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to protect our home, Earth. Listen

1:00

now wherever you get your podcasts. Hello,

1:08

I'm Matt Jolly, and this is Politics

1:10

Without the Boiling Bits. Happy Election

1:12

Eve. Coming up on

1:14

today's episode, half a century of

1:16

general elections by the people who

1:18

cover Two former Times political editors,

1:21

Frank Emery and Roland Watson, joined

1:23

by the current political editor Stephen

1:25

Swinford to put this election in

1:27

some historical context. In The Columnist,

1:29

Robert Crampton and Alice Thompson on

1:32

Boris Johnson's comeback and what it

1:34

would be like as a child

1:36

to grow up in number 10. And

1:39

don't forget, you can join me on election

1:41

night from 9.55pm on Thursday night right the

1:46

way through until 6am on Friday morning

1:48

for the General Election Night Live. I'll

1:50

be joined by Times political editor Kate

1:52

McCann, Times Radio's Callum MacDonald is going

1:54

to be across every single result as

1:56

it comes in. Our in-house pollster is

1:58

James Johnson. join the course

2:01

of the night by the likes of

2:03

Andrew Neil, William Haig, the How To

2:05

Win Election Gang, Peter Manlinson, Daniel Finckstein

2:07

and Polly McKenzie. We've got Times Radio

2:10

presenters right across the country, John Pina,

2:12

Jane Garvey, Feke Glover, Rosie Wright, Kate

2:14

Borsay, Patrick McGuire and many more right

2:16

across the country. We've also got a

2:19

live brass band and no one else

2:21

has got one of those, possibly with

2:23

good reason. But if you like the

2:25

sound of that join me for the

2:28

election night live on Times Radio kicking

2:30

off a hundred hours of election

2:32

coverage right across the weekend. That's

2:34

9.55 p.m. Thursday night

2:37

on Times Radio. Now

2:42

I thought this would be a good

2:44

opportunity on election eve to take a

2:46

look back at what we learned during

2:48

the election campaign. We

2:52

learned that Rishi Sunak doesn't own an

2:54

umbrella. Is it still raining? I hadn't noticed.

2:56

We learned that Diane Abbott is more

2:59

powerful than Keir Starmer. You're definitely

3:01

standing. I'm definitely going to stand.

3:03

We learned that life was tough on

3:06

the mean streets of Southampton. Famously Sky

3:08

TV. We learned that Grant

3:10

Shapps gave up quite early on. You don't want

3:12

to have somebody receive a

3:14

super majority. We learned again what Keir

3:17

Starmer's dad did. My dad was a

3:19

tool maker. He worked in a factory.

3:21

It's true. We learned that Rishi Sunak

3:24

confused D-Day with Dunkirk and staged his

3:26

own evacuation from the Normandy beaches. I'm

3:28

no hero, they will

3:30

say. Yeah. We learned that the Tories thought

3:32

they would try an unorthodox campaign slogan.

3:34

I'm fully cooperating with routine inquiries for

3:37

the gambling commission. We learned that Ed

3:39

Davey is quite the player. My wife,

3:41

I met her in a liberal Democrat

3:43

housing policy working group. And is having

3:45

the time of his life. We

3:51

learned that we should all find someone who

3:53

loves you as much as Mel Stride loves

3:55

Rishi Sunak. Mel Stride is the work of

3:58

pension secretary. Mel Stride work and pension secretary.

4:00

Mel Stryde, work in pensions, secretary you're on

4:02

more often than I am. We

4:04

learn that Nigel Farage sometimes says things which

4:06

he doesn't mean. I couldn't have done those

4:08

things and fought a seat from scratch. We

4:11

learn that reforms Paul Thomas thinks he's in

4:13

the Spice Girls. I'll tell you what I

4:15

want what I really really want. I'll

4:17

tell you what I want what I really

4:19

really want. We learn that the SMP's John

4:22

Swinney now exists in low-fi beats form. I

4:24

offer myself to be the first minister

4:27

for everyone in Scotland. And

4:30

we learn that Keir Starmer is ready for

4:32

Friday's weather. I do own an

4:35

umbrella. And

4:38

that's what we learn to join the election campaign. Now

4:40

these two. The Columnists with

4:42

Ali Burt, Alice Thompson and

4:44

Robert Crampton. And

4:47

they're both in the studio for the last

4:49

time on Christmas. For the

4:51

last time? No, before the election. Happy

4:53

election Eve. Yes, same to you, yeah.

4:56

How are you celebrating? What,

4:58

today or tomorrow? Tomorrow I might

5:00

be hanging around here. You were mentioning something maybe about

5:02

coming on here. Come on. We're on

5:04

from Tentill. Who have

5:06

you got on? All sorts.

5:08

Andrew Neil, William Hayke. I

5:10

should do my

5:13

William Hayke impersonation. Oh

5:15

well Liam Hayke. My

5:18

name's Oh William Hayke. It's not bad. You

5:21

can stand in for him. Yeah there we are, we're done

5:23

with the booking. You can drop him. We've

5:25

also been voicing Cameron. Cameron, how are you? So

5:27

Cameron, you're doing work experience. And

5:30

you're following, who are these two? Cameron's following me

5:32

today. Following you for the day. What have you

5:34

discovered so far about journalism? I

5:37

realised it was all in one building.

5:39

Apparently. There's no other journalism out there. There's

5:42

no other journalism. There's some Wall

5:44

Street Journal, Sunday Times. Times Radio.

5:48

Virgin, Talksball, it's all happening. HarperCollins. Why

5:51

would you leave? I know, we don't do it. We're

5:53

going to be here all tomorrow night. Really?

5:56

Anyway, it's nice to have you covered. So, let's dive in

5:58

and talk. about

6:00

this excitement from last night,

6:02

the Willie Won'ty. Oh,

6:04

they're like Ross and Rachel, aren't they? Boris Johnson and which

6:06

you see there. They finally got

6:08

it back together at the last minute. This

6:10

is Boris Johnson last night warning about people

6:13

voting reform. They can achieve

6:15

nothing at this election except

6:17

to usher in the most left-wing Labour

6:19

government since the war with a huge

6:22

majority, and we must not let it

6:24

happen. Don't let

6:27

the Putin-easters deliver

6:29

the Corbyn-easters. Oh, oh,

6:32

oh, oh, oh, oh. So

6:35

he was going to do it, and then he wasn't going to do it

6:37

because he was on holiday, and then he ends up doing it quite

6:40

late at night. Boris Bellingham, they're

6:42

calling him. Are they? Yeah, a good

6:44

last-minute savior. Who's calling him that? Oh, I don't know,

6:46

some sub-editor or some headline

6:49

writer. This was somebody at the

6:51

time who's called him that? I think I must have read

6:53

it at the time because I haven't read anything else so

6:55

far this morning. Yeah, I think it was us. Boris Bellingham,

6:57

yeah, but not with a graceful overhead kick. No. Not

7:00

quite the looks either. No, not quite the looks.

7:02

Looking quite bonkers actually. Yeah, I

7:04

thought, actually, I mean he's gone grey as well, white actually,

7:06

hasn't he? I mean that's the thing. Yeah, how did

7:08

Tom Peck, Worsall Gummidge, have been left out in the

7:10

sun? Right, he described it. Do

7:13

you think it will work? I

7:17

think Bellingham obviously is what they want, but I don't see how

7:19

it could work in any way. I

7:21

mean, it just alienates some people because it brings

7:23

you back to partygate and all the bits we

7:25

found really irritating about Boris, which is that he's

7:27

very funny and entertaining, but there's no substance there

7:30

and it's all about words and playing with words

7:32

and it all sounds quite ridiculous now and old-fashioned.

7:34

It's like in the past, he is the past

7:36

now. Yeah, he just reminds us that we elected

7:39

a kind of newspaper columnist rather than a, he's

7:41

a good phrase maker and you know, the Peter

7:44

Neesters and Corbin East is very nice. But

7:47

no, I don't think it will work. I think in

7:49

the south where he's supposedly going to rescue these

7:51

hundred seats that are dependent

7:54

on only a few tens of thousands

7:56

of votes, I think it will just annoy people. I

7:58

think that's those, those Tories in the south. I mean,

8:00

I know people like that,

8:02

and they are very annoyed about, they were very

8:04

annoyed about Partygate, and this will remind them about

8:06

it. It'd almost been better if you'd done it

8:08

as a local opt-out on Northern ITV regional news.

8:11

Maybe so. If they could

8:13

have landed Bois in, you

8:15

know, places where he still is popular. Yeah.

8:18

Well, if he'd done the decent thing, he would have gone round

8:20

all those red-walled seats, and he would have campaigned, but in fact,

8:22

he went on holiday. And that, I mean, says

8:25

it all really bad, he couldn't quite be bothered. And

8:27

whatever you say about David Cameron or William Hague or

8:29

any of those, they have all been out, actually, on

8:31

the doorsteps. They have tried, and it's

8:33

almost like they feel it's part of their duty to go

8:35

off and do this sort of thing. Even John Major, whatever's

8:38

happening to their party, they are there. Whereas you feel that Boris

8:40

has come back at the end, and it's all about him again.

8:43

Yeah. In fact, David Cameron was

8:46

caught on someone's doorbell. No, that was Theresa May,

8:48

wasn't it? No, they both. They both. Yeah, yeah.

8:50

In fact, can I play it from here? You

8:52

know, this is David Cameron, who was caught on someone's doorbell.

8:56

Uh, um, there

8:59

we are. There we go. Hi,

9:01

it's David Cameron. I was calling for the election on July

9:03

the 4th, and we'll be leaving one of these in your

9:05

door. Thanks very much. Have a good day. So,

9:08

David Cameron. And then, yeah, then... Theresa

9:10

May. Yeah, Theresa May. Here we go. You

9:13

can't answer the door right now, but if you'd like to

9:15

leave a message, you can do it now. My

9:17

name is Theresa May, and I'm here supporting

9:20

the Conservative candidate for the general election on

9:22

4th of July. As you're not in,

9:24

I'll put the leaflet through your door. Yeah,

9:26

so I kind of admire that. It's nice. I

9:28

thought you just wouldn't get that in America, would you? I mean, that's

9:30

what I like about it. Apart from that awful

9:32

voice. Imagine if that was your doorbell. Yeah.

9:35

No, I think it's weird. Hi. Yeah. Yeah.

9:38

Well, maybe Theresa May can be the doorbell, can't you? I mean,

9:40

she could actually get her voice on it, couldn't she now? Or

9:42

stand out. They could sell it, yeah. Yeah. Anyway,

9:46

uh, no, I don't think Theresa May can

9:48

make much difference, apart from possibly to annoy

9:50

people. Yeah, and just drag all that

9:52

stuff up again and make people cross all over. Yeah. Yeah. And

9:55

also it goes against, if Rishi

9:57

Sunak, you know, all the advice.

10:00

people know about these things is that one route

10:02

he had really was to distance himself

10:04

from Boris Johnson and Liz Tush. Which is what he

10:06

should have done on day one. After

10:08

he replaced Truss. You know, drawn a new line,

10:11

come up with a new logo if necessary. Totally

10:13

and utterly. Yeah I think Danny Finkelstone who I

10:16

often refer to when he was written another great column this

10:18

morning said as much. There's

10:20

a great line in Danny's column today where

10:22

he's talking about... When he

10:24

failed to do that that was him done

10:26

really. That was his one option. He

10:29

said there isn't a target

10:31

market for uselessness. No, exactly. He's talking about

10:33

people trying to segment voters into... No

10:38

segment of the electorate wants chaos or incompetence

10:40

or lack of integrity. So

10:43

there we are. So that's the tour. We'll see if Boris Johnson's

10:45

at last minute. I don't know if we'll get any more polls

10:47

so it'd be difficult to know if he... He

10:50

looks a bit like that inflatable they put up of him. Yeah

10:54

I'm not sure the Olympics working is it? He

10:57

stopped taking it. Yeah I think that's what happened.

11:00

I think having read a bit about it

11:02

I think he probably did a very bloke

11:05

thing and had the maximum dose immediately. Because the

11:07

people who've done that end up feeling a bit

11:09

ill. You're supposed to start off with a little

11:11

bit and then... Anyway not that I'm here to

11:13

offer. I suggest you speak to your TV. He

11:16

does look appalling. I think it's often

11:18

the things that people initially appeal

11:20

to people about politicians is what does them in the end.

11:23

And obviously his eccentricity and his appearance was a big

11:25

plus. And now you look at him and you just

11:27

think oh mate. And that's just... The magic... And Todrow

11:29

was a bit the same. He was like a bit

11:31

cold and smooth. And then he became a bit too

11:33

tanned. Yeah a bit too smarmy. That's

11:36

what goes against you. Same with Clinton and all. Well

11:39

let's talk about the Labour Party then. The possible incoming

11:41

Labour Party. And you've been looking at what the cabinet

11:43

might look like. So the

11:45

cabinet's really interesting because it will be very different.

11:47

But one of the things that they've referred to

11:49

a lot actually and that's been referred to by

11:51

both David Lamy and John Ashworth and various ones

11:53

in the Labour Party. The fact

11:55

that it will be the most working

11:57

class and it'll be the most...

12:00

comprehensive and state school

12:02

educated. Also really interesting,

12:04

I thought, is that it will also

12:06

have the most post-grad in

12:08

them. Over half of them are

12:10

going to have an MA or some sort of

12:12

post-grad and then two PhDs. So they're going to

12:14

be incredibly well-educated as well. So it's interesting. It

12:16

will be different and it's interesting to see how

12:19

that will play out. I wonder

12:21

as well, because a lot of them are,

12:23

haven't been in politics that long. And

12:26

though, you know, some of them have sort of sat out

12:28

the Corbony of it. And I wonder whether we're sort of

12:30

slightly more businessy, academically

12:33

approach and a bit less. I

12:36

hope so. And that's the fact that

12:38

they're going to have, you know, potentially a big majority of means. Yeah.

12:42

And it's also a good sign if you've got people coming

12:44

from that unprivileged background, it tends usually to mean that they're

12:46

pretty good. If they've risen to

12:48

the top, they usually, I mean, I

12:50

find that usually if you, if somebody's overcome some

12:53

hurdle, then you think, well, they're going to be better than the

12:55

person who hasn't. So that is, yeah, I

12:57

mean, that is a potentially a good

13:00

thing. On the other side, on the other

13:02

hand, they're going to, they do lack any

13:04

ministerial experience at all. And it's,

13:07

it's hard. I remember interviewing Tony Blair years ago

13:09

and he said the biggest problem about being in

13:11

government was making anything happen. Yeah. Pull

13:14

a lever and you, and you think, oh, that's

13:16

job done. Six months later, nothing's happened. They have

13:18

got Sue Gray, though, who has been in, I

13:20

think she'll be really important because she knows how the civil service

13:22

works. And weeks ago now, when I

13:25

was doing the exit interviews, I think Ben Branshaw

13:27

said that he and Harry Harmon and some of

13:29

the other people that had been doing sort

13:31

of little salons

13:34

for them. What's

13:36

interesting to me is that the fact that actually

13:38

the Tory party was the party of graduates. It

13:41

was the party of university that, you know, it was aspirational

13:43

in that way. And also that they did like experts. And I

13:45

think Michael Gove, it was really damaging when he said he

13:47

didn't want to. It's a shocking thing for Michael to say. Because actually

13:49

what happens, they don't really, now they seem to

13:51

be very anti-university. They're anti-graduates. It's all about you

13:53

don't have to go to university with sort of

13:55

stupid degrees. It's partly what Daddy was getting at

13:57

this morning and it's certainly what I found going

14:00

up into Falken Street. Now, the first one I

14:02

went to, Sedgefield, which is now Newton, A. Cliff

14:04

and Spennymore, that will go back

14:06

to Labour, but it will do so with

14:08

the votes of middle-class people in the nice

14:11

houses, as it were. And the more you

14:13

get out into the villages, the former mining

14:15

villages, it's solid reform. So

14:17

this has, like you say, we saw that

14:19

with the referendum. The realignment. Yeah, yeah. And

14:22

the ABC voters are all going for the Labour Party, which is

14:24

kind of extraordinary if you look at it. And

14:26

you can see why then it's going to be good that

14:28

they've got all these graduates and post-grads. And

14:30

it is, I mean, you know, I don't know whether there'll

14:32

be any good or not. It just is different. And they're

14:34

not going to be quite so anti-university, I think. It used

14:36

to be a bad part of social,

14:39

of upper social mobility was starting to vote Tory. And

14:41

that's the opposite. Yeah, it's really interesting. You go, you

14:43

become middle-class, you get your degree, and you start voting

14:45

Labour. And Danny makes the point today. I don't want

14:47

to talk about daddy so much, but anyway, but about

14:49

how the realignment will continue afterwards, isn't

14:52

it? This isn't even the empire. Just on the

14:54

experience question, there

14:57

are some people in the shadow cabinet who have been

15:00

in government. But, well, I think there's an interesting question.

15:02

I've picked up that there

15:04

are definitely question marks over David Lamy,

15:06

Yvette Cooper, and Ed Miliband. Ed

15:08

Miliband has not been seen. You mean question marks as to when there will

15:10

be in the cabinet? There will be in the cabinet. Right. Because

15:13

he has got this problem that he's got 20, I

15:15

think, too many people on his front bench. Shadow ministers

15:17

who don't shadow a job. And there's a limit on

15:20

how many paid jobs there are. So he's going to

15:22

have to tell a couple

15:24

of dozen of his existing MPs that

15:26

are not going to be in the government. And

15:29

then he may well want to bring it.

15:32

Peter Madison may come back. He can't just, well, they asked him

15:34

that, and he said no. Did he say no? Well,

15:37

if he's got any sense, he'll put those people in

15:39

for not, perhaps for not very long. I mean, Blair

15:41

did that. Blair had a shadow cabinet in 97 that

15:43

it wasn't particularly his own choosing. I think maybe the

15:45

NEC was still choosing it in those days. I think

15:47

he's got to make a big, high-packing change. He

15:50

said he's not going to do that, hasn't he? He said that once

15:52

he puts them in, he wants to keep them there for five

15:55

years. I think he's got to make a big, high-packing

15:57

change. Otherwise, Fida will be all about the sackings. I

16:00

don't want it to be all about the sacking. So there has

16:02

to be someone coming in that's

16:04

been talking, might be Douglas Alexander,

16:07

who was in the Blair Brown government. And he has

16:09

got experience. Could come back as Shadow Foreign Secretary. You

16:11

know, there's a feeling amongst some that Cooper hasn't made

16:13

as much impact as she could have done, but she

16:15

is at least someone who's been in the government department,

16:17

the home office as a nightmare. What about Lord Andy

16:19

Burnham? Lord Andy Burnham, imagine that.

16:22

Mm-hmm. Yeah. He's out

16:24

there. He's a pretty popular-led politician. It

16:27

will be interesting. You know, Friday

16:29

morning, when we start

16:31

seeing the outlines of that government, it will be

16:34

really surprising if everyone stayed in exactly the same

16:36

jobs. Yeah. I think people like

16:38

Steve Reed, I'll be surprised, because he's a really good campaigner, but

16:40

he's not really deaf, for his, he's not like farming

16:43

an environment in the same way, I don't think. Think

16:45

about Michael Gove. Put Michael Gove

16:47

in the laws. Yeah. A lot of government of all the

16:49

talents, isn't it? Gove has had enough, hasn't

16:52

he? He's done a very long stint. He

16:55

might turn up here more like in the business.

16:57

Anyone else want to get bogged down in that?

16:59

Now, let's talk about children in number 10, actual

17:01

children, not a criticism of

17:03

the Prime Minister. Now,

17:05

on the show Yes Day, I asked Keir Starmer

17:07

if he was going to be moving a dog

17:09

into number 10. Here's what he told me. Our

17:11

kids have been on a campaign to get a

17:13

dog for a number of years now, and they're

17:15

ramping up in the final days of this campaign.

17:19

So we'll see. And

17:21

obviously, I just hope they don't get hold of

17:23

the footage or listen to this interview, because

17:26

they'll be using it. Have they already

17:28

identified a breed? We've

17:31

been through all that. German Shepherd is the

17:33

current face, although there's a range of possibilities.

17:35

It's quite a big dog. We shall see.

17:37

But as I say, I'm getting into dangerous

17:39

territory now. Now, German Shepherd's a

17:41

big dog. Yeah. And it's not a... And Larry the

17:43

Cat is not going to like that. There was Larry

17:45

the Cat in his old age. It's not what you

17:47

want, is it? You don't want a really big dog. On

17:49

the other hand, you don't want a Frisand Bichot, whatever they're called,

17:52

which is that what George Osborne had. And that was difficult, because

17:54

he was chasing everything in the park. He was trying to get

17:56

around a reception like a baby. And what was the one, the

17:58

one, the Dylan? Dylan the

18:00

dog. Dylan was,

18:02

I thought was a refugee dog, wasn't it? Yeah, but he

18:04

was a refugee. Rescue. Rescue.

18:07

Hadn't they come from some extraordinary place?

18:09

Well, okay, but the farms. I

18:12

thought it'd been abandoned at birth and it was

18:14

all sorts of things, wasn't it? Well, he was

18:16

poorly trained. He was so poorly trained. Then

18:19

he got two labradors at the moment. I just think there

18:21

were the pokey rooms, there were, you know, priceless

18:23

antiques on it. What's that tail? A big tail,

18:25

you don't want a dog? Big tail. And

18:28

I'm not being, you know, a refugee crude, but dogs

18:30

do do their business. And a German Shepherd is a

18:32

big dog. That's a couple of

18:34

handfuls. And in presence of America, the German

18:36

Shepherd said it hasn't gone well, has it? Oh yeah,

18:38

German Shepherd. Joe Biden did. They

18:40

had to retire it. Didn't they have to?

18:42

They sent a memo telling people to make

18:44

sure they've got treats in their pocket to

18:46

throw. Yeah, it's about 14, didn't they? They

18:50

had to go off somewhere. I

18:52

thought it was all about kids, not dogs. Well, yeah,

18:54

but it's the kids who are lobbying. The kids are

18:56

lobbying. Kids are all right, okay. Because I once asked

18:58

David Cumin about this and he told me what it

19:00

was like bringing up a

19:02

family in number 10. I didn't think

19:04

I was going to like it because I

19:07

loved our family home in North Kensington and

19:09

all of that. But actually, it does

19:12

mean you see your children. So, you know,

19:15

I could talk to them every morning before they

19:17

went off on the school run. And

19:19

Florence, of course, you know, was a baby for most

19:22

of the time she was born in 2010. So

19:24

we had six years of her growing up in number

19:26

10. And so I could pop up

19:29

in the middle of the day sometimes and just have five minutes with

19:31

her to sort of escape from the madness of it

19:34

all. It's interesting, the journey we've

19:36

been on, Alice, from sort of Tony Blair, you

19:38

know, wheeling his kids out on the steps of

19:40

number 10 at every opportunity. So, Kia Stommernad doesn't

19:42

even name his. I think

19:44

he's done the right thing, though, actually. Because the press don't, if

19:46

you don't name your children and you don't bring them out and

19:48

you don't use them in any press releases and you don't use

19:50

them anywhere, I think then they're not

19:52

going to name them. And, you know, I

19:54

attached to a piece on Vic

19:57

Stommer, Lady Victoria Stommer, which she doesn't like

19:59

being called. But they said, please

20:01

don't name the children. They don't even like their ages

20:03

being given. And I think that's right. I didn't, they

20:05

will stand on the steps. And I think Tony Blair

20:08

now probably regrets that. She definitely says she does because

20:10

they thought they should be there. They wanted to look

20:12

like a normal family, but in fact, what happened is

20:14

it put huge pressure. So. No,

20:17

well, it doesn't now, but can you imagine

20:19

when you were kind of caught drunk in Trafalgar Square? Yeah,

20:21

that was bad, yeah. That was bad. It was like

20:23

you're brought up, particularly as, I mean, Kirsten almost said

20:26

that it's the teenage years that are really difficult to

20:28

be in Downing Street. Because when you're little, it's quite

20:30

fun and you run around and they're a hundred star.

20:32

I think that's so true. Because in fact, I think he did say

20:35

this week that his son has just finished his Jesus

20:38

fees. And he came up with how do you put

20:40

his uniform and his notes at the building and all

20:42

that. So that's a really tough time. Being 16th of

20:44

2018. It is a tough time. And Nicholas Somes was

20:46

saying, his Churchill's grandson, he was saying

20:49

he was there when he was four. Which is

20:51

absolutely brilliant. Because he's just running around this

20:53

old place, just caught on. And nobody's really telling you off.

20:55

And you've just had a fantastic time. Yeah, and you've got

20:57

a big garden. You had the swing, the swing got broken by

20:59

Boris Johnson, didn't it? So that might be a problem. But I

21:01

think it's actually the two flats are quite nice, aren't they? No, it

21:03

was the one of the parties. Oh,

21:06

right, yeah, he wasn't actually there. Right. So

21:08

there's some of the other people. But yeah, teenagers, that's tough. I

21:11

mean, yeah, Blair's kids

21:13

weren't, it wasn't ideal, was it? There

21:15

was especially around you. And

21:17

I mean, it's become the, it's quite

21:19

weird because it's become the norm. It was such a

21:21

novelty with Blair, with Leo and everything. Well, it was

21:24

the prime minister's getting younger. Yes, and now it's unusual

21:26

that they don't have. Yeah.

21:29

Children there. Because I don't think, well, Theresa May hasn't

21:31

got children. Actually, Liz Trusser was obviously hardly

21:33

there. Well, Liz Trusser, at least they had a

21:36

sleepover with the children, because you did feel sorry for them

21:38

because they were there for like 48 days or something. Yeah,

21:40

seven weeks, yeah. And actually, she talks quite poignantly about it.

21:42

She said, first of all, there were fleas in the flat.

21:44

And that was obviously from Dylan, she thought. But that was

21:46

difficult. That was a lot to ask for. And then she said,

21:48

it's just hard because they hadn't even moved the furniture in by the

21:50

time they left. But you have to bring your own furniture in. And

21:52

you have to, you get 30,000 quid a year to

21:55

redo the flat. But the children's stuff has to

21:57

be moved out. Then they can't walk to school,

21:59

most of them. So you have to have

22:01

all sorts of protection that is quite hard

22:03

just to live the normal life Somebody

22:07

just text in saying the number 10 dog should be a labrador

22:10

We need a lot of exercise, but they're so good loving

22:13

and trainable definitely a labrador Soon

22:15

that's got a labrador hasn't he and says Jeremy. Oh,

22:17

yeah, they've got two labrador. Yeah, that's nice Yeah,

22:20

you know I mean you don't have to have a

22:22

dog at all I think here should probably resist his

22:24

children's that yeah, well I have

22:26

been doing that for over 20 years So he should

22:28

get a cat No, but they've

22:31

got a cat my view is not me here for much longer

22:33

I mean, I know nobody wants to say it but now how

22:35

long has Larry been around? I don't want to give away too

22:37

much But my column this week may or may not be about

22:39

how I think kiss Thomas first act when he gets another tennis

22:41

to get rid Of Larry the cat because

22:44

I didn't know you were an anti cat. Oh, do you know?

22:46

No, I didn't know about this before I'm

22:48

sorry. I'm very anti cat Why

22:50

are we gonna fall out of this very late stage?

22:52

No, we know They're

22:55

just pointless pointless the

22:57

pointless cats. Yeah, but Larry's not pointless. I was

22:59

being there People

23:02

who find Larry the cat amusing I've only

23:04

just are using it as a substitute for

23:06

having a personality People who think a few

23:08

months. I'd married tiger when you come and

23:10

you're telling me he was pointless. That's just

23:13

that's not what I said It's not for

23:15

me mind the tape No,

23:19

I just I just think if Keirstubber wants

23:21

to draw a line and say, you know

23:23

serious people are now in charge You can't

23:25

get rid of Larry the cat live about

23:27

nine million cats in this country about 11

23:29

million dogs. I see many you're getting you

23:33

Annoying a lot of people good. Remember the whole thing

23:35

about Cherie Blair trying to get rid of her Yeah,

23:37

he did and he went on to win two more

23:39

elections. There's no there's no risk. I Think

23:43

there's a major risk. Do you yeah, I mean

23:45

I yeah, and I think the dog could be dangerous actually I think

23:47

that's me. I'll show you blessed. Do you want to bring

23:49

you some breaking news? Oh, yeah,

23:51

Rishi Sunak has just been on ITV's

23:53

this morning and and he's told them

23:56

that his favorite meal is

23:58

sandwiches That's weird What

24:01

sort of sandwiches? Yeah, what sandwiches? Do we

24:03

know what sort of sandwiches? Butter? Butter? No,

24:06

I've made that up. It's a bit weird. That

24:08

is, yeah, I mean, that is strange

24:10

and rather unimaginative. Well, it obviously

24:12

means he hasn't had that many, whereas the rest of us have had

24:14

so many we never want to have another one again, don't we? Perhaps he

24:16

was deprived of them when he was a child, when he wasn't able to watch

24:18

Sky TV. Just sitting there, yeah, just

24:20

eating. Not eating, all his mates were watching Sky and eating

24:22

sandwiches. But also, it's a weird

24:25

thing, your mind thinks of a sandwich as a meal.

24:28

Yeah, I mean, it's just an incidental, it's a bit of fuel, isn't it?

24:30

What's your favourite meal? I'm not saying that

24:32

we couldn't do the olive oil story,

24:34

but what's your favourite meal? My favourite

24:36

meal, I eat very healthily, I like

24:38

chicken and fish and vegetables

24:41

and salads and stuff like that, yeah. Chocolate

24:45

souffle. Chocolate souffle, ooh. Yeah, that's the one I had

24:47

when I was little. Let's bring Callum back in at the end, Cameron, what's

24:49

your favourite meal? Bolognese and rice.

24:51

Bolognese and rice. Bolognese and

24:53

rice? Yeah, no spaghetti. No spaghetti. I don't know why,

24:55

I just like it for some reason. Have

24:58

you enjoyed this, Cameron, getting this insight into how the

25:00

three of us earn our living? Yeah, very much. It's

25:02

weird, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah, it's

25:04

extraordinary. at

25:07

thetimes.com. Up next, half a

25:09

century of general elections. Hello,

25:17

Tom Clark here, host of the Game

25:19

Football podcast from the Times. Now, I

25:21

don't know if you've heard, but there's

25:23

this little football tournament going on right

25:25

now and England are absolutely smashing it.

25:28

Well, they're still in it at least. Sorry,

25:31

Scotland fans. Yes, that's right, the

25:33

quarter finals have arrived and the

25:35

excitement is palpable. Join us every

25:37

single day as we discuss, dissect,

25:39

analyse and have a little moan.

25:42

Find us wherever you listen to your podcasts. Anyway, that was

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a rant. I don't really know where we're going here. Here's

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a question for the marketers listening. To

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Slash closer to get started.

26:31

The big thing. I

26:45

don't think that other people in the world

26:47

would share the view that there is mountain

26:49

chaos. When there is discord,

26:51

may we bring harmony. When

26:54

I'm alone, it is time to put up or

26:56

shut up. A new dawn has broken,

26:59

has it not? This is a decisive moment

27:01

for the world economy. Now the decision has

27:03

been made to leave, we need to find

27:05

the best way. Nothing has changed. Nothing

27:08

has changed. I have been repeatedly

27:11

assured that there was no party.

27:13

Growth, growth and growth.

27:17

Mistakes were made. This

27:21

is the Political Editor's half a

27:23

century of elections told by the

27:25

people who wrote the first draft

27:27

of history for the Times. We did a whole

27:30

series last year speaking to every political

27:32

editor from the 1970s onwards.

27:35

Today, as this election campaign draws to a

27:38

close, we'll look back at how it compares with the

27:40

elections of the past. We'll hear from the current political

27:42

editor of the Times, Steve Swinford. Roland Watson, who was

27:44

the political editor of the last big change

27:46

election in 2010. And

27:49

Fred Emery, who first became political editor of the

27:52

Times in 1977, who oversaw the fall

27:55

of Jim Canahan and the rise

27:58

of Margaret Thatcher. during

28:00

this chat, I was rooting around on

28:02

YouTube and came across an extraordinary interview

28:04

that Fred did with two other political

28:06

journalists on ITV's This Week. Interviewing

28:09

the three of them, taking in terms to

28:11

interview Jim Callahan in the summer of

28:13

1978, before the

28:16

Liblab Pact had come to an end, but there

28:18

was lots of talk about when he would call

28:20

the general election. Let me quote

28:22

you yourself in the wind-up

28:25

speech you gave on the confidence motion,

28:27

the confidence vote a month ago. You said we have

28:29

much more support in the country than we have in

28:31

the House. We said it twice. What's

28:34

stopping you from trying to prove it's right? Oh,

28:36

I was being very clear about this again, I think whilst

28:39

you were in the United States. I thought we had a

28:41

job to do and the job was to

28:43

get down inflation and I

28:45

was absolutely definite that I would not go

28:47

to the country if I could hold Parliament

28:49

until we got the rate of inflation down.

28:51

We've got it down to the lowest it's

28:53

been for many years. It's still too high

28:55

for me. That's why I want another, have

28:58

another turn tomorrow. But having

29:00

got to that stage, I now want to

29:03

hold it down and I now

29:05

can go to the country you see and I

29:07

can say look we were told we wouldn't get

29:09

it into double, below double figures. This was said

29:11

to us we wouldn't get it down below double

29:13

figures. All the Jerry Myers said then

29:15

they said you won't hold it there. Well we've

29:17

held it there. Now they're saying there's going to

29:19

be a wage explosion that's going up again. I

29:21

want to prove them wrong on that too and

29:23

we will. That's why I said what stuff are

29:25

you going? I'm

29:27

stopping us going when I've had a holiday I

29:30

can give it some consideration. In the meantime I

29:32

promise you I don't wake up every morning thinking

29:34

about this. I have I alas too many other

29:36

problems. Takes us right back to 1978 this was

29:38

but I mean it's exactly the same conversation was

29:40

going on with Rishi Sunak. When you got to

29:42

call the election he said he wants to bring

29:44

inflation down. Can

29:46

you remember doing that interview because it was it

29:48

was live that summer wasn't it? Will he call

29:50

an election? Absolutely

29:52

I mean the main issue

29:55

was whether he would be able

29:57

to survive the Union protests that

29:59

really sorted that election

30:01

out. There was a wage policy, if

30:03

you remember, from the Callahan government which

30:06

failed because the unions voted against their

30:08

own government and all his talk there

30:10

about bringing inflation down was lost in

30:13

what followed with the unions actually

30:15

just defying. Remember the people couldn't

30:17

get buried, the dustbins

30:19

weren't emptied, I mean those were the sort

30:22

of issues that came to the fore after

30:24

that. And obviously if you

30:26

look back over literally that last half

30:28

century of British politics we only get

30:30

change elections very occasionally. Did it feel

30:32

like in that period, 79, that this was

30:34

a moment of

30:37

change? Actually the Conservatives were on the

30:39

up and the Labour Party was not

30:41

just sort of struggling a bit

30:43

but it was a turning point. Yeah

30:46

I wish I could say I'd recognize that. In

30:48

fact as you might know and Times readers

30:51

might remember the times itself was

30:53

closed for this election because of

30:56

our management lockout and we covered

30:58

it of course as best we could by

31:01

going to all the events that our

31:03

correspondents do now and we

31:06

the political team got it wrong. I

31:08

mean in their one edition that we

31:10

published which was published in

31:12

Frankfurt in Germany as a

31:14

kind of rogue edition led on

31:16

the fact that Callahan was recovering in the

31:18

polls. What a

31:20

mistake to make. But did that feel, I suppose

31:22

it's one of those things that would only be

31:25

the hindsight of people's remember the Thatcher winning

31:27

in 79. Did people sort

31:29

of project backwards? That was an

31:32

inevitability but you didn't feel that that was? No

31:34

I didn't. It seemed much more even and Callahan

31:36

was actually a fair Prime Minister so it seemed

31:38

to be you know down on him to say

31:40

he was gonna go down in flames. He didn't

31:42

go down in flames but it was still a shock

31:45

to him and the Labour Party. I

31:47

want to play one other clip from this interview because at

31:49

the end we thought I was amazed

31:52

three journalists managed to at least get the now

31:54

the Prime Minister you know to get

31:56

a word in edgeways because you wouldn't expect that. Right

31:58

at the end another one of the journalists journalists is

32:00

trying to wrap up the interview and you were determined to

32:02

get one more question. I'd like to ask the question about

32:04

Moses. Your son-in-law told the world that you... I don't think

32:06

you will get a chance to ask about Moses. In fact,

32:08

I think... Do you see yourself not reaching the Promised Land?

32:13

You never reach the Promised Land, do you? You

32:16

can march towards it. I'm glad you

32:18

asked that question because that quote has entered the book

32:21

of political quotations. I remember it actually and

32:23

he answered it fairly, didn't he? Yeah. You

32:25

don't reach the Promised Land, you just keep

32:27

on marching towards it. And that is politics,

32:30

to a larger extent. So then you had the 79 election, Thatcher comes

32:32

in and then

32:36

actually gets the bigger landslide in 83. What

32:39

was it like covering that one? Well, 83,

32:41

of course, was the, if

32:44

you like, the hopeless Michael Foote campaign.

32:47

They had what one of his juniors

32:49

described as the longest suicide note in

32:52

history. That was the Labour manifesto. But

32:55

he was up against not only the

32:58

fact that she had won the Falklands War,

33:00

which was very important in 83, but

33:03

a dreadful campaign. I

33:06

was interviewing him on television, actually, for the BBC

33:08

at the time, every week or

33:10

so. And he

33:12

didn't believe the polls, he didn't believe the

33:14

pundits or anything which had him on a

33:16

hiding to nothing. He just looked

33:19

out when he came to rallies and saw

33:21

all these people there who were in favour

33:23

of him cheering him on. And he said,

33:25

that's the truth. That's what I'm working on.

33:27

But I mean, in an election, if you

33:29

just work on the people who are for

33:31

you, you don't know where you're going. That's

33:34

the most compelling, obviously, with Jeremy Corbyn and

33:36

the huge rallies and support that he got.

33:38

I mean, do you think, what's

33:40

slightly odd about the election this time round

33:42

is you've got two people quite evenly matched

33:44

in terms of background experience. Lots

33:46

of people have written their two decent blokes doing

33:48

their best. Whereas in the past,

33:50

it's been slightly easier to call Jeremy Corbyn over

33:53

against Boris Johnson. Boris

33:55

Johnson basically hammered Jeremy Corbyn. Margaret

33:57

Thatcher hammered Michael Foote.

34:00

Is it always obvious at the time what's going to happen? I

34:02

don't think it is actually. I

34:04

take another election, the 97 election, everybody

34:09

before that election was saying, well, wipe

34:11

out for the Tories, you know, they

34:13

were tremendous storming ahead and so on.

34:16

Many people like me, political journalists

34:18

at the time, thought the polls were way over

34:20

the top and so on, and

34:22

that it wouldn't be like that. After all,

34:24

the economy was incredibly strong under

34:27

Ken Clark as chancellor. It didn't seem

34:29

likely somehow that the Labour would just

34:31

wipe the board with a new politician

34:33

who'd never even been a cabinet minister at

34:35

the time, I think, talking to

34:38

Tony Blair. I covered

34:40

Ken Clark's constituency on election night

34:42

on the programme. And the

34:44

thing I remember about that, and it's not

34:46

just that he won, but he was desperate

34:48

that major shouldn't resign. I

34:50

think that was a mistake looking back. Ken

34:53

Clark said, I'm declaring for the Tory leadership.

34:55

And had he done that, I think many

34:57

Tory woes would have been avoided because he

34:59

would have led a stream of centrists right

35:02

down to Brexit years, or

35:04

maybe we'd never even got to Brexit, but

35:07

it never happened because he didn't call for

35:09

the resignation which would have led him perhaps

35:11

to the top. And it led to all

35:13

that string of Tory

35:15

leaders. We can barely remember who they were.

35:18

It's so interesting that, I mean, it's exactly the place

35:20

that we've been going through this week of which counts

35:23

do we have reporters at, and, you know, the chancellor

35:25

again, you know, people are following. So

35:27

when you're at that count, Ken Clark

35:29

wins his seat, but his entire

35:31

political career is sort of crashing down around

35:33

his ears despite, like you said, being the chancellor

35:35

who's overseen this economic recovery.

35:38

It's really as if there was no

35:41

consideration of that. People just

35:43

thought that for granted. And the

35:45

rest of the major lot were seen as

35:47

tired, worn out, you know, lost it, except

35:50

for people like Ken Clark. So

35:53

I'm sure you've been watching this

35:55

election campaign. Have you ever

35:57

seen anything like it? No. It

36:00

has been, in a word, incompetent.

36:02

I mean, from the moment that Sunak

36:05

stood outside number 10 without an umbrella

36:07

or anything, we're just pathetic. How

36:10

could any organization presenting

36:12

itself as having been running the country

36:14

effectively for 14 years and now wanting

36:16

to win an election have their leaders

36:19

stand outside looking, dare I say it,

36:21

like a drown road? And

36:24

often people say, well, the polls will now or

36:26

the polls will be this. Actually, the polls have

36:29

been remarkably resilient. The last 18 months, nothing has

36:31

really happened, which is sort of remarkable in itself.

36:34

Yeah, it's slightly scary, isn't it? It must be

36:36

scary for the labor leadership, actually, to find that

36:38

it isn't even going up and down a little.

36:41

We have to remember the polling is much more accurate

36:43

now than it has been. I

36:46

can't see any dents in it. So

36:48

we'll have to wait and see. But, you know, I

36:50

reckon it will be a tremendous surprise if it was

36:52

otherwise. Just finally,

36:54

if you're looking at the polling back over the

36:57

years, there's been lots of commentary on the fact

36:59

that going into this election, Keir Starmer is the

37:01

least popular lead of the opposition going into an

37:03

election, who would

37:05

then go on to become prime minister. Less popular

37:07

than Margaret Thatcher at this point, than Tony Blair at

37:09

this point, than David Cameron at this point. Do

37:13

you think that's an advantage for him if you're

37:15

going with low expectations or when you

37:17

go into number 10 is the only way down? I

37:20

think it's probably an advantage for him because

37:23

people have tended to write him off as a

37:25

character. But think of him as

37:27

a sober athlete type figure. That

37:29

stands to benefit him, I think. People

37:31

want change. That's the overlying,

37:34

underlying, overlying message, if you like.

37:36

Change is what we need after the 14 years of

37:39

people who are burnt out and don't really know where

37:41

they're going. It's not the only election,

37:43

of course, which is taking place right now.

37:45

You were there in the US for the

37:47

times, covering the fall of Nixon. What

37:50

have you made of the rerun Biden

37:52

versus Trump? Scary, in a word.

37:55

I thought Biden was on track. He's

37:58

been a fairly good president. He

38:00

put the issue of age to the fore

38:02

when he should have put it to the

38:04

back. It's very difficult for him

38:06

to say after his performance last week, to come up

38:08

and say, look how good I was at the rally

38:10

that followed. I was all sharp and I know what

38:13

I was doing and so on. In

38:15

that case, his advisors who knew the truth

38:17

should have said, no debate. We're

38:19

not going to debate anybody this year. Just let us

38:22

go with what we know. And

38:24

he's put himself in a very difficult position, I

38:26

think, because he doesn't want to

38:28

stand down. The whole of his

38:31

clique don't want that to happen. And yet

38:33

now the Democratic Party has sort of come

38:35

to its senses and said, oh, God almighty,

38:37

how did we get to this position? You

38:39

know, we've got possible candidates,

38:41

you know, think of Governor Newsom in California,

38:45

Kamala Harris, of course, another Californian. Somebody

38:48

has got to come and step forward

38:50

to invigorate that campaign. Otherwise, it'll be

38:52

Trump and the Lord help

38:55

us. If it's not too

38:57

delicate to point out, you're a little bit older than

38:59

Joe Biden, but not by much. Were you 90? I

39:02

am not. You're 90. He's what, 81? Yes.

39:05

Would you have wanted to be president of the United

39:07

States in your mid 80s? I

39:10

think I could have done it. But

39:14

that's what Joe Biden feels. Yeah.

39:16

So I'm not dawdering. I'm not quite

39:18

the opposite. Speechless and

39:20

all the rest of it, you know, I

39:22

followed it very carefully. However, who would honestly

39:25

want that job? It's murder. Now

39:28

I'm joined in the studio by Roland Watson, police

39:30

coach for the Times, who covered the 2010 general

39:33

election of another big change election. And

39:35

we've got Steven Swinford, a current police coach at the Times,

39:37

who somehow has found time to talk to us. Hi, Steve.

39:41

Hello, Matthew. Nobody

39:43

calls you Matthew Steve. Roland, 2010 was

39:45

similar in the sense it was a

39:47

change election, but it was an election

39:50

where the outcome was perhaps less clear

39:52

than in 79 or certainly now. It

39:56

was, it was a genuine, exciting contest. And

39:59

it was a contest. contest in which all

40:01

three parties were

40:03

competitive. The Lib

40:05

Dems weren't going to win, but they were certainly going

40:08

to have an influence on the result. In

40:13

that sense, it was very different

40:16

to what Steve's been

40:18

involved with over the last six weeks. I

40:21

suppose the one similarity is that none

40:23

of the leaders standing then, Brown,

40:26

Cameron, Clegg had ever

40:28

stood in the general election before, as

40:31

is the case today, and as tends to be

40:33

the case in big change elections. I hadn't thought

40:35

that, it's really good thought that. And

40:38

Steve, although to some extent the outcome

40:41

has been clear from the beginning,

40:43

I suppose actually the truth

40:45

is when he called the election there was the possibility

40:47

that we should have seen that might have done something

40:49

to shift the pulse. The absence of that change is

40:51

still worth notable. It hasn't been without

40:53

incident though, Steve. It's

40:56

been an amazing campaign. I mean, given, as you

40:58

say, that the broad result is a foregone conclusion.

41:00

The Tories will lose, Labour will

41:03

win. But that question of how big

41:05

a victory will it be? How

41:07

much will that landslide be? It's actually

41:09

at the fore of it. And the

41:11

fight over that is extraordinary. You've had

41:13

like Mel Stride on Times Radio this

41:16

morning, effectively kind of forfeiting the election.

41:18

Yeah. And everybody's at every

41:20

cabinet minutes. I did Jeremy Hunt, he forfeited it,

41:22

Grant Shapps forfeited it. And

41:24

that is some of that is part of the supermajority

41:26

strategy. Tories warning of

41:28

a supermajority as a bid to galvanise

41:31

their core. But I felt with Mel

41:33

Stride this morning, he was actually just

41:35

quite honest and frank that we're

41:37

heading for defeat was the kind of message that

41:40

was coming from him. And that's very, very unusual.

41:42

But that scale of the defeat as we sit

41:44

here today, Matt, that is the big question. Everybody,

41:46

that didn't happen in 97. The

41:48

Tories, John Maynard, didn't sort of throw his arms up and go,

41:51

oh, no, we're going to lose. Gordon Brown

41:53

didn't give up in 2010. It's maybe

41:55

it's a sign of just what extraordinary times we

41:57

live in that is now seen as a strategy. I

42:00

think possibly partly, I think both Major

42:02

and Brown were coming off extraordinarily

42:06

difficult economic times and

42:09

yet had good economic stories to

42:11

tell. I mean Major and

42:13

Ken Clark had turned the economy around after

42:15

Black Wednesday and Gordon

42:17

Brown had, as we know,

42:19

had saved the world after the 2008 financial

42:22

crash. It's been

42:24

much harder this time round for

42:26

SUNAC to put together a credible

42:28

economic story. And

42:31

the whole issue of calling

42:33

the election at a moment before

42:35

he could fully claim the economy had

42:37

turned the corner but was turning the

42:39

corner has

42:42

obviously been a difficult sell

42:44

and possibly the wrong,

42:47

possibly illuminates the sort of wrong time to

42:49

call the election. But I think that's been

42:52

one of his main problems. And

42:54

Steve, when we've looked back on the show,

42:56

we did a half hour, a couple of

42:58

weeks ago, on the 1979 election and

43:01

the way that Margaret Thatcher prepared for that. And

43:04

the sort of the team she had around her

43:06

and the intellectual case they were making and

43:09

the documents that they drew up and they were ready in

43:11

1978, so they were definitely ready for

43:15

1979. It feels like, by contrast,

43:17

the main person caught off guard by Rishi Sunak calling

43:19

the election was Rishi Sunak. By

43:22

the end of the campaign, it seemed like

43:24

he got his attack lines together, he was

43:26

pretty good, it seemed, in the TV debates.

43:29

But it all seemed a bit odd that he wasn't sort of on

43:31

the front foot from day one. And

43:34

that's when all the damage was done.

43:36

Those first three weeks of the campaign

43:39

were absolutely devastating. I think

43:41

one of the primary reasons they went early

43:43

was to try to neutralise suspected reform and

43:45

Nigel Farage. They thought,

43:47

we go early, we shoot his fox. In

43:50

actual fact, the fox is very much

43:52

alive well and in the house eating

43:54

the chickens as we speak. And Farage

43:57

called his bluff and went for it. seems

44:00

to have failed on every level of

44:02

the tactic to go early. I think

44:05

there's one for the historians, would it have

44:07

been better to wait the counterfactual of going

44:09

in the autumn? I'm not sure it would,

44:11

to be honest, because the

44:13

economic circumstances might not have improved much.

44:15

We might have had interest rate cuts.

44:17

I would have had a summer of

44:19

small boats. So he's kind of damned

44:21

if you do and damned if you

44:24

don't. But it was certainly those first

44:26

three weeks of the campaign were absolutely

44:28

dreadful for the Conservatives packed with so

44:30

many spectacular own goals, and they never

44:32

really recovered from that. Go

44:36

on, Ben. One

44:38

lesson for the historians, maybe in the long campaign.

44:40

I mean, in 97, Major hung on for

44:45

as long as he could and called the

44:47

longest campaign he possibly could, which is six

44:49

weeks, which is what we've lived through now.

44:52

Maybe that six weeks is just

44:54

too long for the electorate. And

44:57

one of the oddities about this campaign

44:59

is that with the advantage of calling

45:01

it early, he

45:03

didn't truncate it in any way. Yeah. So that everyone got

45:05

their act together. And actually, the truth is the Labour Party,

45:08

it had expected him to do it in May, so they

45:10

were sort of on quite a good footing. And

45:13

there's that story about how Morgan McSweeney,

45:16

Keir Starmer's strategist,

45:18

had noticed a spike in betting on

45:20

a July election. So bought up all of the sort

45:22

of the Sun and the Mail

45:25

online homepage advertising. So anyone going on those

45:27

had these enormous labour ads, which is extraordinary.

45:29

But the way these campaigns unfold has changed,

45:32

Roland, from the days of the sort of

45:34

the morning press conference to now the morning

45:36

rounds. And I just

45:39

wonder whether just explain to people what

45:41

used to happen with those daily press conferences. Well, in

45:43

92 and 97, and I think in 2001, for

45:45

sure, the day of a campaign would start. So we

45:54

would start at Liberal

45:57

Democrat, Liberal Democrat HQ, believe it

45:59

or not. probably about half

46:02

seven in the morning and then each party

46:05

would hold a press conference you'd beatle round

46:07

to all of them they'd be quite snappy

46:10

probably 15 20 minutes at the

46:12

Lib Dems a bit bit more at Labour

46:15

and the Tories and

46:17

all the parties would use those moments

46:19

to try and set the day's agenda

46:21

to try and craft it and cast

46:23

it as they wished it to be

46:25

and that had huge

46:27

advantages from their point of

46:30

view to a degree from

46:32

the journalists point of view we

46:34

had a sort of full lineup of

46:37

party not always the party leader

46:39

but certainly always the party chairman

46:41

and and cabinet ministers who

46:44

were there to answer any questions

46:46

and as I say it allowed them to get

46:49

off on the front foot or start the day as

46:51

best they possibly could and Steve we're thinking about

46:54

that actually the part of the problems that the

46:56

Tories had is instead of doing I mean I

46:58

wondered actually why they hadn't done a daily press

47:00

conference because at least they could have set the

47:03

agenda with what they wanted to

47:05

talk about instead every morning has begun with a

47:07

cabinet minister out explaining why the Prime Minister doesn't

47:09

own an umbrella why half of

47:11

Downing Street seems been putting bets on

47:13

why he missed DJ it's always been

47:15

reactive rather than you know what are

47:17

you going to do about the fact that Labour

47:19

are gonna get a massive landslide it's been very reactive they

47:21

haven't been able to sort of grip the

47:24

campaign and

47:26

I also think the level of exposure has

47:28

changed I think if you look at the

47:30

number of interviews that Sunak and Kia Starmer

47:33

have done in his campaign it's extraordinary this

47:35

morning we've learned that Rishi Sunak's

47:37

favorite meal is a sandwich I'm not sure anyone

47:39

needs to know that but that's that's what we've

47:41

learned from one of the sofas on the breakfast

47:43

show this morning and it's just

47:46

the sheer I haven't trotted up the

47:48

interviews but two things that have changed

47:50

the one they are just constantly on

47:52

every outlet both of them saying very

47:54

similar things and that's a constant thread

47:56

of it the other thing but I

47:58

think it's really interesting that changed more

48:00

dramatically than any election I've ever reported on is

48:02

polling. So we have had I think I was

48:04

trying to do a count before I came on

48:07

air map. I think we've had over 120

48:10

polls in this election campaign. That is a

48:12

record number. I think we've had will be

48:14

on for more than a dozen mrp. mrp

48:16

didn't used to exist in election campaigns. They

48:19

are now kind of de rigor. And the

48:21

sheer intensity of what we see in the

48:23

polls means that actually, as to

48:25

that sense that this is a foregone conclusion, because

48:27

look, all the numbers are pointed that way. And

48:30

I don't know what it was like for

48:32

Roland back in 2010. It's just that they

48:34

dominate the landscape and the narrative so much

48:36

now. They're quite hard to escape. We've got

48:38

another you got one coming today. And they

48:41

give readers these very detailed glimpses of

48:43

possible futures in which cabinet ministers lose

48:46

their seats, Prime Ministers could even lose

48:48

their seats in some of them if

48:50

you believe them. And

48:52

they dominate the campaign in the narrative in

48:54

a way that means that it feels like

48:56

it's kind of a done deal way

48:59

before polling day. I think

49:01

the polling point is interesting. Back

49:04

in in the 90s, every

49:07

national newspaper would have a have

49:09

a polar relationship with a polling

49:11

organization and have a poll but

49:14

but no more than once a week. And

49:17

those results were were eagerly awaited,

49:19

and would become stories in their

49:22

own right. In 79, there

49:24

was a poll that cut the

49:26

labor lead to four points, which dominated

49:28

for the next 48 hours or

49:31

so. But there was

49:33

much, much less of it, it wasn't as

49:35

dominant. In 2010, the

49:38

novelty was the first televised

49:40

debate. Yeah, a lot of sun do daily polls

49:42

in 2010. Or

49:47

maybe I'll make maybe I'm thinking of 2015. There

49:50

was definitely a point where it was

49:52

just relentless to the point. I also

49:54

whether social media over over

49:57

analyzes promotes disseminates those.

50:00

those polls amongst journalists and that becomes the thing that

50:02

everyone is... I

50:04

think the big loss of election coverage has

50:07

been the thing that Roland told us about when he

50:09

came on the show last year and was talking about

50:11

interviewing party leaders on the campaign trail in 2010. There

50:14

was a rather fabulous tradition of

50:17

the editor interviewing every party

50:19

leader along with a political

50:21

editor and for these events

50:24

we didn't just turn up with a

50:26

photographer but we turned up with an

50:28

artist as well so that

50:30

the interview would be displayed across

50:32

two pages of the Times inside.

50:35

With this artist sketch as the main

50:37

image on the page we got Cameron

50:39

and Clegg under our belts quite early

50:41

on in the campaign. Gordon

50:44

Brown was incredibly reluctant. He

50:46

really did not want to do

50:48

this interview. Oh,

50:51

I thought you were going to talk about the

50:53

artist and you took an artist with you. A

50:56

man to paint and

50:58

draw you on the campaign trail. Well, it took us

51:00

a long time but we tracked him down and I

51:03

spoke to him recently. This is Matthew Cook

51:05

talking about... As you say, some of the

51:08

interviews were on trains which is horrible. All

51:10

you can do is stand in the aisle

51:12

bit or stand on a chair

51:14

trying to get a different angle. So,

51:17

I'm never sure what I'm going to get. I had about four

51:20

or five hours to do the final

51:22

artwork which, believe me, drawings are

51:24

slow and it's very hard to make them

51:27

quicker. So that's quite

51:29

terrifying and you've got one

51:31

chance to make a likeness or

51:34

you're going to be struggling. Are you

51:36

planning to draw any of this

51:38

election campaign at all? I'm

51:41

not but if there's any editors listening, yeah, I'm

51:43

here. There's still time, Steve. Should we send him

51:45

down to Westminster with his oils? I

51:49

think the party leader has sadly gone to

51:51

the kind of far corners of the UK.

51:53

They're everywhere. On the final day, getting

51:55

their flights, I think Starmus is doing all four

51:58

corners of the UK on... you

52:00

know, what aides describing the victory lap privately,

52:02

but obviously not publicly. That's it on today's

52:04

episode of Politics Out the Boring Bits. There

52:07

won't be an episode on Thursday because I'm

52:09

not on the radio because I'm having a

52:11

sleep, because as I may have mentioned, I'm

52:13

on air overnight for the general election. So

52:16

join me live 9.55 p.m. Thursday night, right

52:18

the way through until 6 a.m. for

52:21

the general election night, which will make history

52:23

whatever happens. But for now, from me back,

52:25

Sean, it's goodbye. A-Cast

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