they're miles behind. So

13:09

it'll be a big change, I think. Why

13:11

is that? Why are they so far behind in

13:13

the opinion polls? Well,

13:15

because they're useless. You

13:18

know that I'm

13:20

not obliged to be BBC independent and impartial

13:23

anymore. I can say what I think. But

13:26

most people agree that this

13:28

has been a pretty awful government,

13:31

and they've been in power for

13:34

14 years, and the whole

13:37

managed to mess up nearly everything. And

13:41

the character of the government

13:44

has been brought into question.

13:47

They are people who don't seem to believe

13:49

in public service and seem to be working

13:51

for themselves. And there

13:53

have been a number of scandals about,

13:55

you know, Conservative MPs one

13:58

way or another helping themselves. The

14:03

main problem is that the public

14:05

services have been underfunded, underfunded, because

14:08

this is a right-wing government that

14:10

doesn't believe in funding public services

14:12

very much. They

14:14

believe in cutting taxes, which

14:17

means you can't fund public services properly.

14:21

Everybody's fed up with it. We

14:24

have a situation where one of the issues,

14:26

the health service is pretty much top of

14:28

the list. The

14:32

situation now is that if

14:36

you have to have to go and

14:38

have an operation in hospital, unless it's

14:40

a life-saving one, you have to wait.

14:42

You wait and you wait, and you can wait a

14:44

long time. For example, for a replacement

14:47

knee or hip operation, so you're in

14:49

pain or something, but you just wait,

14:52

because there's a huge backlog. Some

14:56

people wait well over a year, and there

14:58

are, at the last count, seven

15:00

and a half million people on

15:03

waiting lists. I mean, it's just

15:05

gone up and up and up. At

15:08

the local level, if you want to go and

15:10

see a doctor, that's become more and more difficult. Everybody

15:13

complains, I can't just go

15:15

and see my general practitioner, my

15:18

doctor, because there aren't enough

15:20

of them and because of the amount of pressure

15:23

on them. It's

15:26

the same where we live, it's exactly that. You

15:30

ring up and they say there are no appointments

15:33

today, sorry. You

15:35

just can't see a doctor. This is

15:37

a health service which is in crisis. There

15:40

used to be a lot of targets which

15:43

had to be met, such as

15:45

how long before an ambulance arrives.

15:49

The ambulance thing is fantastic. Sometimes,

15:51

ambulances just don't turn up at

15:53

all. There aren't

15:56

enough NHS

15:58

workers. enough staff

16:00

in the emergency units in hospital,

16:03

there aren't enough operating theatres to

16:05

meet the demand. It's

16:07

all because 14 years of

16:10

this government, they have

16:12

underfunded the health service, and

16:14

everybody knows that. So if

16:16

they say, oh, well, we're going to reduce your

16:18

taxes a little bit, isn't that wonderful? Everybody says,

16:20

I want to be able to see a doctor. It's

16:24

not the priority. So there's

16:26

that. There's a whole number of other things. I

16:28

mean, the issue of

16:32

immigration still, like

16:35

in most other European countries, is still

16:37

a big problem area. But

16:40

the government have been

16:42

ridiculous on that. They've

16:46

campaigned, we will stop the boats,

16:48

meaning the boats across the channel

16:50

from France. Now, this is a

16:52

small proportion of our immigration. Most

16:55

of it is people with visas who have the right to

16:57

be here. But they're obsessed

16:59

with it and came up with some kind of crazy

17:02

scheme that they'll send the people

17:04

who come off to darkest

17:06

Africa, they'll go to Rwanda, they've got

17:08

to deal with Rwanda. Well,

17:11

I mean, I can't tell you

17:14

how ridiculous it is and

17:16

expensive, and nobody's gone to Rwanda

17:18

because there are so many challenges

17:20

to this. And

17:23

so people are saying, is that

17:25

the best you could do on

17:27

the immigration front? There's

17:30

the economy is particularly

17:33

bad here. They

17:36

call it the cost of living crisis. And

17:39

this government has managed to

17:41

preside over a growing number

17:43

of very poor families. A

17:47

lot of children are officially in

17:49

poverty now, because

17:51

they have managed

17:54

to fail to get any

17:56

growth in the economy at all. And

17:58

they are... obsessed with

18:01

giving tax cuts to the people

18:03

who don't really need them. So

18:05

as you can see, I think it's an awful government.

18:08

And they've, most of the

18:11

population seems to agree. Mason-

18:14

So going back to the

18:16

fact that Rishi Sunak, who

18:18

is, so we

18:21

had David Cameron, Theresa May,

18:23

Boris Johnson, then Liz

18:26

Truss, and then Rishi

18:28

Sunak, right? He's the current Prime Minister

18:30

after all of those ones. He

18:33

called the election. What were the circumstances in

18:35

which he called it? You said that you,

18:38

no one really knows why he's done it at this

18:40

moment. Do you want to

18:42

speculate on that? Rishi- Well, I don't have

18:44

any inside track on that. I mean, I

18:47

must admit, I don't know why he did

18:49

it. I was predicting he would

18:51

hold an election in November, which would pretty

18:53

much with the last moment he could. So

18:55

I don't know why he did it. A

18:57

lot of his closest supporters don't really know

19:00

why he did it. They weren't ready for

19:02

it. A lot of the

19:04

constituencies where people

19:06

elect their MP, they hadn't even

19:09

selected candidates. I mean, lots of

19:11

them. So they've been scrambling to

19:13

get this election campaign going. And

19:15

it has been disastrous so far. I

19:18

mean, it's been, do you know what a gaffe

19:21

is in English? A gaffe? A

19:23

gaffe? That's like a big mistake that

19:25

someone makes in the public eye

19:27

in some way. It makes them look

19:29

very stupid. Exactly. So far,

19:32

the conservatives election campaign has

19:34

been full of gaffes. Okay.

19:37

It has not gone well. It started right

19:39

at the beginning when Rishi

19:42

Sunak suddenly announced he was going to make

19:45

a statement outside number 10 Downing Street.

19:48

And the little podium came out

19:50

and the press all gathered. What's

19:52

this? What's this? It

19:54

turned out to be him announcing the

19:57

date of a general election, but

19:59

it was raining. It was raining hard and

20:02

he didn't have an umbrella. That's

20:05

planning for you. He

20:07

got completely soaked, I

20:10

mean, visibly drenched as

20:12

he was doing this. How long was

20:14

his announcement? Oh,

20:17

I don't know, five to 10 minutes. Okay.

20:20

In the pouring rain. There's all sorts of

20:23

jokes here. When the last

20:25

time Labour were in

20:27

government was with Tony Blair and

20:29

Gordon Brown, Tony Blair for 10 years. The

20:35

music that he'd use in his campaign was things

20:38

can only get better. Do you know that one?

20:40

I do. It was D. Reem, a British pop

20:42

group. Things can only get better. Well,

20:52

that became a kind of a

20:55

favourite song for political

20:57

campaigns. So

21:00

everybody in Downing Street started seeing

21:02

things can only get wetter. I

21:06

mean, it was a gift. Things can only

21:08

get wetter. So the gaps went

21:10

on. I mean, it turned out that

21:13

his very closest advisor, a

21:16

civil servant, but a close advisor

21:18

to Rishi Sunak, had

21:20

actually placed a bet with a

21:23

betting company, Ladbrokes, on

21:25

a July election, three

21:27

days before Sunak announced

21:29

it. And

21:32

everyone is kind of aghast. Obviously,

21:36

he knew and decided he'd make

21:38

a bit of money on the

21:40

side when I'm putting pounds on

21:42

it. Why else would you do

21:44

it? And I

21:47

mean, that's one. Another

21:49

gaffe was the

21:52

D-Day celebrations. Now, the 6th of

21:54

June is a famous date in

21:56

our history. It's when the British

21:59

in American and Canadian troops invaded

22:02

France to

22:05

get rid of Hitler's Nazi troops.

22:08

The invasion of France, biggest

22:10

invasion in military history, amazing,

22:12

very dangerous, a lot of

22:15

casualties. And it

22:17

is the 80th anniversary this year. And

22:19

there were still a few veterans around

22:21

who were there at the time. So

22:23

it'll probably be the last time that

22:25

you have a big commemoration of

22:28

some of those who were there. And

22:31

it was a very big

22:33

event. And of course, Joe

22:35

Biden, the American president was there, it

22:38

was all hosted by Macron.

22:41

There were some terrific

22:43

events, really impressive, with,

22:46

you know, recreations and music

22:48

among one another. Rishi

22:51

Sunak was there, of course, but he

22:53

left early. Suddenly,

22:56

he wasn't there. And he'd

22:58

flown back to Britain to do a

23:00

campaign interview on TV. And

23:04

so the final events were the international

23:06

events where you had the

23:10

American president, the president of France,

23:12

and in the lineup, there

23:15

was no Rishi Sunak. We're talking

23:17

about, you know, D-Day,

23:19

the day the invasion

23:22

came from Britain. And

23:26

he afterwards, you know, everyone he criticized it,

23:28

including members of his own party, because you

23:33

don't, you don't

23:35

do that on an occasion like

23:37

that. And it looks like an

23:39

offense towards the armed forces. It

23:42

looks like you don't care very much. And

23:46

Rishi Sunak has got a real

23:48

problem about relating

23:51

to people. And

23:53

I don't think I think that's one of the

23:55

reasons it makes him very unpopular that he's incredibly

23:57

rich. And he's married to a

24:00

billionaire Indian wife

24:03

and he's rich in his own right

24:06

and very privileged and I

24:08

think it's difficult for somebody who comes

24:10

from that background to be

24:12

accepted by people who are suffering an

24:16

economic crisis at home. Absolutely.

24:21

I mean, there's more. Go on. Their

24:25

campaign has not been going well. 76

24:29

of the Conservative MPs have decided they're not

24:31

going to stand. They're not going to compete

24:34

for their seat. Mainly

24:37

because they know they'll lose. Wow.

24:40

76 of them are just going to say, you know what, I'm out. I'm out. We're

24:43

not going to bother. Yeah. So

24:46

just to be clear, just sorry, just to be

24:48

clear, he announced a general

24:50

election, even though it seemed a lot

24:53

of the rest of the people in

24:55

his party were completely unprepared for this. That's

24:57

right. And so when

24:59

an election is happening, the parties

25:01

have their candidates ready,

25:04

the candidates who are going to stand

25:06

for election in the various constituencies around

25:08

the country. Have a campaign that's zero-printed.

25:12

Everything has to be ready. The

25:14

candidates have to be chosen and everything

25:17

has to be prepared and stuff. Rishi

25:19

Sunak calls the election, but

25:22

loads of the seats don't

25:24

have candidates selected. Loads

25:27

of people are completely unprepared. Seems

25:29

to be such a strange move to do

25:32

that. I can't explain it. I'm sorry, but

25:34

that's what happened. People

25:36

have said that he

25:38

did that because he wants to

25:41

have a summer holiday. That's

25:44

a very, very interesting point. I mean,

25:46

another thing that makes him

25:49

very unpopular is the fact that he

25:54

does have property in America. Apparently

25:57

he's enrolled his children in

25:59

America. Very

28:01

right wing. So

28:03

my prediction is that Labour will win this election.

28:07

And the question is, by how

28:10

much? And

28:13

I've been looking it up. As

28:15

I said, the Conservatives have been in power

28:17

for 14 years. Boris

28:20

Johnson, when he called

28:23

an election called the

28:25

Get Brexit Done election. This is

28:28

when everybody was completely exhausted with

28:30

the Brexit negotiations. And

28:33

he basically tapped into that and

28:35

said, let's get Brexit Done vote for us.

28:39

And people did, but the majority made

28:41

two seats. That was an

28:43

effort by Boris Johnson to get the

28:45

Conservatives a bigger majority

28:47

in parliament so that they could

28:49

basically push through their decisions more

28:52

easily. Because previously, what they had

28:54

was a sort of, they

28:56

didn't have an outright majority. So

28:59

they needed the support of a Northern Irish

29:01

party and, and stuff like that. So it

29:03

was basically hard for them to basically push

29:05

through their decisions, which were generally

29:08

unpopular with everyone else. So he used the mood

29:10

of the moment, which was, look, we just need

29:12

to get Brexit done and get on with this.

29:15

He used that as a way to, as

29:17

a way to gain more seats

29:20

in parliament, which was a success. He got

29:22

80. Paul Jay

29:24

He got a majority of 80 seats, mainly

29:27

through telling lies.

29:29

I'm sorry, but that's

29:31

exactly what he did. You

29:33

mentioned the loyalist MPs in

29:35

Northern Ireland. They were worried

29:38

about the implications for

29:40

them, having a border with the EU,

29:42

the Republic of Ireland, and how it

29:44

would work and everything else. He

29:47

told them there will

29:49

be no paperwork. Everything

29:52

will be the same. Well, there

29:54

was loads of paperwork and nothing was the same. And

29:57

it's the same with everything else. we

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32:22

plushcare.com/weight loss. Isn't

32:27

it possible that lots of people are

32:29

going to vote for the kind of far

32:31

right wing party,

32:34

what are they called again? Reform. A lot

32:36

of people are going to vote

32:39

for the reform

32:42

party because it's Nigel Farage's party,

32:44

isn't it? He's the leader of

32:46

the party? Yes,

32:51

he is. Right. Him and all

32:53

the things that he stands for, that still

32:55

has a lot more support than it did

32:58

back in the days when Tony Blair

33:01

became the prime minister. Surely,

33:04

a lot of people are going to vote

33:06

even further to the right of the conservatives

33:08

this time. Yes, they might

33:10

well do. Like

33:12

in other parts of Europe, there is a populist

33:16

movement because

33:18

people are unhappy about their

33:21

standard of living and because

33:23

they're unhappy about immigration. This

33:26

man, Nigel Farage, has

33:29

been around for a while. He was prominent in the

33:33

Brexit Leave campaign.

33:36

He was the inventor of

33:38

the UKIP party,

33:40

the UK Independence Party.

33:44

He's very recently decided

33:47

that he'll join reform

33:49

as its leader, whether it's

33:51

a party or not is an issue. It's

33:53

certainly a business, but nobody's quite sure

33:56

whether it's actually a party. And

34:00

they've launched a

34:02

sort of manifesto which promises massive

34:06

tax cuts and things

34:09

that can't be delivered. I

34:11

mean, he himself might become an

34:13

MP. He's tried seven times before

34:15

and always failed. But this

34:17

time he might make it. He's

34:20

standing in an Essex

34:23

coastal town which is pretty

34:25

Brexity. So

34:28

he might become an MP, but he might be the

34:30

only one. But

34:33

the party will definitely siphon votes,

34:36

probably more from conservatives than

34:38

anybody else. So it's

34:41

not particularly bad news for Labour

34:44

in that it's not going to damage

34:46

them at all. It might even damage

34:48

the Conservative Party. Okay,

34:51

so it's more a question of how

34:55

much will Labour win rather than will Labour

34:57

win? That's my view. What

35:00

are Labour promising to do? Well,

35:04

they're not being incredibly radical

35:08

because Kiers Dahmer

35:11

have decided that in

35:13

order to win, they've got to persuade people

35:15

who have voted Conservative in the past to

35:17

vote for them. And

35:21

his predecessor was very left wing. Jeremy

35:23

Corbyn was a very left wing Labour.

35:25

And he was pretty well unelectable. Got

35:27

to the point where, you

35:29

know, this is one of the reasons why Boris

35:32

Johnson won a big majority was that people wouldn't

35:34

vote for Corbyn. And

35:37

Kiers Dahmer has changed the Labour

35:40

Party since those days, emphasizing

35:44

that they're not going to promise

35:46

things they can't deliver, trust,

35:50

competence. And so

35:53

he's not suggesting they're

35:55

going to make tax cuts,

35:57

but he's not saying they're going to... it's

38:00

time for a change and everybody agrees. Okay,

38:06

it'll be difficult for Labour though, won't it? When

38:09

they come into power, and as I could say,

38:11

I mean, if they don't

38:13

make it, you could interview me again and say,

38:15

nah, nah, you've got it all wrong. But

38:18

I'm convinced they will get into

38:20

power. And

38:24

the challenges are incredible, what

38:27

they're faced with. I mean, there

38:29

is no money. And they've

38:32

got a whole number of things

38:34

that require investment. But of course,

38:36

the health service up there, they'll

38:38

have to try and look at how you can

38:41

restructure it to make it work better. And

38:43

associated with that is what we call

38:46

social care. I'm sure

38:49

a lot of your viewers and listeners

38:51

will recognise this, because it's

38:53

a problem everywhere, that

38:56

as we get a bigger

38:58

ageing population, more

39:00

and more older people, their

39:03

demands on their health services

39:06

grow. And when

39:10

they get to the point they have to go into

39:12

some kind of care home, because they can't look after

39:14

themselves, and they haven't got family members who'll do it,

39:18

then a lot

39:21

of the people who don't have lots

39:23

of money to pay for a care

39:25

home, which can be incredibly expensive, they

39:28

finish up going in and out of

39:31

hospital, because there's nowhere else from to

39:33

go when they go into hospital, and they're quite ill.

39:35

They can't be sent home because

39:37

they can't be sent home. And

39:40

so that's called bed blocking. And bed

39:42

blocking means is one of the

39:44

reasons why the hospitals are

39:47

kind of full, and everybody's

39:50

operations get delayed and so on.

39:53

So Labour are committed to try and find

39:55

a solution to that. And

39:57

they'll have to put some money into the

40:01

local authorities which provide social

40:03

care homes. There's

40:07

a lot of issues. Yes,

40:09

absolutely. Okay. Are

40:11

there any other parties? What about Scotland?

40:13

Yeah, well, I'm glad you mentioned Scotland.

40:15

They're actually quite important. They

40:19

have currently 43 seats.

40:24

They're the third biggest party in the House

40:26

of Commons. This is the

40:28

Scottish National Party, the SNP. Now,

40:31

there is a devolved Scottish Parliament. It

40:33

has quite a lot of powers. And

40:37

the SNP have been the party

40:40

of government in Scotland for a long, long time.

40:45

But things have gone wrong for the SNP. Their

40:48

formerly popular leader

40:52

suddenly discovered

40:54

that her husband, who was the cut

40:57

party treasurer, has actually been

40:59

doing some strange things with the money. And

41:02

she was replaced, and the guy

41:04

who replaced her had to

41:06

stand down for various reasons.

41:14

The Scottish National Party says they

41:16

want independence. But

41:19

surveys show that the

41:22

general population of Scotland isn't going to

41:24

vote for independence. So

41:26

you might say, well, how come they all vote for the SNP?

41:29

Well, it's because they're a socialist party.

41:31

They are to the left of the Labour

41:34

Party, and they have introduced

41:37

a number of quite popular measures over

41:39

the years. Now

41:41

that they're in a bit of trouble, and

41:44

they are thought to be untrustworthy,

41:47

those votes may go to Labour. So

41:51

Labour will probably do better in Scotland than they

41:53

have done for some time. Okay,

41:56

so we're looking at probably a

41:58

Labour government. then in

42:01

July. This is what everybody is saying. But

42:04

how long? I mean, they'll

42:07

probably last for at least two terms. That's

42:10

a decade. Yeah, don't you

42:12

think? They

42:14

could last for 10

42:17

years. Obviously, people will be

42:19

disappointed after a year, a year and a year

42:21

or two, because they can't solve all the problems.

42:25

Yeah, but the reason is that the

42:27

opposition, the Conservatives, will be in a

42:30

state of disarray. And who

42:32

will they choose as their leader? It

42:34

can take a political party quite a

42:36

long time to fully recover from

42:38

a situation like the one that the Conservatives

42:40

are in at the moment. It's

42:43

a really interesting question. What will happen to

42:45

the Conservative Party if they get heavily defeated?

42:48

Which I think they will. There

42:53

is a movement that

42:55

says they should embrace

42:58

this small reform

43:01

party of Nigel Farage because

43:03

they're probably going to get

43:05

a lot of votes. So

43:08

it might, the effect might be to

43:10

drag the Conservative Party even further to

43:13

the right. And it's pretty

43:15

well on the right at the moment. And

43:18

the number of people that

43:20

the commentators are suggesting will replace

43:22

Bushy soon because if they lose

43:25

heavily, he'll resign. Fact

43:28

and probably shoot off to America. Exactly.

43:30

That's my point. He'll he'll resign. He'll go on holiday

43:32

and he won't have to have any

43:35

work to do. And the

43:38

process of the Conservative Party to elect its

43:40

leaders is a bit of a torturous one.

43:42

It's not particularly democratic, I have to say.

43:46

So they will have their

43:49

process where a number

43:51

of people put their

43:53

names forward. They have to get a certain number

43:55

of MPs supporting them. And

43:57

then the MPs go through a ballot.

44:00

process, eliminating one

44:02

and then having another ballot, eliminating another,

44:05

until they get down to the final

44:07

two, and then the final two campaign

44:09

around the country amongst the membership of

44:12

the party. And the membership

44:14

of the party then vote on which one

44:16

of those twos go to the Prime Minister.

44:18

So that's a longish and rather torturous process.

44:21

But of course, it's a relatively small number

44:23

of people who are electing our Prime

44:25

Minister. The

44:28

people who are putting their names forward at the moment,

44:31

or said to be, are

44:33

all pretty right wing, pretty Brexit-y.

44:37

And I

44:39

think that whoever it

44:41

is, I mean, there's some pretty

44:44

unpopular people. Sowela Braverman, the Home

44:47

Secretary, is a particularly

44:49

right wing character. Her

44:51

predecessor, Priti Patel, is allegedly thinking

44:53

she might be the next Prime

44:56

Minister. Penny Morden, who

44:58

is another one. And

45:00

when you look at them, and you look

45:02

at Keir Starmer and his front

45:04

bench, you feel, no,

45:06

they haven't got the caliber, and

45:08

they haven't got the ability to

45:10

bring the party together. So

45:13

I think the Conservatives will be in a bit of a

45:15

mess for some time. And the relationship

45:18

with the reform will be very interesting.

45:22

The Lib Dems are the other party, Liberal

45:24

Democrats, they are the center party. They

45:27

only have 15 seats, but they

45:29

have a history, you know,

45:32

they have done quite well in the past.

45:35

And they'll probably do a bit better too, because

45:37

there are certain conservative seats, particularly in the

45:40

south of England, where people

45:42

can't bring themselves to vote Labour,

45:44

which is a class thing. But

45:47

they will, if they want to change, they'll

45:49

vote for the Lib Dems. So I think they'll probably pick

45:51

up some seats. Yeah,

45:54

there are the Northern Irish parties who at

45:56

the moment have the same number of seats

45:58

each, that's the DUP in Sinn

46:00

Féin, basically DOP, the

46:03

unionist party, Sinn Féin

46:05

the Republican Party, basically,

46:07

right? Yes, they are.

46:09

They want to be a united Ireland. They

46:12

would like to join with the

46:14

Republic of Ireland. Sinn Féin don't take up

46:16

their seats in the House of Commons because

46:19

they would have to swear loyalty to

46:21

the Crown if they were to do that and

46:23

they refused it. I'm

46:27

just mentioning the other parties. There's

46:30

also Plaid Cymru, that's the

46:32

Welsh party. Welsh

46:37

Nationalist Party. Do they want Welsh

46:39

independence or not? Well, they don't

46:41

talk about it much because the

46:44

general opinion in Wales is we could do

46:47

without an independence referendum, thank you very much.

46:50

And so their assembly, a devolved

46:53

kind of parliament, with not as many powers

46:55

as Scotland because it's a much smaller country

46:57

and it has closer links with England. I

47:03

think that they have been ruled by

47:05

a Labour majority in the Assembly for quite a

47:07

long time and

47:10

I can't see that changing really.

47:13

Okay, and then there's the Green Party

47:16

who have won. She's

47:19

been terrific, much

47:22

admired, but she's not standing again. So

47:25

they might finish up with none. They

47:28

focus on environmental issues. They're

47:31

also a party. I mean, they

47:34

say we would raise taxes on people

47:37

learning more than a certain amount and

47:40

pour it into the public services, which

47:44

I must admit sounds like quite

47:46

a good idea sometimes, but the main

47:48

party is afraid to talk about raising

47:50

taxes. Mm hmm. Reformers,

47:52

we've mentioned they currently have one seat

47:54

and then there are 20 other

47:57

seats which are occupied

47:59

by England. independent candidates. That's

48:03

20 others. Okay,

48:05

so basically, 4th of July is

48:07

when the vote is going to happen, the

48:09

election, and we'll know the results the

48:12

next day, the 5th of July. It's

48:14

quite dramatic, really. In this country, it all happens

48:17

on the same day. We have the first

48:19

past the post system

48:22

here, which is in

48:24

itself controversial. We don't have proportional

48:26

representation with two rounds

48:28

or anything like that. It all

48:30

happens bang, and the person who gets

48:32

the biggest number of votes in each

48:34

constituency, even if it's just one, becomes

48:37

the MP. It's

48:40

not a particularly democratic system, but it means that

48:42

we start counting the votes as soon as the

48:46

polling booths close at 10 o'clock in

48:48

the evening, counts through the

48:50

night, a lot of

48:52

places. Results start being announced at

48:54

2 o'clock in the morning, 3

48:56

o'clock in the morning. You start

48:58

getting the idea of what the

49:00

general picture is going to be.

49:02

It's quite good fun, really. Okay,

49:07

all right. Well, there you go. Thanks a

49:09

lot for telling us all about that. It's

49:11

going to be interesting to see exactly how

49:14

it all turns out. Yeah, that's okay. Well,

49:16

I've made my prediction that it'll be a

49:18

win for Labour and quite a big

49:21

one, but we'll see.

49:23

I might be entirely wrong. We've still

49:25

got a bit of campaigning to go.

49:27

We're recording this with a couple of weeks to

49:29

go. Yeah, okay.

49:32

Maybe we can talk again afterwards. To

49:35

end, let's talk about sports, shall we?

49:37

Are you watching the Euro 2024 football

49:39

tournament? Certainly.

49:43

Oh, yeah. So, we're recording

49:45

this on the 18th of June,

49:48

England. We're probably going to talk a bit more

49:50

about England because we're English. England

49:54

played their first game, when

49:56

was it? Friday? Sunday. England

49:58

played their first game on Sunday

50:00

evening, we beat Serbia

50:04

1-0. What did you think of

50:06

the game? Well, I thought

50:09

England weren't particularly good. I mean,

50:11

Serbia are always a tough opponent. But

50:18

the longer the game went on, the

50:20

more unimpressed I was

50:22

with the England team. I

50:25

think they've got to up their game if they're

50:27

going to go far in the competition, because

50:29

I think they were lackluster, a bit slow and

50:31

uninspired. And you compare that

50:33

with Germany scoring five goals against Scotland,

50:36

and you say, no, they've

50:39

got to play better than that. And by

50:41

the time this podcast

50:43

is broadcast, we will have

50:45

paid Denmark for another

50:47

strong team. So we'll

50:49

see whether they've managed to get past that

50:51

one. In theory, England ought to get quite

50:54

a long way. People

50:56

who are not interested in football can turn

50:58

off now. But basically, there

51:01

are six groups of four teams, 24 teams,

51:05

and the group stages are going on at the moment. And

51:08

when you're a group of four teams

51:11

who played each other, you

51:14

finish up with the

51:16

top two in each group going

51:18

through to the knockout stages. But

51:20

also, the four who came fourth,

51:24

third, sorry, the four best third

51:26

place ones, judged on how many

51:28

goals they scored and things like

51:30

that. Mason W Out

51:35

of the six third place teams in each group, four of those teams are

51:37

also going to go through. Yes. So

51:40

the bottom six are eliminated and

51:42

two of the teams that

51:44

came third are eliminated. So

51:47

next round, if England win their group,

51:50

which I would have

51:52

thought they should do, but Denmark

51:56

might beat them,

51:58

then in the knockout stages, they

52:00

will meet one of the teams that came

52:02

third in their group. So

52:05

they'll be avoiding, you know, the

52:07

big, big players like Italy,

52:09

Spain, Germany, you know, all that

52:11

lot. And

52:14

playing one of the teams that just

52:16

managed to qualify. So

52:18

we got lucky with the draw. Not

52:21

only did we have a relatively easy

52:24

group, but also, yeah, if

52:26

we come first in our group, we'll end up

52:28

playing one of the third place teams in the

52:30

next round, which is pretty

52:33

lucky. So in theory, we

52:35

should definitely get to to the quarter

52:37

finals after that. Who knows? Yeah,

52:39

people are saying lots of things about

52:41

England saying that they're one of the

52:43

favourites and that we've got this fantastic

52:45

squad and everything. Yeah, I don't

52:48

know. People always big up England before

52:50

a competition. But then when it actually

52:52

comes down to it, we always sort

52:54

of underperform, don't we? It's a, you

52:57

know, it's a mysterious thing. We've got a

53:00

great premiership, you know, and so our

53:02

club teams are all excellent. And a

53:04

lot of the players, the English

53:07

international players play at the highest level.

53:09

But for some reason, struggle to achieve

53:11

the same things that they're achieving with

53:13

their clubs. That's

53:16

absolutely right. I mean, that's why

53:18

people, you know, are baffled by

53:20

England, you look at the players,

53:23

you know, obviously, you know, they've

53:25

got a captain and a centre

53:27

forward who is a gold machine

53:29

called Harry Kane. They've got terrific

53:31

players all over the field, including

53:33

this guy called Jude Bellingham, who

53:36

is playing for Real Madrid. And

53:39

he's absolutely incredibly good. And

53:42

they've got a whole number of really good

53:44

individual players. So it's a

53:47

little bit baffling that they seem

53:49

to struggle and only score one

53:51

against, you know, a team they

53:53

should have beaten Serbia. And

53:56

it'll be the same, probably

53:58

the frustrating. It's

54:03

one of those things about if you're an England supporter,

54:06

you know you're going to be

54:08

disappointed. As

54:10

for who or when, I have the faintest idea, but

54:12

I think the home

54:14

team always has an advantage.

54:16

Don't rule out Germany. Mason-

54:18

Yeah, Germany look very

54:20

strong. Home team, as you said, and they

54:22

always seem to raise

54:24

their game when they go into

54:26

these competitions. Even if people are saying, oh, Germany, you don't

54:29

have a strong team this year or blah, blah, blah,

54:31

they always somehow get it all together. France

54:34

are strong favourites. They've got a very

54:38

strong team, squad,

54:40

individual players and stuff like that. And

54:42

lots of experiences, lots of experience. Portugal

54:44

have got a very good squad as

54:46

well with lots of great players in

54:48

it, lots of depth in their squad

54:50

and all that stuff. So anyway, we'll

54:52

see. We'll see. We'll see what happens. By

54:55

the time people listen to this, yeah, I'm

54:57

enjoying it too. It's always good to watch

55:00

big international games. It's really good fun. By

55:02

the time people listen to this, England will

55:04

have played Denmark. So who knows what

55:07

state we'll be in

55:09

at that point. Okay,

55:12

well, thanks very much, Dad. Mason-

55:14

Okay. Mason- Very interesting. Mason- I hope it

55:16

wasn't too boring for your viewers and listeners

55:18

to hear a lot about what's

55:21

going on in English, British, sorry, politics at

55:23

the moment. But you know, it is an

55:25

interesting time and it's going to be a

55:27

bit of a change, I think. Mason-

55:31

Indeed. Change, exactly. All right, brilliant. Thank you

55:33

very much. Have a lovely rest of the

55:35

day, Dad. Mason- I'd see you. Mason- Nice

55:37

to see you too. Bye-bye. Mason- Bye-bye. Mason-

55:42

Okay, so there you go. That was the

55:44

Rick Thompson report. June, 2024, the general election

55:48

is happening on the 4th of July.

55:51

Let's wait and see what happens there. Thanks

55:55

again to Dad for doing that. It's

55:57

always nice to have his contribution to

55:59

these. episodes and I hope

56:01

that everyone listening, I hope you all

56:03

appreciated being able to listen

56:05

to him talk about this subject. Regarding the

56:08

football, so I'm now

56:10

recording this bit on Friday the

56:12

21st of June and

56:14

yesterday England played their second

56:16

group match of Euro 2024

56:18

against Denmark and

56:22

what happened? Well

56:24

the score was 1-1 and England

56:26

were unimpressive.

56:33

I noted down some adjectives, lackluster.

56:36

This word

56:38

has come up on the podcast before, it's a

56:40

word that my brother used to refer to the

56:43

Star Wars Obi-Wan Kenobi Disney

56:45

Plus series. He said that was

56:47

lackluster. It's quite a nice adjective.

56:49

If something's lackluster, it means it's

56:51

just not particularly special,

56:53

it lacks a certain shine.

56:56

So it's kind of seemed a

56:58

bit dull or not

57:01

particularly interesting. So

57:04

England's performance was unimpressive, lackluster,

57:06

a bit slow, quite conservative,

57:09

right? Meaning not very adventurous, not

57:11

very daring. They

57:13

were pragmatic, which is this word that's used

57:16

in football to

57:18

mean sort of defensive or

57:21

playing it safe, let's say, playing

57:23

it safe, not taking very many

57:25

risks. There was not much creativity

57:27

going on, lacking a certain spark.

57:31

It was frustrating to watch England

57:33

do this and you

57:36

know, I don't know if anyone out there,

57:39

if those of you in different countries even

57:41

really care about England, right? You probably don't

57:43

really. Maybe there's a

57:45

certain level of support for the England

57:48

football team in some places, but obviously

57:50

you'll be supporting your own teams. But

57:53

just to describe the team that

57:56

I support, it's quite a frustrating

57:58

experience with England as I

58:00

think I mentioned earlier on

58:02

in this episode, the thing about England is

58:04

that we've got this

58:06

premiership which is very good. The club

58:09

teams in England are excellent. Obviously, we've

58:12

got a lot of foreign players in

58:14

the premiership. Also, most of

58:16

the players in the England team play

58:19

at the highest level for their clubs, a

58:21

lot of them in the premiership. They're

58:24

excellent. They're really top

58:26

class players and they

58:28

play an excellent game with their

58:31

club teams. But when you take

58:33

these England players out of their

58:35

clubs and you put them in England shirts

58:38

and you put them on the field representing

58:40

England, they always

58:42

seem to have a problem

58:44

gelling together and forming a

58:46

really well-functioning team. It

58:50

just doesn't seem to click. I

58:52

don't really know why. I don't know what the

58:54

issue is there. There was

58:56

a lack of spark and none

58:59

of the players seem to be able

59:01

to unlock their talent

59:03

that they show normally during

59:06

the season when they're playing for their clubs. They

59:08

just can't seem to make it work when they're

59:10

playing for England. I don't know what the story

59:13

is, but every single time I feel like every

59:15

time I talk about England playing football on

59:17

this podcast, it's always

59:20

the same story. It's always this story of

59:22

frustration, the mystery of

59:24

why English players can't seem to switch

59:26

it on when they're playing for their

59:28

national team. England

59:31

are still safe. They are still top of their

59:33

group, which means that depending on

59:36

the result of the last game, the

59:38

third game, which England really should

59:40

win against Slovenia, which

59:43

is next Tuesday, I think

59:47

England will probably still come top of the group.

59:50

We'll see. But if

59:53

we continue to perform like this, then there's

59:55

no way we'll get through the later knockout

59:57

stages. And as soon as we hit, one

1:00:00

of the bigger teams then

1:00:03

I can't see really how we will

1:00:05

be able to win if we perform

1:00:07

like that. So, you know,

1:00:09

we'll probably get through to the knockout stages,

1:00:11

but I don't really fancy our

1:00:13

chances of getting through to the final. Even

1:00:16

though before the competition people were saying lots

1:00:18

of very complementary positive things

1:00:20

about England. A lot of people tipped

1:00:22

England as being one of the favourite

1:00:24

teams for the competition, but

1:00:26

that's just on paper. That's just when you look

1:00:29

at the players that we have, when you look

1:00:31

at the quality in the team, but

1:00:33

in terms of the way the team is actually performing,

1:00:35

it's another story. Okay,

1:00:39

I would love to talk more about football, but

1:00:41

I think that's probably enough at this stage. I

1:00:44

expect that our manager Gareth Southgate is

1:00:46

coming under a lot of criticism today

1:00:49

in the media and stuff. We'll

1:00:51

see how the whole team responds to it.

1:00:53

But I would love to see England playing

1:00:56

a bit more adventurously

1:01:00

and playing a

1:01:02

bit like one of those really

1:01:04

aggressive attacking club teams like Manchester

1:01:07

City or Liverpool. Teams

1:01:10

which do

1:01:12

something called a high press game, which

1:01:15

is where they essentially

1:01:17

kind of smother the other team.

1:01:20

They play all the way deep

1:01:22

into the other team's half and

1:01:24

they don't let the other team have any possession. Normally

1:01:27

what happens in football is that, so

1:01:30

you've got the two halves of the pitch,

1:01:32

right? You defend your half

1:01:34

and you attack into the other half. And

1:01:36

what often happens is, let's

1:01:39

say the opposing team gets the ball

1:01:41

in their half and your team sits

1:01:43

back a bit and defends their half

1:01:45

of the pitch. And when the

1:01:47

opposing team brings the ball into your half of the

1:01:50

pitch, that's when you start to defend,

1:01:52

especially when the

1:01:54

ball is brought towards the penalty

1:01:56

area. You start to really defend and close

1:01:58

down, which means... come

1:02:02

in close to the players you've got the ball

1:02:04

and tackle. But

1:02:06

that means you're waiting until the ball

1:02:08

is fairly close to your goal really,

1:02:11

before you start to press

1:02:13

the other players. But this

1:02:15

high press game is where your

1:02:18

team pushes deep into the other

1:02:20

team's half and you start pressing

1:02:24

them or trying to tackle them, trying

1:02:26

to win possession all the

1:02:29

way deep into their half. And

1:02:31

you don't let the other team get

1:02:34

any possession of the ball and

1:02:36

you win the ball close

1:02:38

to their goal and then you quickly,

1:02:41

acting quickly, thinking

1:02:43

quickly and being quick on your feet,

1:02:45

you're able to make something happen in

1:02:49

every part of the pitch in a sense. So

1:02:52

it's kind of like a very kind

1:02:54

of gregarious, very attacking, dominating

1:02:57

form of football that requires a lot

1:02:59

of speed, a lot of quick thinking,

1:03:01

a lot of fast teamwork, a lot

1:03:03

of skill and a lot

1:03:05

of kind of risk as well. Because

1:03:08

when you do that, you kind of also

1:03:10

leave yourself a little bit exposed at the back

1:03:12

if your team is stretched out through the pitch.

1:03:16

But it's a way to kind of

1:03:18

make things happen, to be exciting and

1:03:20

to make your own opportunities. And

1:03:22

England, I don't know why, but they're just not

1:03:24

doing anything like that. They're not even defending that

1:03:27

well. It's just

1:03:29

a boring, kind of conservative, safe,

1:03:31

pragmatic form of football which no

1:03:33

one likes. And I even feel

1:03:35

like the team members aren't

1:03:37

happy playing that kind of football, that that's

1:03:40

not what they're used to doing. They're used

1:03:42

to playing this other form of

1:03:44

football. Anyway, that's enough stuff

1:03:47

about football. Alright,

1:03:51

and that's the end of this episode. Thank

1:03:54

you so much for listening. Don't forget,

1:03:56

premium subscribers, P61, part one is available

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1:04:40

lovely, have a great day, morning,

1:04:42

afternoon, evening or night. If your

1:04:45

football team is in the Euros

1:04:47

then good luck to them unless

1:04:49

of course they're playing England. Alright,

1:04:51

speak to you next time but

1:04:54

for now goodbye bye bye bye.

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