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

0:21

Rory, welcome to The Rest Is Politics.

0:23

Me, Alistair Campbell. And me, Rory Stewart.

0:25

And how are you, Alistair? I'm fine,

0:27

I'm fine. I survived the debate. I'm

0:30

a very dark place. All the lights

0:32

are on, but it's so dark. Where

0:34

are you? I'm at home, but for

0:36

some reason I've got lights on everywhere,

0:38

but they're all working. Now, what did

0:40

you make of that? Well,

0:43

I think it's... So

0:45

I put out a tweet saying Rishi

0:48

Sunak can win this debate on

0:50

debating points like it's a debating competition, but

0:53

he's going to come across to people as

0:55

though he's rude and patronising. And

0:57

I think that's about right. I

0:59

think if this was a kind of technical high

1:02

school debating competition, he won

1:04

lots and lots of points, but

1:07

the effect on people... I

1:10

mean, I don't know what works, and I'd be

1:12

interested to see what the comments are, but my

1:15

Twitter thread is full of people

1:17

saying, yeah, that's

1:19

probably right, but in fact he

1:21

comes across as rude, shouty, patronising.

1:25

Other people saying Stama did look quite

1:27

weak and cowed at bits, some people

1:29

blaming Mishal Hussein, but

1:31

it's an interesting problem. I mean, it's set

1:33

up as though it's a formal debating

1:36

competition, but what

1:38

I suppose I wanted to start with maybe is just throw

1:40

back at you and say, actually, does it really matter at

1:42

this stage anyway? Is anything really going to change

1:44

the result? It's hard to

1:46

know. I don't think there was a sort of

1:48

moment where you thought, oh, yeah, that's really going

1:50

to change things. I

1:53

actually got it home just in time for the

1:55

start because I'd been out speaking

1:57

at an event, a lot of business

1:59

people, you

8:00

what I'm going to do. What are you going to do? What

8:02

are you going to do? Actually comes across this kind of private

8:04

school rather than something you want in a prime

8:06

minister. Somebody just asked the question,

8:08

is the relationship between prime minister and leader

8:10

of the opposition always being this sort of

8:13

hostile and negative? No

8:16

is the short answer, I think. Look,

8:18

there's obviously, I mean, let's be honest, Keir

8:20

Starmer's trying to take Rishi Sunat's job and it's

8:22

one of the most high profile jobs in

8:24

the world. And it's humiliating when

8:26

you have it taken away from you. But

8:29

I think it's interesting that, you know, I

8:31

think when Tony Blair bumps into John Major

8:33

these days, I think they have perfectly nice

8:36

civil chats. And I think sometimes did when

8:38

they were both in offices at

8:40

work. Let's just give people a list of

8:43

it for those maybe who didn't. By the

8:45

way, Rory, we're currently running at well over

8:47

double what the Sun got for the... That's

8:49

why Harry Cole hates us. This is great.

8:51

I know. I know. Yeah. Yeah. Just

8:54

to get, just go, I think I took

8:56

this accurate... Wait, wait, wait, sorry. Can I

8:58

just explain to people the reference Alice has

9:00

made? Sorry. So the previous leaders debate was

9:02

streamed live on YouTube and they got only

9:04

7,000 people watching it. What Alice

9:06

is pointing out is that twice as many people

9:08

are watching a commentary on a debate than actually

9:10

watch the same debate, which the last

9:13

debate, which is slightly worrying world of kind

9:15

of virtual podcasts taking over the real thing.

9:17

Yeah. Just to go through the questions,

9:19

I think I took a note of them all. First

9:21

question was about betting. We've talked

9:23

about that. I think that went on a bit too long, to be honest. Welfare

9:27

to work, disability, waiting

9:29

lists came up. Welfare to

9:31

work. Can I just interrupt you on that? Yeah. That was

9:33

an interesting one. So welfare to work. Again, I don't know

9:36

whether people... I was watching it with my mother-in-law who's over

9:38

from the States and she was

9:40

like, I don't get what this question's about. This

9:44

is about the fact that since

9:46

COVID there have been 800,000 people who are

9:51

no longer looking for work. And

9:54

it's a really big conundrum

9:56

because some of it is... possibly

10:00

long COVID, some of it may be health-related.

10:02

Some of it is people who have just chosen not to

10:04

go back to work. So there are

10:07

two responses to this and neither of them

10:09

seem convincing. There's the Roshisunat response,

10:11

which seems to be just, we need to be tougher and

10:13

we need to say, if there's a job out there for

10:15

you and you don't get it, we're gonna force you into

10:17

it. And the Kia-Sama answer,

10:19

which he gave three times, which is

10:21

we have to cut NHS waiting lists.

10:25

But it's a big issue and one

10:27

of the problems is none of the economists who

10:29

talk, so you fully understand how it happened, why

10:31

it happened. Very few other European countries

10:33

have seen it. So we're already struggling to come up with

10:35

an answer on it. Anyway, over to you, Guy. Yeah,

10:38

so that came with that one for a fair bit. The

10:41

issue of borders and immigration, very

10:43

good question for a young man, where's the money coming from?

10:47

Quite an aggressive question that got the loudest applause

10:49

of all the questions, which is, are

10:51

you two the best that this country can produce as the

10:53

sort of choice? What sort of question was that, though? I

10:55

mean, that was, it wasn't really a question. So

10:58

how are they supposed to answer that? Well, I think, you

11:00

see, again, Rishi Sunak answered it by saying, well, this is

11:02

what I've done. Kia-Sama likewise said, you

11:05

know, well, I did this and I did this and I've

11:07

changed the Labour Party. I

11:09

think I would have answered that a little bit. Well, in fact,

11:12

I think with Kia, he could have said, you know, well, you

11:14

may not think I'm as charismatic as Boris Johnson, but I tell

11:16

you, I'd be a much better prime minister. You

11:18

may not think I'm as interesting as Liz Truss, but I'll tell

11:20

you, I'd be a much better prime minister than her. And you

11:22

may not think I'm kind of, you know, I

11:25

don't know how he would describe Rishi Sunak. So that's how

11:27

I would have done it. So they had that one, then

11:29

they had bankrupt councils, then

11:31

they had women, and that's

11:33

where single sex basis came up. And

11:36

I thought, I thought Kia, I thought he was very,

11:38

very strong on trans in a way. That's

11:40

where he maybe he found his stride a bit. So, yeah. So

11:43

my sense is the debate had

11:46

broken to thirds. First

11:48

third, a little bit

11:50

stiff. Second third, I think Rishi Sunak was really

11:53

landing blows. I mean, if this was like a

11:55

boxing match, I think

11:57

Stama was really struggling. Last third, as

11:59

things slow, slowed down as

12:01

Sunit was interrupting less, Stama was able

12:03

to get stuff out. For people who

12:06

didn't watch the debate, that was particularly

12:08

interesting. He said on transgender, look,

12:11

I think that women only

12:13

spaces should be there. He talked about his own personal

12:15

experience and then he said, but I

12:17

also think that all human beings should be treated with

12:19

dignity and respect. And

12:22

when he was challenged on the Equality Act,

12:24

of course, he turned around to Michel Hussein

12:26

and said, no, it's in

12:28

the acts. And of course, at that point, nobody challenges him.

12:31

That's the point where he pulls rank as a senior lawyer.

12:33

And nobody's going to take the mark. And he also talked about

12:36

the notes to the act as well. I mean, only lawyers will

12:38

talk about the notes of the act. No,

12:40

and I think I like I also liked

12:43

when he, because Richie Suenak kept coming back

12:45

about, you know, sex, biological sex and, you

12:47

know, why won't you support me on this

12:49

and what have you. And he,

12:52

Keir Starman had this big thing about, you know,

12:54

I see the job leads of bringing the country

12:56

together rather than dividing it. And I think that

12:58

does speak to people quite a lot. I was

13:00

obviously I'm sure you were very pleased that Brexit

13:03

was finally raised in one of these. I

13:05

didn't think either of their answers were very good on that. Yeah,

13:08

quick question on that was absolutely lovely. Oh,

13:11

the vinyl records. And the lady said, will

13:13

you mend our broken trading relationship

13:15

with Europe? And it was such a great

13:17

question. But obviously, none of them was proposing

13:19

to do so. Now, really, lots of our

13:21

Scottish listeners and Welsh listeners and viewers are

13:23

pointing out that none of the Scotland and

13:25

Wales they're not going to mention. I

13:28

think that is a bit of an omission.

13:30

Naomi keeps posting a message and I felt

13:32

this as well. Nothing on mental health yet

13:34

again, it is really alarming the way that

13:36

mental health has just fallen off the agenda.

13:39

Somebody's just posted very disappointed climate change,

13:41

wasn't there? Yeah, also there was I

13:43

think the protest outside was

13:45

Palestine. And yet Palestine

13:47

didn't come up. I thought

13:50

Michel Hussein did well. I

13:52

think I think it's very, very difficult, particularly

13:54

when you've got people who know

13:56

that they're limited in time, they want to speak,

13:59

they're trying to speak. speak. I thought she

14:01

kind of kept it moving along pretty well.

14:03

Charlie O'Neill said that too. I mean, it's

14:05

true that when Stammell was

14:07

struggling, there were quite a lot of Labour supporters saying

14:09

that she wasn't doing a good job. But

14:12

I think she probably feels a little bit

14:14

like I do that, given

14:16

that he's almost certainly going to be the

14:19

next Prime Minister, it's good to ask these

14:21

questions. Yeah, I thought

14:23

she handled it fine. And

14:26

it's not easy. It really isn't easy. I

14:29

thought the audience was, it was interesting. They were

14:31

clapping at points sometimes that I didn't expect them

14:33

to and then other times. I'll tell you what,

14:35

I think there were a lot of don't nose

14:38

in there. I think you

14:40

can tell a lot from somebody's face. And

14:42

I think there were a lot of people really

14:45

not quite sure about both. And

14:47

that was, and the other thing that

14:50

gets me in some of these debates, I

14:52

think these debates should go back always to

14:54

what particularly for the party of government, what

14:57

did they promise at the last election? Nothing

15:00

on social care. That was such a big thing at the

15:02

last election. Yes, they

15:04

did Brexit, but I thought

15:06

on pensions, just show that he's

15:09

quite a street fighter, Rishi Suna, because as Keir

15:11

Starman pointed out in a very technical way, our

15:14

policy is what your policy was until

15:16

this campaign started. Right, right, right. So

15:18

how come that policy is now terrible

15:20

just because you've changed it during the

15:22

campaign? But you did it a bit

15:24

better. I think it's a really good point, but

15:26

you did that a bit better by saying- What do you mean? If

15:30

only Starman had framed it in exactly those words. Oh, I

15:32

see, right. It's probably not being a bit more effective. I

15:34

think it was a good point, but it didn't quite land.

15:36

No. He managed to say, I think what he said is, it's

15:40

the same as it was in the last budget.

15:42

Exactly. I mean, that's a bit of a problem

15:45

with him not quite being quick enough in his feet.

15:48

Yeah. Like same as it was in the last budget. What he needed to

15:50

say is, wait a second, we have literally

15:52

signed up to your plan in your budget

15:54

and you've just changed your mind in the

15:56

last two weeks. Yeah. Yeah. I think there's

15:58

a lot of comments. coming in, essentially

16:01

saying that, I mean, I'm

16:03

summarizing, but given that Sunak is, in

16:06

the words of one of our viewers,

16:08

toast, thinking that Keir Starmer should

16:10

have done better against him, lots

16:13

of people are worried about my throat and my voice, well,

16:15

that's very kind. People worried about my gilet, they think I'm

16:17

too far. Yeah, the gilet, they think you're Imran Khan, that

16:19

you've stolen it from Imran Khan, but that means you have

16:21

to go and decide your prison. Extremely talented. There's James W.

16:23

Rory cannot surely be in the UK with a gilet in

16:25

the summer. He is in the UK, I know he's in

16:27

the UK. No,

16:30

so I think it was okay. Of

16:36

course, you never know how long people stay with

16:38

these things. Fiona

16:41

was struggling at one point to kind of, you know, see

16:43

it through to the end. I

16:46

think that some of the messages I was getting through

16:48

it were, and it's fascinating. This

16:50

has completely changed the nature of viewing. It's the

16:52

same with sport now, Rory, when you're watching football

16:54

now. Not if you're in the stadium, it's

16:56

different, but if you're watching football on television now, you're

16:59

following it on social media, you're watching it, you're following it

17:01

on social media, you're talking to your mates on WhatsApp about

17:03

it as well. It's the same with

17:06

these debates though. I was trying to concentrate

17:08

to make notes for our discussion. And you

17:10

can get these messages saying, that was shit.

17:12

And do you know, you want to know

17:14

what was shit? You're totally right, you completely

17:16

can't concentrate. You're exactly right. There am I

17:18

sending what I think is a tweet, and

17:20

then I realized that instead of saying, will

17:22

someone fix the broken relationship with Europe, I've

17:25

put bromide relationship with Europe. Meanwhile, I've

17:27

missed the... No,

17:31

it was, yeah, I don't know. I

17:35

don't know. We talked on the main podcast

17:37

about what might be in the Q&A that we put

17:39

out earlier today, whether we thought these things would

17:42

endure. And

17:44

this, our board, our listeners are all, this is

17:46

what I'm saying. Alistair, have you ever met any

17:48

famous footballers? I'm not talking about Diego Marra bloody

17:51

Donner on this thing. The other thing to say,

17:53

by the way, I thought the, Keir's

17:55

point, Keir Starman's point

17:58

about investment from private sector. This

18:00

event that I was at earlier, it was the

18:02

Association of British Ports and it

18:05

was really interesting because the Danish guy who's

18:07

the chief executive and He

18:09

was he made this really really quite impressive

18:12

speech It was all about he essentially said

18:14

July the 5th cannot come soon enough because

18:17

we are we are going to have an

18:19

opportunity to reset Reset

18:21

some of the challenges we're facing on trade

18:23

on the environment on net zero And

18:25

we're going to have to do it with

18:27

real genuine partnership with government Which

18:30

they obviously feel has been lacking somewhat and

18:33

so and I it was interesting to I

18:35

asked them Roy I think you've done the same I asked them so

18:38

I was speaking at about six o'clock I

18:40

asked her a show of hands as to how many would

18:42

watch the debate Now this thing

18:45

was at Somerset House. There was drinks on the

18:47

terrace afterwards. It was a very

18:49

very very low number But some people I was

18:51

saying that I did these some big These

18:54

big events recently I've been doing events with 1200 1400

18:56

people in live live audiences Day

19:00

after day for the last few weeks and I keep

19:02

asking the question. These are obviously people are interested in

19:04

politics They wouldn't be turning up to To

19:06

these shows and maybe 5% of

19:09

the audience are watching these debates No,

19:11

that'll be very different with the US debate and

19:13

I'm really looking forward to getting into the US

19:15

debate with you this Trump Biden debate I think

19:17

will be absolutely vital because It's

19:20

doing something a bit different In

19:22

this case, we know that both of these

19:25

people are Reasonably

19:27

bright reasonably competent. We've

19:29

seen them perform back and forth in

19:31

Prime Minister's questions and Fundamentally,

19:34

this is an election about booting out the

19:36

Tories and we know I know

19:39

you're still holding off knowing that Stalman's gonna be

19:41

next Prime Minister But in

19:43

America when a debate happens,

19:45

which is 50-50 when both sides are

19:48

suggesting the other person is actually not

19:50

mentally competent When people

19:52

are going to be watching how Biden walks across the

19:54

stage I mean, you know the

19:56

stakes then it's like a kind of gladiatorial fight. I

19:59

know And also it will be, I think it was

20:01

you telling me earlier that they're going to mute the

20:03

mics when Biden

20:06

speaks, they mute Trump. When Trump speaks, they

20:08

mute Biden. It'd be interesting whether

20:10

Trump still feels that he's

20:12

very rude and aggressive shtick is

20:14

the right way to go. By

20:17

the way, Rory, I took up your GB

20:19

news. Oh yeah, yeah, how was

20:21

that? How was it? Well, I did it with Andrew

20:23

Pierce. He was very polite. He allowed me to talk

20:26

loads about my books. He had a little pop about

20:28

me and John Major and Underpants. And I said to

20:30

Andrew Pierce, I really don't think you want to be

20:32

talking about men and underpants. But

20:35

they were perfectly nice and perfectly polite. I

20:39

don't honestly, I haven't got a clue how many people

20:42

watch it. Didn't get much feedback from doing

20:44

it. But no, the

20:46

American debate is going to be mega,

20:49

absolutely mega around, because it's around the world.

20:51

I mean, I'd be very surprised. Would any

20:53

foreign media have covered that debate tonight live?

20:55

I doubt it. No, and

20:57

of course it's completely mystifying. I mean, judging

21:00

by my American mother-in-law watching it is totally

21:02

mystifying to an international audience, because they simply

21:04

don't get any of the references. She's like,

21:06

what's the triple lock plus pension? And I'm

21:08

like, shh, I've got to go. Let's just

21:11

finish, because we're getting quite a lot of

21:13

this stuff of people raising

21:15

issues that weren't raised. And I suppose that's a

21:18

good way to maybe wrap up a little bit. This

21:21

has been the last of many

21:23

debates, which are beginning to look a bit

21:25

repetitive, and they keep focusing on the same

21:27

things. But what are they not

21:29

focusing on? You mentioned they're not focusing on Gaza.

21:32

They're not focusing on adult social care. They're

21:35

not focusing on mental health.

21:37

They're not focusing on climate

21:39

and the environment. Yeah, biodiversity.

21:42

Scotland, Wales, biodiversity. Foreign policy

21:44

generally. Foreign policy in

21:46

general. Nothing. Relations with the

21:48

US, NATO, a lot

21:52

of stuff. And I think that they're still trapped

21:54

in this sort of thing that they, you can

21:56

imagine that I've been sitting around all day thinking,

21:58

well, what orders should I do? they say, oh,

22:00

we've got to start with betting, because

22:02

that's the lead story. But you know that nothing new is

22:04

going to come out of that. You just knew that was

22:06

going to be five minutes of, you know, really

22:09

nothing there. I thought the most interesting

22:12

discussions anyway, I think the welfare, because

22:14

welfare to work and disability hasn't really

22:16

featured much in the debate. I

22:18

think that was that was useful. Ditto councils. Brexit

22:22

came up, but I sort of feel it

22:24

went downhill from the question. Matthew

22:27

Lang, nothing on homelessness, other people.

22:29

Housing, poverty, sewage. Yeah, yeah,

22:35

yeah. No, I think, look, you can't cover everything.

22:37

You know that when we're doing the podcast, you

22:39

cannot cover everything. But I think

22:41

in a debate like that. Yeah, but I would

22:43

have thought, I mean, let's say that we agreed

22:46

that the key thing in

22:48

for both parties is

22:50

this question of growth. I mean, given that both

22:53

parties are basically refusing to borrow, saying

22:55

they're not going to put up taxes,

22:58

saying they're going to cut spending, so it's all about

23:00

growth. And growth, presumably,

23:03

has got to come from planning reform.

23:06

It's got to come from AI. Yeah, it's

23:08

got to come from a closer relationship with

23:10

Europe. And probably

23:13

given that the public services are in trouble, there's

23:15

got to be serious reforms to the NHS. And

23:19

that means fights on

23:21

regulation, on unions, on biodiversity, on

23:24

climate, on Europe. That's

23:26

what's going to define the next five years. Is

23:29

there any way that Michelle Hussein or the BBC could

23:31

have got those in as questions? Yeah,

23:33

I think all of them, all of them,

23:35

they obviously made a decision

23:38

about what they felt had to

23:40

be covered. And then two or three that,

23:42

as I say, were maybe less

23:44

obvious ones. But I think it's a very,

23:47

very kind of media driven sort of

23:49

narrative agenda, even though the questions are

23:51

coming from members of the public. I

23:55

think that sometimes in these

23:58

question time type programs, Sometimes the left

24:01

field question that's about something that's not

24:03

topical will actually produce a

24:05

better debate. I think on the economy

24:07

generally and that stuff, I mean, they're

24:09

both now so rehearsed in their lines.

24:13

Kia Stama knows that there's somebody,

24:16

Michael Meili, can you explain the Mingvars

24:18

strategy? Essentially, you saw that, Michael, is

24:20

that Kia Stama has worked out the

24:22

strategy. He's got the plan. He knows

24:25

what to campaign on. He knows all

24:27

the difficult questions. He's worked out the

24:29

best way to deal with them. So

24:32

carrying the Mingvars means that you're cautiously

24:34

entering into the campaign because you worry

24:36

about dropping the Mingvars. Whereas Rishi Sunak,

24:38

who's the kind of the

24:41

guy who's having to really put up a fight, he's

24:43

the guy who's kind of lashing out more, taking,

24:45

if you like, more risks because

24:48

he's so far behind. So

24:50

essentially, it's just about holding onto it. We're getting a

24:53

lot of people tweeting saying there's

24:55

been a soup in Bolivia, but other

24:57

sayings been a coup in Bolivia. I think it must

24:59

be a coup, yeah. Oh, no, not another one. Wow.

25:02

But that's worth looking at.

25:04

So this is a present

25:06

Bolivian man called Lucho, a Bolivian banker,

25:08

economist and politician. We'll

25:11

get into that in a proper part, but that's

25:13

very interesting. I mean, people will remember there were

25:16

six coup d'etats in Africa

25:18

last year, replacing pro-Western

25:21

elected governments with pro-Russian military

25:23

governments. You know what

25:25

I think will happen after the

25:27

debate is that there'll be lots

25:29

of journalists going, phew,

25:32

coup in Bolivia. We can talk about that now instead.

25:37

The one piece of breaking news, and I see

25:39

somebody else during the debate, Fiona, who was looking

25:42

at her phone, said

25:44

that Philip Davis was

25:46

involved in this betting thing. He's

25:50

always struck me as quite a nasty piece of work.

25:52

So no doubt the producer can check out whether I'm

25:54

saying something that's not true, in which case I'll obviously

25:56

apologize. But I think

25:58

he's involved in the betting industry. well, I could

26:01

be wrong about that, but I think he might

26:03

be. Well, that's getting more and more. Let's get

26:05

the researchers. Let's get the researchers. Alastair, unrelated, but

26:07

why do all of your book covers look like,

26:09

is it beer? Croft beers. Croft beers. I don't

26:12

even know what that means. What is it? I

26:15

don't know what he's talking about. Great lamp,

26:18

Rory. I don't think this debate set the

26:20

world on fire. Oh, here's one. Jonathan Rowe,

26:22

development team. Hardly a single question in any

26:24

of the debates about education. This is something

26:27

we talked to Bridget Phillips and David Blunkett

26:29

about. Is that education

26:31

just isn't high enough up the agenda.

26:34

And that's for both campaigns to

26:36

address. Yeah. And you

26:39

could always find a way. I mean, it's interesting also,

26:41

because they were able to leave those

26:43

things in. I mean, obviously one of their tricks

26:45

is to, in the case of Kiyosama, he could

26:47

have wanted to put the NHS and waiting lists

26:49

in the answer to almost any question, it doesn't

26:51

matter where it's coming from. But

26:54

it's interesting that for some reason, they're not

26:56

putting education, because you could do the same

26:58

with education, right? I mean, in fact, I

27:00

think you did that, didn't you? In 1997,

27:02

you can make the education, the answer to

27:04

almost every problem in the country. Absolutely. From

27:06

growth through some, you know, child poverty to

27:09

social mobility. Absolutely. And listen, the

27:11

producer, having been asked

27:13

gently to check out the Philip Davis

27:15

thing, they sent me this saying, for

27:17

Tory Sir Philip Davis, I mean, for

27:20

God's sake, another of Boris Johnson's cronies,

27:23

made 8,000 pound bet that he

27:25

would lose his seat. A

27:27

long time supporter of the gambling in his industry, he

27:29

said to him, wage did he be defeated in shit?

27:31

That's what the Labour candidate's been suspended from. Yeah, but

27:33

hold on, the Labour candidate, as I understand it, is

27:35

in his seat where he's got no chance. This is

27:37

a guy who's the serving MP with a 6,200 majority.

27:41

Well, I mean, my mother's been on to me

27:43

on that. She thinks it's even more shocking than

27:45

betting on the day to the election, because she

27:47

thinks that's what it is. In sport, where you

27:50

actually throw the match in. Yeah. If

27:52

this was, if that was a cricketer who's

27:54

betting on getting out for naught. Right.

27:58

You could put a million pounds on to say that, you

28:00

know. If you're a no-free batsman for that. Seriously,

28:02

that's the equivalent. I agree, it's unbelievable. And Rory,

28:04

let me tell you. Then you set out to

28:07

lose your election. Presumably, Steve Baker can be pretty

28:09

confident to that, given that he's sitting on an

28:11

island in Greece during the entire campaign. Well, I

28:13

wonder how many of them have actually done this.

28:15

I think I am genuinely, genuinely shocked by that.

28:18

You're the serving MP. You're

28:21

going around, presumably campaigning and saying, I deserve to

28:23

be reelected and I can win. Well, presumably not

28:25

if he's trying to make it. And

28:28

he's chalking money on himself to lose anything that's a

28:30

matter of... Eight thousand pounds is a colossal sum of

28:32

money to... It's eight of your parts,

28:34

Rory. It's eight parts. It's a triple up the parts.

28:36

But for some MP salary, that's a colossal amount of

28:38

money. Now, Rory, let me just tell you. I checked

28:40

out, I know you probably don't look at the FA,

28:43

the Football Association website very often. I looked at it

28:45

this morning, right? What is the

28:47

guidance to footballers on betting? A

28:49

worldwide ban on betting on football

28:51

was introduced for all those involved in the game,

28:54

Premier League, Football League, National League, the FA Women's

28:56

Super League, and FA Women's Championship, as

28:59

well as those at clubs in the Northern,

29:01

Southern and Ishmael Leagues. In other words, virtually

29:04

all footballers, you cannot bet on football

29:06

anywhere in the world, right? Why

29:09

are they held to much, much

29:12

higher standards? Philip Davis has said he's done

29:14

nothing illegal. Well, I don't really

29:16

care whether it's legal or legal. It is totally

29:18

wrong. And it's politically one of

29:20

the most stupid things I've ever heard in

29:23

my life. It's also politically insane. It's unbelievable.

29:25

His constituents are going to be so enraged

29:27

with him. You're very good to

29:29

vote for him. You're a voter. Somebody

29:32

wants your mum to come on the podcast, Rory. Honestly,

29:35

you're in a campaign and you've

29:37

bet. And I get it, it's wrong, wrong,

29:39

whoever you are. But that is,

29:41

I don't very often get shocked. I'm genuinely shocked

29:43

by that. Isn't he the one who's on GB

29:46

News with his wife? He's married to Esther McVeigh. No, he's not married to

29:48

Esther McVeigh, is he? No, he's not married to Esther. He's just very close

29:50

friend of his. God, that's terrible. I'm so sorry. I think they're just

29:52

very close friends. They've been very close friends for a long time. They were

29:54

very close friends with Parliament. Are they close friends or are they close friends?

29:56

No, no, no, no. friends.

30:00

I'm sorry, I don't know why it's just that I

30:02

saw them together a lot in parliament. They're not married.

30:04

Right. But are they married to

30:06

other people at all? I

30:09

don't know. It's any strange things. Okay, fine. It's just that

30:11

they just are very clever. Well,

30:15

I may I be the first thing

30:17

because Esonwel Vey was in the cabinet at one

30:19

point and Philip Davis like the definitional

30:21

backbencher, the thorn in the government side. So

30:23

it was always kind of really interesting dynamic

30:25

that one. Yeah. Somebody's

30:28

surprised that my moral outrage, but I

30:30

just think it's so, so wrong. I think I'm going

30:32

to be the first person. I hope I'm the first

30:34

person to say, I think Philip Davis should be stripped

30:37

of his knighthood for this. What do you think, Rory?

30:39

That's right. You should put it out on Twitter. That'll

30:41

get 20,000 likes and meet

30:43

you there. Exactly. Somebody says that they are married. Now

30:45

we've just had an instruction from the producers saying we

30:47

have to end on a positive note. Well, it's actually

30:50

from a listener called James McCoy. Oh, okay. Thank you,

30:52

James. Yeah. Well, this is very good.

30:54

I noticed Harry Cole has been mocking me

30:56

for putting out debate advice with a picture of

30:58

me in my final debate against Boris Johnson with

31:00

my tie off my head in my hands. Harry

31:02

Cole is just never going to get over the

31:05

fact that our debates with each other in

31:08

the middle of the night get more viewers and

31:10

his with Keir Starbrough and Richie Sudeck.

31:13

Or we get lots

31:15

of people. Yeah, they're married according

31:18

to young bees. God

31:20

says Jeanette, I wish Tatton would vote estimate

31:22

Vey out. Yeah, Tatton was brilliant. Tatton was

31:24

brilliant because we won that in 1997 with

31:26

Martin Bell. Nick D on September 2020, Davis,

31:28

Mary McVernor, Prime Senator, after I left parliament.

31:30

So there was I thinking they'd just been

31:33

close friends in parliament, but obviously it was

31:35

becoming a bit more romantic. Yeah. Now maybe

31:37

this is the final question, Rory, because I'm

31:39

sure you'll have watched both very closely. McCulloch,

31:41

what was the more boring that debate or

31:43

the England-Slavinia game? Oh,

31:45

good. Okay. Let, we're going to tell us about the,

31:49

we could keep us up to date here. So England,

31:51

go and tell us what's happening because you keep telling

31:53

me England's rubbish, but you also told me they're definitely

31:55

going through to the quarterfinals. They are through. I think

31:58

they're playing Slovakia. So that's actually. pretty

32:00

good draw. Again, Dom

32:02

will correct me if I'm wrong. But the last

32:06

night's game was really,

32:08

really, really dull. But

32:11

England fans, Scotland fans, Scotland didn't play

32:13

very well, but the Scotland fans cheered

32:15

them off. They were nice to everybody.

32:17

The England fans were throwing stuff at

32:19

Gareth Southgate. What is wrong

32:21

with them? Positive, optimistic things went

32:23

on then. Positive, optimistic things went

32:25

on is that when people stay

32:27

up to watch the debate between

32:29

Biden and Trump, they

32:31

will be incredibly relieved and pleased

32:33

about the debate we just watched.

32:36

Whatever the flaws are of Rishi

32:38

Sunet and Keir Stama, Britain is

32:40

not facing the horrible, horrible

32:43

threat that's happening in the United States.

32:45

And we should be very, very grateful

32:47

in Britain that we have a slightly

32:49

boring lawyer against a slightly boring banker.

32:51

Okay, yeah, I see what you

32:54

mean. Yeah, because I actually will watch the

32:56

entire American debate with a sense

32:58

of nervous energy,

33:01

anxiety. A lot

33:03

of emotion will be flooding through my veins.

33:07

Whereas tonight, yeah, you sort of got the

33:09

feeling from the word go, this

33:11

is going to be all right. And also, by the

33:14

way, Katikai and the Mooch are going

33:16

live after the debate. And we're going to get into

33:18

it next week too. Yeah,

33:20

no, it's a big, big, big, big thing. Huge,

33:23

huge thing. And I thought that was strangely

33:26

with all the big problems in the world and

33:29

Supes in Bolivia. I

33:31

thought it was a sort of slightly

33:33

reassuring kind of British occasion, BBC, people

33:36

shouting outside so you can really hear anything.

33:38

Yeah, I enjoyed that. And

33:42

even its boringness was probably something that's going

33:44

to cheer us up. All

33:47

right, thank you very much. Well, that's three

33:49

in two days, Rory. I mean, they're working

33:51

like dogs and what with you doing book

33:53

tours and me doing book tours and my

33:55

tooth and with your tooth. I've got very

33:57

big swelling up a little. Yeah,

34:01

it's I look like a Neanderthal. Yeah, but

34:03

you look better than you did yesterday when

34:05

you took it out. It's absolutely Unbelievable.

34:08

I've been on these horrible drugs and

34:11

I've been you know when I if anybody listens

34:13

to question time I just have to apologize. Yeah,

34:15

you were a bit you were a bit. You're

34:17

a bit wobbly I think into confusing the IFS

34:19

and the IMF was a This

34:21

is a bad mood. Yeah, all right, we'll

34:23

sleep. Well, right. Thank you. Bye. Thanks again.

34:25

Bye Hi

34:30

there, this is kati Kay from the

34:32

rest is politics us and I'm Anthony

34:35

Scaramucci on Thursday June the 27th Joe

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