0:00

Hey, I'm Ryan Reynolds. At Mint Mobile, we

0:02

like to do the opposite of what big

0:05

wireless does. They charge you a lot, we

0:07

charge you a little. So naturally, when they

0:09

announced they'd be raising their prices due to

0:11

inflation, we decided to deflate our prices due

0:13

to not hating you. That's right, we're cutting

0:15

the price of Mint Unlimited from $30 a

0:17

month to just $15 a month. Give

0:21

it a try at mintmobile.com. Give it a try

0:23

at mintmobile.com/switch. $45 up front

0:25

for three months plus taxes and fees. Promote it for new customers for

0:27

a limited time. Unlimited more than 40 gigabytes per month, slows. Full terms

0:29

at mintmobile.com. Sooner or later, you'll need

0:31

to upgrade your tech, but you don't

0:34

have to pay full price. We're BackMarket,

0:36

a leading online marketplace for refurbished smartphones,

0:38

laptops, tablets, and other tech. All up

0:40

to 70% less than brand new. Each

0:43

device sold on BackMarket is tested and

0:45

restored to perfect working condition by industry

0:47

experts, and they all come with a

0:49

one-year warranty and 30 days to change

0:51

your mind. So never pay full price

0:54

for tech again. Visit the BackMarket

0:56

app or backmarket.com Hello,

1:08

I'm Matt Trolley and this is Politics

1:10

Without the Boring Bits. Before I tell

1:12

you what's coming up on the podcast,

1:14

let me tell you about how to

1:17

win an election live the morning after

1:19

the general election. If you are a

1:21

Time subscriber, you can come to Times

1:23

Radio Towers and see Peter Manderson, Danny

1:26

Finkelstein, Polly McKenzie, and me live on

1:28

stage, very tired after having had probably

1:30

no sleep at all, analysing the election

1:32

results. It's 11 o'clock on Friday, 5th

1:35

July at the News Building. If you

1:37

want to come, go to mytimesplus.co.uk and

1:39

register to enter the ballot for tickets,

1:41

or you can watch along online. Never

1:44

mind that, let's not wish away our

1:46

lives. Coming up on today's episode, disunited

1:48

election. We bring you the very latest

1:50

political news from the four corners of

1:53

the UK. And in the

1:55

columnists, Robert Crampton and Alice Thompson on

1:57

whether Keir Starmer is just a very

1:59

lucky man. And if you like what

2:01

you hear on the podcast, don't forget you can

2:03

join me for Politics Without the Boing Bits live

2:05

on Times Radio, on your DAB radio, on your

2:07

smart speaker, or download the Times Radio app, it's

2:09

Politics Without the Boing Bits, weekdays from 10. Now,

2:21

I'm not saying that things are going badly if

2:23

I wish you'd seen it. But

2:26

he stood in a field with

2:28

a free bucket of food and

2:32

the sheep still ignored him. Well,

2:47

as someone who's milked a sheep, I know a way around

2:49

a sheep and I think I

2:51

could have got the sheep to

2:54

eat the bucket of food. Anyway, it

2:56

was very funny. Meanwhile, it's

2:58

a day with a why in it, so it

3:01

must be Mel Stride.

3:04

Let's speak to Mel Stride, who's Work and Pension

3:06

Secretary and a frequent guest on this programme. So

3:09

many listeners getting in touch saying that you can't

3:11

claim, you know, credit for it coming down when

3:13

you won't accept responsibility for it going up. That's

3:16

just economically illiterate. Mel Stride

3:18

standing by for us, Work and Pension Secretary, of course,

3:20

inflation is nothing to do with the government, is it?

3:22

That's what you always tell us, especially when you don't

3:25

consent. No, no, no, it is

3:27

because look, controlling your face. Oh, it is? OK.

3:29

Mel Stride's on the line, Secretary of State

3:31

for Work and Pensions. Do you think you're

3:33

going to win the election? Well, I don't have a

3:35

crystal ball. Nothing

3:46

going to break Mel Stride. He's the

3:48

last person left in the Cabinet. Mel

3:51

Stride appearing morning, noon

3:54

and night on all outlets. If

4:02

you see Mel Stryde, just check

4:05

he's okay. I'm

4:07

wondering, maybe they've cloned him. Is

4:09

he the first AI Cabinet Minister so he

4:11

can appear on TV and

4:14

radio simultaneously with

4:16

the lines to tank? That's

4:18

enough Mel

4:20

Stryde. The Columnists with Alibert,

4:23

Alice Thompson and Robert Crampton.

4:27

Here they both are in the studio.

4:31

Both wearing blue today, do you call them that? We both

4:33

are on the road, haven't we? Yeah, we

4:35

have. Well, we're going to talk about

4:37

that momentarily. Yes, or 90s at the

4:39

moment. Directly, as my gran would say. First,

4:43

inflation down to 2%, which means, does still mean that

4:46

price is rising 2% year on year, but that's better

4:48

than it was. The lowest has

4:50

been for what, three years? It

4:52

suggests that interest rates could be

4:54

cut imminently, mortgage rates start coming

4:56

down. Possibly just

4:58

as Keir Starmer's settling into number day. Is he basically,

5:01

the question I want to know, is he just a

5:03

very, very lucky man, Keir Starmer? Yeah, we want luck

5:05

though, don't we? I mean, that's the whole point. He

5:08

had Boris Johnson and Liz Jostreshe Sunak alongside

5:10

that Nicholas Sturgeon, the camper van, and everything

5:12

that's going on in the S&P in Scotland.

5:16

And then the economy just looks like it's coming

5:18

good, just at the right moment. None

5:20

of which has got anything to do with him. Alice?

5:23

Well, I just think that actually you

5:25

want a lucky general, don't you? So the problem is that

5:27

you can say, isn't he lucky? But I don't really care

5:29

as long as it happens. And the person I do feel

5:31

sorry for is Jeremy Hunt, because I think Rishi Sunak, you

5:33

know, actually whatever you want to

5:35

say, he's become Prime Minister, he has messed it up

5:37

really. And it's on him. Whereas

5:40

I think with Jeremy Hunt, he's actually tried quite hard.

5:42

He hasn't been a bad chancellor. He's been quite steady.

5:45

He's been an MP for years, far longer than Rishi Sunak was.

5:48

He's quite experienced and he's done okay. And now

5:50

that's all going to be forgotten really, because this has

5:52

been such a disastrous campaign. Parallels

5:54

to Ken Clark in the 90s, who gave

5:56

Gordon Brown a pretty decent inheritance, isn't he?

6:00

Is it label only sort of emitted

6:02

quite belatedly? Yeah, I mean, it's yeah, it's good.

6:04

It's lucky for Keir. I mean, it's probably Reasonably

6:07

lucky for Rishi as well He might mitigate things

6:09

a little bit but he can't really claim it's

6:11

down to him when it wasn't his fault

6:13

when it was 10% And that was so

6:15

striking this morning when you know, Mel stride who's

6:18

now the only cabinet minister left appears on all

6:20

outlets all hours When

6:22

he was on do the interviews this morning Every

6:25

single interview asked him well, how can you

6:27

take credit for this when you

6:29

said it was all Ukraine? It was

6:31

all Russia energy bills supply-side stuff after

6:33

kovid and yeah, you can't yeah

6:36

But you do need I mean, I think the country

6:38

needs some luck anyway But I've interviewed Rachel Reese weekend

6:40

and and that that's her greatest worry Isn't it is

6:42

what she's going to inherit and I think she thought

6:44

they were gonna be there all summer battling against it

6:46

And this is just a tiny bit, you know, a

6:48

glimmer of light for the rest of the country, isn't

6:50

it? There's also one and I've tried

6:52

to sort of ask people who understand these things slightly better.

6:54

I do just wonder whether the

6:58

the effect of there being an election and a

7:00

change of government with a decent majority Which is

7:02

what the polls at least suggest will

7:04

that lead to a certain amount of

7:07

just? Breathing out by business who've been

7:09

putting off the least nowhere. They said I really

7:12

really hope so But you can't get much worse

7:14

than it is at the moment because people sort

7:16

of treat business and even the stock market Science

7:18

it's not human. Have you just been holding off

7:20

on Building that thing expanding

7:22

that business always says they want stability. They

7:24

always say they want some for investment decisions

7:27

and so on and they're probably They

7:30

haven't had it for many years now and they're

7:32

gonna Get a measure

7:34

of it if there's a decent majority. Yes, so I

7:36

think it will and I think they Hopefully

7:39

also it might just give everyone a little bit of a lift

7:41

in terms of the just mood and

7:43

a kind of intangible optimism

7:47

about maybe you know spending a bit more money

7:49

or making some investments or moving Because

7:53

it can't get much worse than this I mean

7:55

we'll talk about this later, but it's really grim

7:58

out there It really is grim. There's a national

8:00

kind of depression almost. But that's what I think is

8:02

that now you've got the sense that actually people aren't

8:04

very interested in the election but they're holding off, they're

8:06

just not interested in anything. They're not

8:08

going shopping, they're not buying houses. There's nothing they're doing and

8:10

part of it is because they haven't got any cash but

8:13

part of it is because they just don't know what's going

8:15

to happen next. And I think that will help after July

8:17

the 4th. There'll be a sense more

8:19

of certainty of, you know, even holidays they were saying

8:21

people just aren't booking anything or doing anything. It's like

8:23

we're in this kind of holding pattern waiting. Well, yeah.

8:25

You sort of wonder whether Rachel Weaves and whether she

8:27

does it immediately. Some

8:30

suggestions of a fiscal event before the... They need to

8:32

make some sort of gesture like Brandon with the Bank

8:34

of England. Do something. But then say we're

8:36

going to leave everything alone. This

8:39

is what our plan, you know,

8:42

big shock's to one side. But our plan is to leave everything alone. You

8:44

can just get on and run your business and get on and run your

8:46

life. I think that's in terms of the economy but I think there needs

8:48

to be a sort of sense of clearing

8:51

the decks and of separation in other aspects

8:53

too. I mean, I think people have actually

8:55

been battered by this series of scandals for

8:57

which nobody is held accountable. You've got infected

9:00

blood, you've got postmasters, you've got somebody, the

9:02

nurse killing babies, you've got

9:04

COVID and nobody... You've

9:06

got the rivers full of effluent.

9:10

Nobody ever seems to have... There has to be some sort

9:12

of reckoning in

9:15

a sort of gesture, I think. To

9:17

me, it's staggering. Those

9:20

things haven't appeared in the election campaign. Yes. I

9:22

mean, the Lib Dems have been banging about rivers

9:24

but mainly because... And neither was Hugo was writing

9:27

the other... Hugo Rifkin was writing yesterday and neither

9:29

was Brexit. No. Yeah. Which

9:31

is the... The jury's kind of filing back into the

9:33

courtroom on Brexit, isn't it? After eight years. And

9:36

it's not that it hasn't been done properly like

9:38

people used to say about socialism in the Soviet Union.

9:41

It's been a massive self-inflicted

9:43

national disaster and somebody

9:46

needs to sort of start owning that.

9:48

Yeah, but when we say it, actually, I think quite a lot of

9:51

if you go canvassing, the people are saying that. So people do bring

9:53

up Brexit. to talk about it.

9:55

Yeah. Oh, you said that,

9:57

yeah. And they're talking about sewage nonstop. I

10:00

mean, that was one of the big issues that just

10:02

came up over and over again. Because that's what they

10:04

like. You know, actually, all that wild swimming, we like

10:06

to joke about it, but it's free. And that's what

10:08

they enjoyed about it. They could go into the river,

10:10

suddenly got in lockdown, this idea that you could use

10:12

the countryside. And then you start going to the

10:15

beach, you start going to the river, and then you get ill. And

10:17

then you do mine because that's the last thing left

10:19

that you could do really for free. And you

10:22

could imagine an imaginative sort of early budget

10:24

for which we deal with things you're talking

10:26

about, the postmaster compensation. Yeah. And

10:29

I'm clear with it, you know, we're going to do this.

10:31

Ideally, maybe you'd find a way of taxing,

10:33

I don't know, water companies or something like that. Sure.

10:36

You most certainly would. To get the baddies to pay the order

10:38

or whatever. Well, Rachel Rees has got quite a good plan on

10:41

that, as has Lib Dem. So I mean, they've all, you know,

10:43

they're all coming up with plans apart from the government. That's the

10:45

problem. It's just such a weird thing that the Rishi Sunak could

10:47

at least go into the election campaign

10:49

saying, if I'm reelected, I will settle all of

10:51

these things. I was sought out. Yeah, but he

10:53

seems to be... He's gone off in the small...

10:55

He seems a bit signed off. A piece the

10:57

other day saying the central office is kind of

11:00

like a graveyard. It's kind of... There's

11:03

nothing happening. Yeah. It's

11:05

a defeated army, you know? And Boris

11:07

Johnson can't be bothered to come back from holiday. I

11:09

thought I was all for you. But honestly, what we're

11:11

going to do so badly that you don't need to

11:14

bother to come back is actually the worst thing that

11:16

you can say, isn't it? Yeah, he's due to go

11:18

out second holiday within the next... second summer holiday. We're

11:20

still in June. Yeah, that's not bad. And he's been

11:22

on a skiing holiday, hasn't he? For

11:24

man, he's had a lot of holidays. He looks quite

11:26

rough in those videos he's

11:28

filmed for... Do you think he took

11:31

a suit out with him to Greece? Well,

11:33

don't we all? He's weird on this. Everywhere

11:35

he goes, he always seems to have a suit jacket

11:37

on. He's wearing shorts. Yeah, that's true, yeah.

11:39

Really? It's strange. Is he still going on holiday with all

11:42

those people 30 years younger than him, like he did that

11:44

a couple of years back, do you remember? All of the

11:46

spads. All called

11:48

Henry. Yes. It's a picture

11:50

of him, wasn't there, with a bunch of really kind of

11:52

buff guys on the beach and with their dad and kind

11:54

of thing. I've

11:57

seen you always go get yourself out. Red

12:00

wall or Greece, you kind of know which way he's going to go,

12:02

don't you? That he just can't be bothered. I thought he loved it

12:04

up there. Yeah,

12:06

we now know he does. He loved going to Sunderland and

12:08

Hartlecpool. Well, the interesting thing about the piece

12:13

and the time today about how Boris Johnson is

12:15

shunning the campaign is that there's

12:17

lots of confused briefing of people saying, when

12:19

we thought we could win in the red wall, he

12:21

was worth having. But now we're really trying to hang

12:23

on to the South. Yeah, where he annoys people. Suddenly

12:26

he's... So he definitely does annoy people, I think, in the

12:28

South East and South West. And that's what's so strange, that

12:30

the old-fashioned Tories don't really like him. It's the new Tories

12:32

that like him. I think the people

12:34

in the red wall might have moved on anyway, because

12:36

they've got a new hero now. If you were that

12:38

way inclined, then your Faraj is your man.

12:41

And he's a better version of Boris. Sarah's been in

12:43

touch saying, oh, God, Boris is a private man. Leave

12:45

him alone. We'll tell that to the dozens of candidates

12:48

who've got him filming election videos. Yeah, and I think

12:50

he might come back again, don't you think? I mean,

12:52

I think he's planning to anyway. Yeah, you

12:55

hear that. I don't know. I don't know. I'm less convinced

12:57

by that. I think being the permanent man across the water

12:59

might be a pre... Man prince across the

13:01

water might be preferable to... And you're making

13:03

quite a lot of money doing that, aren't you?

13:05

Especially when he's... Yeah, yeah, I mean, his

13:07

money is astounding. Somebody was telling me

13:10

it's really off the scale of

13:12

his money. Yeah, yeah. Well, we'll see. Right,

13:14

up next then, Robert Allis

13:16

have been out across the country finding out,

13:18

taking the temperature, Vox Popping.

13:21

Yeah, Vox Popping, I mean, a curious form of

13:23

journalism, and

13:25

not necessarily... Hugely scientific. Now, the pair of

13:27

you have been out and about across the

13:29

country. Yeah. Who

13:31

wants to go first? Where did you go, Alice? You

13:34

went a long, long way from home. I went a

13:36

very long way from home. I went to Kensington and

13:38

Bayswater, but then I did also go to Tiverton, surprisingly,

13:40

and Minehead. And they

13:42

are actually very dissimilar and very similar. So

13:45

I would say Kensington has... It

13:47

is almost the richest constituency in Britain. It's

13:49

got the most extraordinary houses. The average house

13:51

price is over two million quid, so it

13:54

has a lot of city people, it has

13:56

a lot of professionals, and a lot

13:58

of natural... and it

14:00

was one of the strongest Tory seats.

14:02

It had a sort of 20,000 majority

14:04

only five years ago. It was like

14:06

really rock solid. Then it had Grenville,

14:08

which made it very difficult and

14:10

it has got pockets of real

14:13

poverty, but they are

14:15

gonna vote Labour. I mean, very strongly gonna vote

14:17

Labour. He's gonna get a huge majority, Joe Powell,

14:19

who's the candidate, I think. And

14:21

it's odd, because I watched him talking

14:24

to these very rich people who all say actually,

14:26

we wanna be tax more. We don't mind about

14:28

the VAT on private schools. 58%

14:30

of children in the borough go to a private school. They

14:33

don't mind that. They just want someone who's gonna sort

14:35

out what's going on. That's extraordinary, because Kensington, that used

14:37

to be like rock solid Tory, Alan

14:40

Clark, Michael Portillo. Malcolm

14:42

Rifkin. So a lot of the big cabinet ministers went there. It

14:44

was one of the places where you went when you wanted a

14:46

really safe seat. And also it

14:48

should be a safe seat, but it has got

14:50

these, so it's quite a disparate. Well, I think

14:53

a lot of people were surprised when Grenville happened, because it's sort

14:55

of everyone's minds of Kensington. The

14:58

posh bit and Alan Clark, and then actually took, you

15:00

know, intrigued by Dell. that is

15:02

definitely voting Labour. And that's what's

15:04

so interesting, that it's them. Yeah,

15:06

the link between income and political

15:09

voting has been broken, hasn't it? I

15:11

mean, it's almost kind of inverted. I

15:13

mean, I went to Segefield, Blair's old seat,

15:16

County Durham, former RG

15:18

Mining, and the Segefield, not Segefield itself, but

15:20

surrounded by former Pitt villages. And

15:22

in Segefield, which is a pretty market town, that's,

15:25

you know, with Dellies and all the rest of it,

15:27

doing, you know, not wildly prosperous, but doing okay. Labour,

15:31

solid. Out in the former

15:34

Pitt villages, and they're very former. They haven't been, and

15:36

they've been in mind there for 40 odd years, longer

15:39

in some cases. Solid

15:41

reform. Really interesting. People,

15:43

yeah, people, you know, my granddad voted Labour, my

15:45

dad voted Labour. They were all down the Pitt,

15:48

I'm voting for Nigel. Well, it's interesting

15:50

that I think it's the Labour have got

15:52

the graduate vote now. So almost anywhere you go, if you're

15:54

a graduate, you're going to vote Labour, or you might vote

15:56

Lib Dem. So down in the West Country, it's been the

15:58

same. I think in Tiviton, they were. will vote Lib

16:00

Dem. They won't vote Tory, which they've

16:02

always voted before. So until you had

16:05

Neil Parrish, who was done for the

16:07

tractor porter, that was an incredibly safe

16:09

majority. I remember even in the height

16:11

of the sort of Charles Kennedy, Nick

16:13

Clegg, Tiviton and the Huntington. Tiviton was

16:15

always, they were always absolutely rock solid and

16:17

they had a 25,000 majority for

16:19

a long time and now they're probably going to

16:21

lose that. And actually they should be more solid

16:23

because now they've just changed the boundary and it's

16:25

the whole of Exmoor really. And Exmoor has always

16:27

been very traditional, but the Tories somehow have lost

16:29

the rural vote. And we should say that was

16:31

up there, wasn't he? I mean, he went yesterday.

16:33

He was trying to chase all those sheep, but

16:35

actually he just looked like a complete outsider and

16:37

they don't like outsiders. It's interesting,

16:40

isn't it? That Blair and Brown sending 50% of

16:42

kids to university was, I mean, I think economically has

16:44

been a bit of a disaster, not least because you

16:46

can't get a bill during London for two

16:49

years. But politically

16:51

it's been rather smart, hasn't it?

16:53

Graduates vote Labour. It's amazing. They've

16:55

created a generation of Labour

16:59

voters. I mean, it's always been

17:01

the case, but there only used to be 10% of the

17:03

population, but now it's 50% of

17:05

the population. It was one of the big driving

17:08

factors in the vote on Brexit. That was the

17:10

biggest indicator, was that with age and education. I

17:12

think education even more so than age, actually. I

17:14

think that's what went wrong with the tourism and fact is

17:16

that they broke that LinkedIn. They'd been incredibly rude about universities.

17:19

They're always going, you know, they don't like the fact. Well,

17:21

they weren't the first day of the campaign, they were rude about young

17:23

people. First day of the campaign to get them out of their bubble.

17:26

They got to the National Service. What a way

17:28

to run an election. And Robert's right, it

17:30

is about Brexit, actually, is that Brexit broke,

17:32

basically it broke that kind of Tory

17:35

alliance. But also it

17:37

feels like something for years. David

17:41

Willets, former Social Minister, was then a think

17:43

tank. Was he with the Resolution Foundation? Did

17:45

the pinch book. Yeah. And he was talking

17:47

for years about how the idea that old

17:49

people aren't interested in young people, you know,

17:51

they're all in. That had just been broken

17:53

because then parents and grandparents could see that

17:55

their kids were running up massive debts and

17:57

they couldn't get jobs. And that was all

17:59

changing. yet that didn't seem to feed into the toy

18:01

party. We should point out that the places that you actually

18:03

went to... Oh yes, I should

18:05

say New nightclub in Spennymore. New nightclub in

18:08

Spennymore, rather than just Segefield, the iconic Segefield.

18:10

So, somebody's got a beer in

18:12

his bottle about this, is Phil Cowley, political scientist at

18:15

Queen Mary University of London. Hi

18:17

Phil. Hi, I'm often introduced as

18:19

having a beer in my bottle. It's

18:22

a good thing to have. So

18:25

Phil, you're aggrieved at the increasingly

18:27

long and cumbersome constituency names. Well,

18:30

I'm aggrieved by it, but I suspect everybody that's going to

18:32

have to read the damn things out on election night

18:34

and for the next four or five

18:36

years is going to be aggrieved by them

18:38

as well. I mean, they're becoming incredibly

18:40

long and incredibly cumbersome.

18:42

And there are understandable reasons why

18:45

they're changing in this way.

18:47

But it's, you know, I don't think

18:49

anybody thinks what we've currently got is

18:51

particularly an attractive set of constituency names.

18:54

So how have they come about? Who chooses them? And

18:56

how do we end up with, you know, because some

18:58

of them are sort of, they're not just two places,

19:00

but two or three, sort of those

19:03

four places. Yeah, no, so the

19:05

two name places are becoming incredibly common. In

19:07

1950, there were about 50 constituencies

19:10

with the word and in their title.

19:13

In this set of boundary changes,

19:16

there are going to be 250 constituencies with

19:19

the word and in their title. And

19:22

actually, you're right, places with two or three

19:26

names are becoming very common. It's quite common

19:28

now to have something, something east

19:31

and something, something west stuck together as

19:33

well, in a way you never used

19:35

to get. Single

19:37

word constituencies are becoming much rarer than

19:39

they used to. So

19:41

the reason it's happening is twofold. The

19:44

first is because the

19:47

government have made the rules, the

19:49

boundary commissioners have to follow

19:51

when reallocating constituency boundaries much

19:53

tougher and prioritized

19:55

arithmetic equality of seats.

19:58

So there used to be more. flexibility. We used to

20:00

aim we used to aim to have seats that were

20:03

broadly equal, but there was more

20:05

flexibility. They now have to be within five

20:07

percentage points of the average,

20:09

essentially bar one or two exceptions.

20:12

And that means that in order to create these

20:14

places, you have to bolt together

20:16

bits of different parts

20:18

of England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland in a way you

20:20

didn't use to. And it

20:22

means that you're getting fewer constituencies

20:24

that are genuinely organic places.

20:27

So you're bolting them together. So

20:29

the idea that previously that you might have had

20:31

a town and some villages a town and a

20:34

few villages around it, but that was fine. Now

20:36

you've got a town and another town or another

20:38

bit of another county even in some cases. So,

20:40

you know, Somerset, northeast and Hanum

20:42

is a really good example. I mean, Hanum,

20:44

I grew up near Hanum, but I would

20:46

struggle to place it on a map. Because

20:51

it's in Gloucestershire and not in

20:53

Somerset, the people in Hanum

20:55

will feel aggrieved in very northeast

20:57

Somerset. So you have to fold these two

20:59

places together and then make them the Chris

21:02

incredibly ugly, ugly name. The

21:04

worst one, by the way, is Dunfermline and Doller

21:06

in Scotland, which sounds like

21:08

one opportunity knocks. I mean, Doller

21:10

has like fewer than 3000 people

21:12

in it. I mean,

21:16

I just think they've gone. The other one

21:19

that struck me was the places that have

21:21

always been contained within the within the name

21:23

of the constituency. I think it was Didcot

21:25

and Wantage. Yes, yeah, absolutely. It was Didcot.

21:28

Oh, it was Wantage. Is it Didcot? It's always

21:30

been in Wantage. Didcot has always been in Wantage.

21:32

And now the two names have to be there. And

21:35

that just smacks of, as you say, it's almost

21:37

have prizes, isn't it? It's well... I was four

21:40

times a day, Didcot and Didcot were mined, actually.

21:42

But they also didn't have a mine for a long

21:44

time. That's what I mean, Didcot mined, but now

21:46

they're getting their way because it's like... Well, that leads

21:48

me on to the second reason this is happening, which

21:51

is public consultation. Because

21:53

this process that the boundary commissioners

21:55

go through involves several stages of

21:58

public consultations. At

22:00

each of these stages, people object,

22:03

relatively tiny minorities of people in each

22:06

case, but quite vocal tiny minority. And

22:09

it's very difficult given the

22:11

stringency of the arithmetic equality

22:13

that's required to alter

22:15

the boundaries. So if someone says, I really

22:17

don't want to be with place X, well,

22:20

it's quite difficult to detach you from place X because

22:22

that then has all sorts of knock on effects with

22:24

other constituencies. But I can get

22:26

around that by simply increasing the constituency length.

22:29

So we saw it in this process.

22:31

The length of the constituencies went up,

22:33

the number of ands went up, each

22:36

time there was a poster of the constituency.

22:38

So you're throwing people the bone. Yeah. But

22:41

you say, well, we'll include, we'll have a

22:43

constituency, and all that happens is people want

22:45

their village to be added as well. The

22:48

other one, and this is not my own gag, so in the

22:50

article I wrote about this recently, I couldn't include it because I

22:52

didn't actually make it up. Never

22:54

stopped us. Someone on social media said that

22:56

Hamilton and Clyde Valley, which is a constituency,

22:59

Hamilton and Clyde Valley sounds like a

23:01

couple your parents know from the golf

23:03

club. Hamilton and Clyde. I

23:07

just think it's a shame that Sedgefield, so

23:10

iconic, is now Newton,

23:12

Akecliffe, and Spennymoor. Which are both, to

23:14

be fair, they're both bigger places than

23:16

Sedgefield. Oh, interesting. But yeah,

23:18

it's gone. But it

23:21

wasn't iconic for very long, to be honest. It was about

23:23

40 odd years. Yeah, but it was iconic when... When it

23:25

was because of Blair, yeah. When it was because of Blair,

23:27

and then when the Conservatives took it, that was, you know,

23:29

it was Tony Blair's old seat of Sedgefield. But I guess

23:31

when it was southern West Durham

23:33

or whatever it used to be, that

23:36

was iconic as well. Robert Crampton, Alice Thompson,

23:38

of course you can read them in The

23:40

Times every week with your subscription at thetimes.com.

23:42

Up next, it's disunited election. Hey,

23:45

I'm Ryan Reynolds. At Mint Mobile, we like to do the

23:47

opposite of what

23:49

big wireless does. They charge you a lot, we charge you Hey,

23:53

I'm Ryan Reynolds. At Mint Mobile, we like

23:55

to do the opposite of what Big Wireless

23:57

does. They charge you a lot, we charge

24:00

you a little. So naturally, when they announced

24:02

they'd be raising their prices due to inflation,

24:04

we decided to deflate our prices due to

24:06

not hating you. That's right! We're cutting

24:08

the price of Mint Unlimited from $30 a month to just $15

24:11

a month. Give

24:13

it a try at mintmobile.com. $45

24:17

up front for 3 months plus taxes and fees. Promote it for new

24:19

customers for a limited time. Unlimited more than 40GB per month. Slows. Full

24:21

terms at mintmobile.com. Hey,

24:27

everyone. I'm Craig Robinson, co-host

24:29

of the Ways to Win

24:31

podcast, alongside my good friend,

24:33

John Calipari. I've been on

24:35

the go recently. Phoenix, Kansas

24:37

City, Chicago. If you're like

24:39

me and have a home but aren't

24:41

always at home, you have an Airbnb.

24:44

Hosting your home or spare room is

24:46

a very practical side hustle. If you

24:48

live in a big game town, you

24:51

can Airbnb your place for fans to stay

24:53

in. Your home might be worth more than

24:55

you thi... Find out how much at

24:57

airbnb.com/host. Ever

25:01

Googled your own name? Prepare for a

25:03

shock because of your personal info, including

25:05

addresses and phone numbers is out there,

25:07

especially with the recent hacks at some

25:09

big phone and healthcare companies. But

25:11

here's where Aura steps in. Aura scans

25:14

the dark web for your sensitive information

25:16

and sends real time alerts. Aura also

25:18

actively requests that your information be removed

25:20

from data broker sites, putting you back

25:23

in control. Aura provides you

25:25

with a complete online safety toolkit, credit

25:27

and transaction monitoring, a

25:30

secure password manager, a

25:32

privacy enhancing VPN, and more. Try

25:35

Aura risk-free with a 14 day

25:38

trial at

25:41

aura.com/safety. That's

25:43

a-u-r-a.com/safety. Rest

25:46

easy with Aura. Visit

25:49

a-u-r-a.com/safety today.

26:00

From Lands End to John Agroats,

26:02

St David's to South End on

26:05

Sea and Belfast to Bognor Regis.

26:08

England, Wales, Scotland, Northern

26:10

Ireland. This

26:13

is Disunited Kingdom on Times Radio. Yes, it's

26:15

that time. We haven't done it for a

26:17

couple of weeks because we've been very busy

26:19

with the election and whatnot but we thought

26:21

this is a good time to stop, take

26:23

stock of what is happening with the election

26:25

right across the country. And

26:29

as ever, we are joined by four of

26:31

the finest political journalists available on

26:33

Wednesday morning. Joining us live in Northern

26:36

Ireland, Jurn Hello,

26:47

Amanda. Hello, Matt. That's how I pre-assess

26:49

there. It's always nice to have you here, Amanda. Rob

26:52

Parsons is flying the flag for England. He is Northern Agenda

26:54

Editor for Greek. Hello, Rob. Fabulous.

26:56

Liz Perkins, a journalist in Wales. Hello,

26:58

Liz. Morning. How are you?

27:00

I'm very well. Where are you? I'm

27:03

in sunny Flynati. Very nice.

27:06

And Katrina Stewart is political correspondent in Scotland. Katrina,

27:08

where are you? I

27:11

am in Glasgow today. Lovely. Lovely.

27:13

Is it sunny? Yeah, it

27:15

is sunny. It's pretty nice. Can't complain. So,

27:18

in fact, let's start with you, Katrina, because

27:20

you're sort of top of the news today

27:23

with the SNP launching their election manifesto. What

27:28

are they promising? What difference will it make,

27:30

do you think? I think

27:34

the manifesto is going to make a

27:36

huge difference for voters for the general

27:38

election. Independence is not

27:40

an issue that is really forefront

27:42

in people's minds at the moment.

27:45

They want practical answers to

27:47

practical issues like NHS, waiting

27:49

times, the cost of living

27:52

crisis, education. And it's

27:54

complicated because many of

27:56

these are devolved issues. the

28:00

SNP are very much looking forward as

28:02

are the other parties to see 2026

28:04

and the Holy Road election. So I

28:07

think this manifesto actually is going to be more

28:09

important in the long

28:11

run in facing that election that

28:13

we've got coming up in a couple of years' time. Yeah,

28:16

it was striking actually that they

28:18

seem to be focusing quite a lot on the NHS, which

28:20

is obviously very much devolved. I had a bit of a

28:23

conversation with Drew Henry about half an hour ago

28:25

about exactly where he thought the money should come

28:27

from to pay for the NHS. Go

28:30

then, Katrina, pick a... we're sort of

28:32

looking for seats that

28:34

we want to keep an eye on. I'm going to be up

28:36

all night doing the election show from 10pm, I think until 6am.

28:40

So which seat in Scotland are you

28:42

really keeping an eye on? For

28:45

Scotland is whether the SNP's hold over

28:47

Scottish politics is about to break. And

28:49

that's a really important question for the

28:51

central belt, which was dominated by the

28:53

SNP the last two elections. Glasgow had

28:55

for decades been a Labour stronghold that

28:57

turned yellow in 2015

29:00

and 2019. But it looks

29:02

like the Glasgow seat might just act

29:04

to Labour. But just

29:07

outside Glasgow is East

29:09

Wrenfershire, and I suggest you keep an eye on

29:11

this, the night map. It's a

29:14

commuter belt suburb of Glasgow. It's

29:16

a kind of place described as leafy,

29:18

and where the schools regularly top the

29:20

school league tables if you buy into

29:23

things like school league tables. I actually

29:26

want to try to ask you in a

29:28

column that people in East Wrenfershire should pay

29:30

especially for coming over the border to use

29:33

Glasgow's facilities. But anyway, what makes East Wrenfershire

29:35

interesting as a constituency is that

29:37

it's a split-way race between the Tories, the

29:39

SNP and Labour. And it

29:41

has previously passed through all

29:43

of their hands. So most Scottish seats

29:46

are a two-horse race. It's either Labour

29:48

versus the SNP or the SNP versus

29:50

the Tories. But East Wrenfershire

29:52

is a bellwether seat, and it's really politically

29:54

engaged but it turned out that the

29:57

UK is a bit higher than

29:59

the UK. average and all of

30:01

the parties have different issues for

30:03

Labour that are concerned about

30:05

reports of rising anti-Semitism. Mayors and

30:08

Eastern Shouts is one of the

30:10

most Jewish places in Scotland

30:12

and apparently the Labour candidate

30:15

is taking two sets of flyers around

30:17

with him so he's got one set

30:19

that seems to excess MP voters that

30:21

are undecided that leading towards Labour and

30:24

that's a fool of positivity and

30:26

then to

30:28

give to traditionally conservative voters

30:31

that has a bit more

30:33

sort of right-wing negative messaging so it's a really

30:35

interesting seat and definitely want to keep an eye

30:37

on. I'll

30:39

just sort of scot him back to the political history of it

30:41

so in the sort of

30:43

2010s it was Labour then it went

30:46

SMP then Conservative then SMP again and

30:48

I mean the other thing that's really

30:50

striking is that the last election there

30:52

are four people standing there, nine

30:54

standing there this time. What could

30:57

we, is there a risk

30:59

that they all sort of split in different

31:01

directions and we read too much into it

31:03

Katrina? Is it a seat that Labour have

31:05

to win in order to

31:07

demonstrate they're on the

31:10

path to reversing their fortunes in Scotland?

31:13

It would definitely be a coup for

31:15

Labour I think it is quite likely

31:17

that Labour is going to be successful

31:19

there but I think it

31:22

is really demonstrative of the way that

31:24

people have fallen out of love with

31:26

politics and that people are really skeptical

31:28

of all politicians when we speak to

31:31

people in the constituency they're talking more

31:33

about who and what they don't want

31:35

to vote for rather than any sort

31:38

of positive desire to vote for a

31:40

specific party or local representative and

31:44

there are a lot of issues in

31:46

the area and you're seeing

31:49

a real sort of focus from the different

31:51

parties in the streets there's a lot of

31:53

flyers going around there's a lot of pavement

31:55

hounding and door knocking going on but I

31:57

think I think it's largely going to be

31:59

a lot of protest votes. that consistency. But

32:02

I suppose the big question is who are

32:04

you protesting against and therefore where do you

32:06

take your protest vote depending on whether you're,

32:09

you know, you're, it's a protest against the

32:11

SMP government in Scotland or the Conservative government

32:14

in Westminster or whatever. It's really interesting that,

32:16

thanks for that, Christina. We should say in

32:18

East of Enfordshire the candidates are Matt Alexander

32:20

for Reform UK, Alan Grant for Liberal Democrats,

32:23

Sandesh Ghislaine for the Conservatives, Blair McDougall for

32:25

Labour, Christine, sorry,

32:28

Kirsten Oswald for the SMP, Maria Reid for

32:30

the Scottish Family Party, Karen Sharkey for the

32:32

Scottish Green Party, Alan Steele for the Liberal

32:35

Party and Colette Walker, Independent for Scotland Party.

32:37

And you can find more details on that.

32:40

Right, let's go to England now. Rob

32:42

Parsons, obviously the last election

32:44

was all about the north, it was all about

32:46

the red wall. What's the seat that you're keeping

32:48

an eye on? Hello,

32:50

Matt. Well, I think on election night

32:52

I was going to try and get

32:54

to Rishi Sunak's constituency

32:56

in Richmond and North Allerton, but I'm

32:59

not going to talk about that one,

33:01

if only because there's about 15 candidates

33:03

and you'd be here all day telling

33:05

everyone who they were. So

33:07

I'll tell you about Middlesbrough South and

33:10

East Cleveland in Teesside, Ben

33:12

Houchins Patch in the

33:14

Tees Valley, where the Tory

33:16

incumbent is former Leveling Up

33:19

Secretary, Sir Simon Clark, who

33:22

listeners will know is no particular fan of

33:24

Rishi Sunak. And I think he came out

33:26

earlier this year and said he wanted Sunak

33:29

to stand down as leader because he

33:31

was hurting the Conservatives' chances.

33:33

He's been MP since 2015, he's

33:35

got an 11,000 vote majority, but

33:39

like most seats in the northeast of England,

33:43

that seat is going to go Labour,

33:45

according to the polls. So Sir Simon

33:47

has been throwing the kitchen sink

33:49

with various different tactics to try and win

33:52

voters over. I think he was one of

33:54

the first to come out of the blocks

33:56

with a video method from Boris Johnson appealing

33:58

to voters. to back him, which seems to

34:01

have happened in a few seats in

34:03

Northern England. And obviously

34:06

in quite a lot of Northern seats,

34:08

reform UK is a big issue. It

34:10

looks like they're going to take a lot of votes off

34:13

the Conservatives. And it looked like Simon Clarke had

34:15

pulled off quite a coup by getting

34:18

the reform UK candidate to

34:20

back him. Instead he

34:22

recorded a video message saying Simon

34:24

Clarke would get his vote. But

34:26

it turned out that actually reform

34:28

weren't standing a candidate in

34:31

that seat. Because they have come

34:33

to an arrangement with the Social

34:35

Democratic Party, a pact

34:37

where they don't stand candidates

34:39

in a selection of each

34:42

other seats in the

34:44

North. And so Rod Little, the

34:46

journalist, is standing for the SDP

34:48

in that seat, which is why

34:50

reform aren't standing,

34:52

which I thought was quite interesting. And

34:55

so Simon has also taken the

34:57

unusual tactic of not going

35:00

along to a local hustings event. Basically

35:03

he said he was invited to go to an

35:05

event in Gisbrough in his patch

35:07

and he told the organisers that he

35:09

thought the event would be poorly attended

35:12

and would be made up of audience members

35:14

who had already formed their prior view, which

35:16

I suspect is what a few candidates think

35:18

when they're invited to a hustings event. But

35:21

he's taken the usual step of actually saying

35:23

it publicly. So

35:25

it's been suggested that maybe he'd just be

35:27

at home watching reruns of Cash in the

35:29

Attic instead of putting his view to voters.

35:32

So Middlesbrough very much

35:34

the key. So what's

35:36

the full lit... Because we were just

35:38

talking about the length of constituency

35:41

names. What's the full title? Middlesbrough

35:43

South and East Cleveland. There we are.

35:46

That's exactly what we're talking about. It'd

35:48

be five words long. So

35:50

that's what to keep an eye on. The Middlesbrough South

35:52

and East Cleveland standing there. party

36:00

and Luke Meyer for Labour.

36:02

So this is good, we're building up some

36:04

good nerdy knowledge

36:06

for election night. Liz in

36:09

Wales, Liz Perkins, what have you got for us? Which of

36:11

the seats we should be keeping an eye on there? Well

36:14

it's actually my hometown that you've

36:16

really got to watch. The constituency

36:19

is known in Welsh as Kaibarthen

36:21

but I'm sure that it will be referred

36:23

to as Kaibarthen on election night. Basically

36:26

that constituency was first contested back in 1542

36:28

and 1997 and then it was divided up

36:34

between Kaibarthen East

36:36

and Denevor which is very much applied

36:38

and lots of Welsh speakers living there

36:41

and they've currently got a majority of around

36:44

1800 so obviously very tight. And then you've

36:46

got Simon

36:49

Hart who is

36:51

the MP for Kaibarthen West and South Pemmes

36:53

but me and South Pemmes is obviously Toryville

36:56

so that made life a little easier for

36:58

him but his majority wasn't very high actually.

37:00

I think it was about 7000-8000. So I

37:02

mean whoever's going to get this seat has

37:04

got a real job on their hands right

37:07

now because there's always been a bit of

37:09

a three-horse race and you know obviously labour

37:11

in the mix as well. In

37:13

the past, I mean the history of it is that

37:16

they had Gwynne Vaudevins win and he

37:18

was the first applied MP to win

37:20

in the town. So it's going

37:22

to be interesting to see how all of

37:24

this shakes out. I mean what's

37:27

curious is that when you have people going

37:29

out cumbersome for polite in different parties like

37:31

that they're turning around to warning voters and

37:33

saying look you know we're going

37:35

to expect to see a Labour government

37:37

in Westminster and they're suggesting don't give

37:40

them this massive majority and to vote for

37:42

them instead and trying to criticize the fact

37:44

that they haven't really done much in

37:47

the area. So who knows

37:49

what's going to happen there. I mean there'd probably

37:51

be Labour. I mean we do tend to wear

37:53

our sort of Labour reds as spectacles in Wales

37:55

that's for sure and you've got like 45% of

37:57

the population who have brought much

38:00

backing Keir Starmer's party on that.

38:03

So yeah, it'd be an interesting night anyway

38:05

and you know it obviously throws things into

38:07

the mix with a new constituency doesn't it?

38:10

And so just say the name of the

38:12

constituency again for us Liz. Kaye

38:15

Vurdon. Let's

38:17

have one more go. Say again. Kaye

38:20

Vurdon. Kaye

38:22

Vurdon. I'll

38:24

come on and give you lessons if you need to in the

38:26

election. Yeah, we'll get you on election night. That'd be

38:28

great. Kaye Vurdon. Very

38:30

good. So that's going on the list.

38:32

The candidates in Kaye Vurdon. Will

38:35

Beasley for the Green Party. Nicholas Paul Beckett for

38:37

the Liberal Democrats. Nancy Cole for the Women's Equality

38:39

Party and David Supply, couldn't we? David

38:41

Evans for the Workers Party of Britain. Simon

38:44

Hart for the Conservatives. Bernard Halton for reform

38:46

and Martha Ankrad O'Neill

38:48

for the Labour Party. Right,

38:51

let's go to Northern Ireland now. Amanda Ferguson

38:53

is there for us. Amanda, what's your seat

38:55

to watch? The

38:58

seat that I'm going for is East Belfast

39:00

or Belfast East as it's described

39:03

by the electoral authorities and the reason for

39:05

that is that is what would

39:07

be described as sort of like a safe

39:09

unionist seat and it was held by the

39:11

former DUP leader Peter Robinson for decades I think

39:13

from the late 1970s until 2010 when the Alliance

39:18

Party leader Naomi Long

39:21

dramatically won Belfast East.

39:23

Now after that Gavin Robinson, who's

39:26

no relation to Peter Robinson and

39:28

who is now the leader of

39:30

the DUP, has been the leader,

39:32

has been the Belfast MP since

39:34

then but it looks like

39:37

he's going to be run quite close

39:39

by Naomi Long. In 2019

39:41

Gavin Robinson won 20,874 votes and now Naomi Long

39:43

won 19,055 votes so it's quite tight there

39:51

and I think that because the DUP is

39:53

probably the party under the most pressure

39:55

going into the selection over the departure of

39:58

their former leader Sir Geoffrey Donaldson. over

40:02

charges of historic sexual offenses, which

40:04

he'll be contesting in court. Soon

40:06

that that really is one to

40:08

look at because the DUP is

40:10

kind of in flux at the

40:12

moment and has been shaken by

40:14

all of that. Their

40:17

new leader is now Gavin Robinson and will

40:19

he hold on to his seat because if

40:21

he didn't, that would throw the party back

40:23

into crisis. And also the DUP is under

40:25

pressure from hardline unionists in the TUV because

40:28

of its stance on the

40:30

post-Brexit trade in arrangements and returning to

40:33

government. So that will be

40:35

the one that I'll be looking out for

40:37

in the in the count center in Belfast

40:39

after all the ballots are filled

40:41

in and people have made their choice. And

40:44

obviously when we get opinion polls and MRPs

40:46

and all of that sort of thing, they

40:48

are very much Great Britain. Certainly

40:51

there's headline voting in terms of not much

40:53

is even telling us what's happening in Scotland.

40:55

How much polling or information is there about

40:57

what is going on in Northern Ireland? Given

40:59

that the outcome might

41:02

not decide who's in number 10, but could decide

41:04

in the longer term the future of Northern Ireland's

41:06

place in the UK. Yeah,

41:09

well, one of the big things that we have in

41:12

Northern Ireland is that perhaps we don't

41:14

have as extensive polling as takes place

41:16

in Britain. So it can sometimes be

41:19

hard to judge. But I know that one of

41:21

the bigger stories of this election is does

41:23

Sinn Féin emerge as the largest party of

41:25

Westminster for the first time? No, Sinn Féin

41:28

are Irish Republicans and they're abstentionist

41:30

MPs. So they'll perhaps maybe be looking

41:32

for a hat trick. They want to.

41:34

They are the largest party of local

41:36

government and of Stormont. So maybe they

41:38

might quite like to add Westminster to that

41:41

list. And at the last general election that

41:43

we had, it emerged

41:45

for the first time that there were more

41:47

nationalist seats than unionists. Now, there is only

41:49

18 seats because Northern Ireland is such a

41:51

small place and rarely are elections

41:54

really about policy. We actually

41:56

only have our first manifesto launched today and

41:58

the rest of the party. will be within

42:00

the next week. So I don't

42:02

know whether people really pour that much

42:04

attention into the detail of

42:07

it because this is a contested

42:09

place in terms of the constitutional

42:11

future which tends to dominate most

42:13

topics of conversation. It's really interesting that

42:15

though. East Belfast, right into

42:18

our list, Seamus DeFoutte is the SDLP

42:20

candidate there, Naomi Long for the Alliance.

42:23

Ryan North is an independent, Gavin

42:25

Robinson DUP, John Ross TUV, Brian

42:28

Smith Green Party and Ryan Warren

42:30

the UUP. Those are our four

42:32

seats to watch. Now, never mind

42:35

the election, the most hotly contested

42:38

contest of the

42:42

whole of the year is of course my

42:47

contest to see, somebody's in the word contest, contest

42:50

to see which is the most fun part of the UK.

42:52

Everyone brings in a fun story. I award points and by

42:54

the end of the year, when I

42:56

leave, we will have found the

42:58

most fun part of the country. I'm just trying to

43:00

find the spreadsheet. That's why I was a bit

43:02

distracted. Here we are, disunited

43:05

schools. Here we go. So currently in

43:08

last place, Northern Ireland on 37, Scotland

43:10

and Wales are tied on 43, England

43:13

on 44. So you really need a high

43:16

scorer today.

43:18

So let's start with you, Amanda. What have you

43:20

got for us in Northern Ireland? I've

43:22

got Belfast charity Sunday service for

43:25

the non-religious who want a sense

43:27

of community. Drag King leads congregation

43:29

and church-like events without religion.

43:31

So a Belfast based charity has launched

43:33

its own version of a Sunday

43:36

service, which it says is like a

43:38

church but without religion. So another world

43:40

Belfast is a community interest company. It's

43:42

queer led and it provides practical support

43:44

to local people who are experiencing hardship

43:46

and they also have a charity linked

43:49

to that as well. So we have

43:51

this new premises in Belfast city centre

43:53

called the greenhouse and they're having a

43:55

sense of going along to mass or

43:57

going along to your usual Sunday service.

44:00

but it's not. It doesn't

44:02

have a religious flavour and

44:04

the newly appointed mayor of

44:06

Belfast is the city's

44:09

first openly gay mayor took

44:11

to the greenhouse pink stage for the launch

44:14

of the Sunday service.

44:16

So they have hers

44:19

rather than him's and

44:21

they're sung to camp classic tunes with a few surprises

44:23

thrown in for good measure. I like the sound of

44:25

it. I like the sound of it. I mean luckily

44:28

religion is so uncontested

44:30

in Northern Ireland that

44:33

everyone could just, I like the sound, I

44:35

particularly like, I'm a fan of a pun

44:37

so singing hers instead of him is very

44:39

funny. Right Liz what have you got for us

44:41

in Wales? Well seeing as

44:43

it's election time and I know you're a really

44:45

busy man you might be

44:48

interested in this one. We have

44:50

the world's fastest wheelbarrow. Yes

44:52

okay. Is it the one that

44:54

Ed Davie was pushing around Yoviltown Football Club this week?

44:57

He'll be on that next. He's guaranteed to be

44:59

isn't he? This wheelbarrow can hit

45:01

speeds of 52 miles per

45:03

hour and was tested out on

45:05

an airfield in Yorkshire after being

45:08

built in Krummoch in Pembrokeshire and

45:10

the previous record was 46 miles

45:13

per hour so it's doing some and

45:15

he thought it um it was Dylan

45:17

Phillips the mechanic who built

45:19

this and he's quelled it was

45:21

fun and fast but he said

45:23

it's uncomfortable and terrifying as well.

45:25

The thing is I'm looking at the

45:28

pictures it's essentially a motorbike so

45:30

he's not running with a wheelbarrow he's what he's

45:32

done is he's put a sort of scooter on

45:34

the back of it and a motor on the

45:36

wheel and he sort of crouched down holding onto

45:38

it kneeling on the scooter while

45:40

traveling really fast so I mean

45:43

if he'd broken a record for pushing a wheelbarrow

45:45

really fast but he's just he's just invented the

45:47

motorbike. He's just basically

45:49

got a scooter wheelbarrow yeah

45:52

yeah I mean I wouldn't fancy being on that

45:54

I mean would you? No

45:56

but I also wouldn't claim it was a the

45:58

world's fastest wheelbarrow. What

46:00

is the practice thing, Gare? Let's not

46:03

fall out about this. Let's

46:05

go to Scotland now. Katrina, what have you got?

46:09

Well I cannot get enough of people

46:11

who are really passionate about random things

46:13

that you would never expect to inspire

46:15

passion. So I

46:17

have for you Graham Parker, who lives in

46:20

the south west of Scotland and he's now

46:22

a global phenomenon and recognised when he goes

46:24

to America just walking down the street because

46:26

he trims the hooves of cows and he

46:29

takes videos and he puts them online.

46:31

Now he's clearly better with cows than

46:34

Dad O'Maraise is with fish because these

46:36

videos are one of the neat

46:39

times radioing joke for everyone

46:41

there. These videos are watched by more

46:43

than 100 million people a month. I

46:45

think we've got the sound of this, just so people get

46:48

the sense of it. This cow's

46:50

hoof was huge and extremely

46:52

bulbous and in actual fact I

46:54

didn't think there was anything I'd be able to do

46:56

for her but once I

46:59

opened this up and it

47:01

sprayed all over my arm

47:03

I realised the pressure relief

47:05

would have been immense. You've

47:07

gone for a very interesting example there.

47:09

You've gone for a very interesting example.

47:11

Some of them are much nicer than

47:13

the exploding hooves but Graham said they

47:16

eat. Oh no, I've just seen

47:19

the video. No, that's horrible. This

47:24

isn't fair, I've been

47:26

sabotaged by whoever picked that video. It's

47:29

on the top of his YouTube page. It

47:32

says there's a fountain of pus from this

47:34

cow's hoof. It's had 4

47:36

million views. It's not,

47:38

isn't it? People love it. I'll

47:41

tell you what, your wheelbarrow is suddenly looking better than

47:43

this. Right,

47:46

let's go to Rob. Rob, what have you got for us in England? Matt,

47:48

I'm going to cleanse your palate now. I'm going to take you up

47:51

the M6. I beg your pardon. Well,

47:54

can you cleanse your palate after... Oh

47:56

yes, sorry. Shall

47:59

we go to press? in Lancashire and introducing you to Irene Reed,

48:01

84-year-old, grandmother of 10, sorry

48:06

great-grandmother of 10, who is

48:08

the UK's longest-serving lollipop lady.

48:13

That is proper, that is a

48:15

nice good bit, a nice clean local newspaper

48:17

fun. I thought that, she

48:19

started her career in 1969 and she

48:21

wanted a job that fitted around school

48:24

hours so she could raise her

48:26

four children. She helps kids at

48:28

Longridge Church of England Primary School cross the

48:30

road and she's been doing it for so

48:32

long that the kids she first

48:34

helped to cross the road in 1969 are now

48:37

nannies and grandads. Wow.

48:40

And she's been doing it so long. So

48:43

yeah, Irene Reed, the UK's longest-serving lollipop lady.

48:45

Now the trouble is because you've named her,

48:47

we now have to read out the names

48:49

of all the other lollipop ladies in the

48:51

whole country. And uh,

48:53

electoral law. Well, I

48:55

see I'm torn because I really want to help. Do you

48:57

know what, I'm going to give four points to Northern Ireland

49:00

because there's a bit of fun, there was a pun involved.

49:03

Often it scores quite badly. I think we'll

49:05

give three points to the lollipop lady

49:07

and I'm torn between what's worse, the

49:09

wheelbarrow that is in a wheelbarrow or

49:12

that fountain of pus on the cow's

49:14

hoof. Fine, you can have

49:16

two points to the wheelbarrow Liz, even though I reject

49:18

the idea it's a wheelbarrow but I appreciate his god

49:20

to the trouble of doing that. And

49:22

that hoof thing is one of the most disgusting

49:25

things I've ever seen. And

49:27

uh, Katrina, you need to take a long hard look

49:29

at yourself. This is

49:31

the first time I've done this and I haven't

49:33

won the four points. This is extraordinary and uh,

49:35

and gutting. Plenty more to come between now and polling

49:37

day. Of course, get in touch if you want, you can

49:39

email me mattattimes.radio. But for now, for me Matt, surely it's

49:41

goodbye. Bye. The

49:53

best way to give someone a gift they'll never

49:55

forget is to give a gift they'll always use.

49:57

American Giant makes clothes that just keep getting better

50:00

with age, like their iconic full zip

50:02

hoodie that's designed to last for decades.

50:04

And a gift they'll wear for years

50:06

is a gift that keeps on giving.

50:08

But American Giant makes a lot more

50:11

than just hoodies. They have impossibly comfy

50:13

sweaters, classic t-shirts, soft, structured sweatpants, even

50:15

classic everyday denim, all made right here

50:17

in the USA, with a quality you'll

50:19

have to feel to believe. Be

50:21

a gift-giving giant this holiday

50:24

season at american-giant.com and get

50:26

20% off your first order when you

50:28

use code GRATEFULAG23. That's

50:31

20% off your first order

50:33

at american-giant.com. Promo code GRATEFULAG23.

50:36

Hey, marketers. Want

50:38

a matchmaker to set you up with your perfect audience? Well,

50:41

look no further. Get intimate

50:43

right away with host-read sponsorships with

50:46

Acast. Use Acast's self-serve ad

50:48

platform to search and partner up with a

50:50

podcast or two from our network of more

50:52

than 100,000 shows. Have

50:55

them sing your praises in their own words. And

50:58

get their listeners ready to be wooed into

51:00

loyal customers. It's the ultimate

51:02

loving endorsement. Book

51:04

host-read sponsorships with Acast. Head

51:08

to go.acast.com/closer to

51:10

get started.