Latest / The Fourcast / Labour in crisis? Inside the vote that shook Starmer’s grip on power

Transcript

Labour in crisis? Inside the vote that shook Starmer’s grip on power · The Fourcast

0:00
What does this Labour government stand for?
0:02
It is astonishing, the days now I've just been sitting thinking
0:06
how on earth has a Labour government?
0:09
And a Labour government. This.
0:11
Point There's a fundamental disconnect here between #10 and
0:15
it's enforcers and the backbenchers and their
0:18
constituents, and they're just not listening enough.
0:21
The public might not be able to understand the lived experience
0:24
of people on benefits, but they are very able to understand a
0:29
government in chaos. Hello and welcome to the
0:35
forecast. Last night Sir Keir Starmer
0:38
pulled Labour's flagship welfare reform plans at the last minute.
0:42
A humiliating U-turn. After days of rebellion,
0:45
confusion, concession and rising anger across his own party.
0:49
With the last ditch capitulation, the pier managed
0:52
to get his bill through. But what for?
0:54
At what cost? Critics say his credibility and
0:57
authority is in tatters, throwing any future reforms into
1:00
doubt. And what will the chancellor,
1:02
Rachel Reeves, do now that she faces an even bigger black hole
1:06
in the government's finances? Tax rises, more painful spending
1:09
cuts? A year on from Starmer's
1:11
landslide election win? And is his premiership already
1:15
on the brink? With me, our social affairs
1:17
editor Jackie Long and our senior political correspondent
1:19
Paul McNamara. Welcome to you both.
1:21
Paul, let's start with you. That was That was one hell of a
1:24
torture, politically speaking. Going through the ringer,
1:26
stretched on the rack for what? Yeah, the problem is you're not
1:32
the only person saying that today.
1:34
Charities are saying that disabled people are saying that.
1:38
Most of his own backbenchers are saying exactly that, regardless
1:41
of which side they fall on, fall on if they were a potential
1:45
rebel or supportive of Keir Starmer, both of them enraged at
1:48
the moment. Was this his worst week so far,
1:52
almost a year into his premiership?
1:54
I mean, that seems to be the common consensus at the moment
1:58
there's. Got a bit of competition for
1:59
that accolade, isn't? There he has, but this one was
2:01
particularly bad. I mean, like it's been, it's
2:03
been a slow moving car crash, right?
2:04
It's been coming for a while. You've got a leadership that
2:08
seems to have had their fingers in their ear for the last couple
2:10
of months. You've had U turns, you've had
2:14
more rebels, then you've had more U turns.
2:17
Now you've got an emergency attempt to save money, which
2:21
might end up costing more money. It's hard to imagine how this
2:25
could have gone any worse for the government.
2:27
Jackie, you know all the people involved in the welfare sector
2:30
and the benefits sector really well.
2:32
You know, from the top to the bottom, the sharp end at the
2:35
soft end. How is it possible for a
2:38
government to set out to reform welfare and end up with an empty
2:41
basket and a massive fiscal black hole?
2:44
I mean it, It is astonishing. There is no doubt about it.
2:47
For days now I've just been sitting thinking how on earth
2:51
has a Labour government? A Labour government at.
2:54
This point, it's just so mad. But you think they ended up in
2:59
this position. We have had disabled people,
3:02
charities who advocate for disabled people, who lobby for,
3:06
for, for their rights and for their chance to to live the same
3:11
life as the rest of us, to have the same opportunities have been
3:14
saying for months and months, this is not going to work.
3:18
And yet the Labour government, a government that many disabled
3:22
people would say, you know, they, they have so much hope in
3:26
they just haven't listened. And is that because they started
3:29
off with the need to say £5 billion?
3:32
So, you know, there was a, there was a fiscal issue here, there
3:34
was an accounting issue. And then Rachel Reeves said, OK,
3:37
where can we find this £5 billion?
3:39
They looked at the opinion polls and it's actually the public was
3:42
in favour of benefit. Reform.
3:44
It started at ten billion originally.
3:45
Rachel Reeves wanted 10 billion off the welfare bill.
3:48
Then we got to 6 billion, then it ended at 5 billion, and now
3:52
it's nothing. But is this government by OBR?
3:54
Is that what's going on here? Yeah.
3:56
Well, I think The thing is that the, the, the one thing that is
3:59
very true and successive governments have known it is
4:02
welfare reform is very, very difficult.
4:03
Yeah. And you may say, well, the
4:05
public are in favour of benefit reform over time.
4:08
I've spoken to many, many people on benefits who say, oh, I think
4:11
benefits should be reformed. It's very easy to say the basic
4:14
premise that this government have said and successive
4:16
government said that the benefit system needs to work and it
4:19
needs to work better and and what we need a benefit system to
4:23
do is to make sure that people who can work should work and
4:26
people who need the safety net should have it.
4:29
The problem arises at how do you decide who can work and how do
4:35
you decide who needs the safety net?
4:38
And that is the that is the area that they have tripped up on
4:41
here like successive governments.
4:43
I mean, you know, they're getting a lot of Flack for all
4:44
the obvious reasons, and we're talking a lot about the
4:46
political consequences and the process that went wrong.
4:49
But is there anything in their intention, at least, Jackie,
4:53
there was, you know, that that people who are on benefits could
4:57
agree with? I mean, was there a, was there a
4:59
core here that was fundamentally benign about trying to fix the
5:02
system? But nobody disputes that the
5:04
benefit bill is going up and the benefits bill has gone up really
5:09
significantly over the last few years.
5:10
It is predicted to go up even more by the end of this
5:14
Parliament. But I think for, for, for
5:17
disabled people, for people on benefits, they cannot get their
5:21
head around how a Labour government where you have people
5:25
in cabinet who have experience of life on benefits under, under
5:30
the last major benefit reform started in 2010 by the coalition
5:34
government, they created Universal Credit.
5:37
That was their flagship reform. It it had a built in six week
5:41
delay. There was nobody in the room at
5:43
that stage who put their hands up and said this is never going
5:47
to work. Poorer people do not have six
5:50
weeks money in the bank. It's a fundamental flaw based on
5:53
the fact that that that people in government, perhaps in the
5:56
civil service had no real idea of what it's like to live on the
6:00
margins. Yet you have a government here.
6:02
Angela Rayner, Deputy Prime Minister, Bridget Phillipson,
6:06
the education secretary, Wes Streeting, who all say they have
6:09
experience of living on benefits.
6:11
They know what it's like and yet they are part of a government
6:14
who came up with the plan in its original form which would have
6:17
seen 250,000 people moved into poverty, 50,000 of them
6:22
children. This from a Labour Party whose
6:24
core purpose is helping children out of poverty, not putting
6:28
children into poverty. So how they've ended up here for
6:31
disabled people and the people campaigning for them and the
6:33
people campaigning for people on benefits is is in is
6:37
inexplicable. And So what you've just
6:39
described so brilliantly is what the Prime Minister so blithely
6:44
and dismissively summed up at the weekend as noises off.
6:48
Yeah, that went down particularly.
6:49
That went down really badly. I just wonder whether, you know,
6:53
quite apart from what they intended to do in the 1st place,
6:55
Saving money, reforming the benefit system.
6:58
You know, at the end of the day, there's a fundamental disconnect
7:00
here between #10 and it's enforcers, you know, and the
7:05
backbenchers and their constituents, and they're just
7:08
not listening enough. They're not getting it.
7:10
So that comment, that noise is off comment that was made at
7:12
this press conference at the end of NATO, right?
7:15
So last week you've got everything kicking off noise,
7:18
noises of rebellion and and whatnot, and the the government
7:23
trying to get on top of it. And then Keir Starmer has this,
7:27
has got this press conference and he actually looked quite
7:29
downbeat the whole way through the press conference.
7:30
And then he came up with this line.
7:32
Oh, it's just noises off. And actually, did you watch?
7:34
He almost looked as if like I've got, I've got a good line here.
7:38
His noise is off. It went down so badly with his
7:42
backbench. Text messages started coming in
7:44
straight away, like what's he playing?
7:45
You know, this is it went down so so he's not.
7:48
Aware of the language because, I mean, you know, the same thing.
7:50
It's a bit of a detour. But the, you know, he gave an
7:52
interview to Tom Baldwin again at the weekend where he said
7:56
that line about an island of strangers in his immigration
7:59
speech. That was a mistake made by me
8:02
and my script writers, right? That's not great.
8:06
You know, pushing your staff under the bus on this one.
8:09
Does he just not understand how some of that language comes
8:12
across? And is that a recurring problem?
8:14
Well, the recurring problem is, I mean, like it's not that long
8:17
ago since Sue, since the headlines were all about Sue
8:21
Gray. And then we got rid of Sue Gray.
8:23
And now it's like, Oh, well, how about we reset?
8:25
We've got a new team, we've got we'll replace Sue Gray.
8:28
And now similar sorts of things happen again.
8:30
And in that interview, you're talking about, yeah, he about
8:34
the the Island of Strangers. But there are a few other things
8:36
he said in there that he he wasn't quite happy with or he
8:39
regrets. And at one point then on Friday
8:42
when that interview dropped, you get lots of text message saying,
8:45
have you read it yet? And they're all talking about
8:46
this interview and the conclusion that lots of
8:49
backbenchers were coming up with was we've had a year now of
8:53
quite a few U turns of quite a few finger pointing and sacking
8:57
that advisers who would come up stuff.
9:00
And at what point do you say, wait a minute?
9:03
Doesn't the buck stop with you? I think there was another thing
9:08
said in that interview that I thought was particularly
9:11
problematic. He sort of said, you know, well,
9:13
I only really turned my my mind to this issue on Thursday
9:17
because I was. Busy with all the other stuff
9:19
now. I mean, there, if you're
9:20
sympathetic to the idea he's a busy man, which is fair, you
9:24
know, you, you might buy that. But for, for, for people whose,
9:28
whose lives will be impacted by that, They're thinking this is a
9:33
huge issue and you've only turned your attention to it on
9:36
Thursday. So it's not about arrogance, is
9:39
it about incompetence? Is it just about not really
9:42
understanding or or caring enough about the people whose
9:45
life this is going to impact and for?
9:47
Those people, I mean, if you're on benefits and you've got the
9:49
Labour Party, that's supposed to be the party on your side in
9:52
power, right, doing this and what are the alternatives?
9:56
The Tory Party, if they ever get in again, in in disarray, the
9:59
Reform Party, you know, So if you're that vulnerable, you must
10:04
be absolutely despairing about, you know, the political masters
10:07
in Westminster who hold sway over your life, I mean.
10:10
You're just not sure how they're that they've come to this
10:13
decision because I'm not saying you need lived experience to to
10:16
to make these judgements, to make these policies.
10:19
But it, you were assumed it might help.
10:21
But you've also got a party and, and many MPs who've come up
10:25
through the voluntary sector who will have worked in places like
10:29
the Child Poverty Action Group who know this stuff to their
10:32
core. So the decision making that has
10:35
gone on or not gone on the listening, You know, it's
10:38
interesting seeing Liz Kendall in the last few days having to
10:41
stand up at the dispatch box and say, do you know what?
10:44
We're listening now? And it, and it's really helping
10:47
us build a better bill. Yeah.
10:49
As if they've. Just discovered the benefit of
10:51
listening to disabled people. They talk a lot now about how
10:54
going forward, you know, the the, the new the review will be
10:58
Co produced, as they say, by disabled people as if, again,
11:02
they've discovered it might be a good idea to hear what disabled
11:04
people have to say. Paul, I mean, one thing that
11:08
really struck me again is this sort of combination of whip
11:12
cracking from #10 Morgan McSweeney, you know, the prime
11:15
minister's conciliary basically, I think he was reported as
11:17
saying at one stage of the weekend, if these rebels vote
11:20
against the government, I'm going to deselect, deselect 10
11:24
of them every hour. I mean, really tough stuff.
11:26
I don't know whether he said it or not, but it's the kind of
11:28
stuff that, you know, it was reported and they never denied
11:30
that he said it. And then at the same time, you
11:32
got the Prime Minister buckling, you know, more than a kind of,
11:36
you know, a weed in winter, you know, to give into all these
11:40
concessions. I mean that combination of
11:43
strictness, unscrupulousness and weakness, that's really
11:47
damaging, isn't it, for a Prime Minister, really.
11:49
Damaging. And some could argue, how on
11:52
earth could you find yourself in that position?
11:55
Because as much as you can say, right, we're going to crack down
11:58
now. We've got all these rebels,
11:59
we're going to deselect however many of them we want, talk to
12:04
every backbench MP. All of them are saying exactly
12:06
the same thing. I don't know how down the
12:07
street's surprised by this, because we've been saying the
12:09
same thing for months and months and months.
12:13
The fact that they're dealing with it now, or surprised about
12:15
it now is either ignorance or stupidity.
12:20
Yeah. But also, you know, this is a
12:22
government, you know, that got elected with a landslide almost
12:24
a year ago, a landslide of seats because the Tories imploded.
12:28
But the number of votes for this party was less than what Corbyn
12:32
got in the last two elections, right?
12:34
So as I think Boris Johnson said quite accurately, this is their
12:37
victory was like a puddle that was a mile wide and an inch
12:40
deep. You got Labour M PS including
12:42
the health secretary who was treating with the majority of
12:44
what, 319 or something? I mean, tiny, tiny majorities.
12:48
They, I'm, I'm not surprised they were panicking with this
12:52
going on. So again, do they feel that
12:55
they're not being heard by #10 that they're being ignored?
12:57
Oh. Yeah, absolutely.
12:58
I mean, like, you know, there's quite a few MPs who started
13:02
talking about last week about how they never actually had a
13:04
conversation with Keir Starmer really even now a year in,
13:08
because they Keir said Keir isn't exactly isn't the sort of
13:12
person who's, you know. He's not a retail.
13:16
Politic, you know, reaching out. Yeah, exactly.
13:18
He's not that kind of guy. You know, he was a guy who was a
13:20
lawyer who you know, paperwork is, is where he where he seems
13:24
to spend most of his happiest times, not with not in bars
13:27
chatting to chatting to his own MPs, but.
13:29
This ability to kind of, you know, squeeze the shoulders, buy
13:33
someone a drink, you know, go to the lobby bar and have a have a
13:36
pint. You know, I know he's a busy
13:38
man, any Prime Minister is, but is he, could he be doing more of
13:41
that? Could he done more of that?
13:42
Yeah. I mean, I suppose the truth is
13:44
on this one is that he could have done more of that, but you
13:48
still would have faced the same rebellion because these were
13:52
such swinging cuts that it was just so unpalatable to so many
13:57
MPs. They couldn't have got behind
13:58
it. However, he would have
14:00
discovered that a lot sooner than at the 11th hour, just as
14:04
they're literally as they're laying down the law in in the
14:08
House of Commons and then having to change it while they're
14:11
sitting down in the House of Commons.
14:14
Like there was no need for it to get that far, but it.
14:17
Looks like an utter shambles by then.
14:19
Yeah, and again, you're the only person to say that.
14:22
His own backbenches are saying that at the moment.
14:24
Jackie, you know, as you said before, successive governments
14:27
have been grappling with welfare reform for as long as we can
14:30
remember. Tell us about that history a
14:34
little bit and, and how this government fits into that
14:36
trajectory. Well.
14:38
It has been particularly contentious, I would say.
14:40
I mean, it's always been an issue.
14:42
We spoke earlier on about how Tony Blair had difficulties with
14:45
his attempts at welfare reform. I think it has become
14:49
particularly contentious. The narrative has massively
14:52
shifted since the years of the Coalition government when, if
14:55
you remember, the narrative was created and I think has taken
14:59
hold over time of strivers versus skivers.
15:02
You present it as this idea that, you know, the man getting
15:06
up in the morning, you know, the famous George Osborne story, and
15:10
he walks past the windows of his neighbors and they're all still
15:13
asleep. And that's why, you know, that
15:16
was their argument for tackling welfare reform, that it was
15:19
unfair. Now, what we have here with this
15:22
government is that they too need to save money.
15:24
We've talked about that too, but they always count it as what we
15:29
need to do is reform it to make it fairer for everyone.
15:32
So you have to, you should be working.
15:35
You know, it is better for everyone to be working if they
15:37
can. We have to create opportunities.
15:39
But I think the problem was they almost got this the wrong way
15:42
round. They have come up with a
15:44
solution for a problem that they and successive governments do
15:48
not properly understand yet. We have watched the rise in
15:51
benefit claimants. The last government put a lot of
15:55
it down to COVID. But it's really important to say
15:57
that rise had started in the years before Covad.
16:00
We now have huge numbers of young people who are going
16:04
straight from school into welfare.
16:08
That is a real problem. So they are right to say that is
16:10
a problem because it is totally corrosive for those young
16:13
people. Once once you have been
16:15
unemployed for a long time or out of the workplace and some of
16:18
these young people are never going into it, your chances of
16:21
getting work reduce into the distance.
16:24
And so they are right to say we need to look at, at, at what is
16:29
happening there, but but they haven't done that.
16:32
We don't fully understand why those numbers are rising.
16:35
And until we do, you can't come up with a proper plan for
16:38
reform. And, and so they talked about
16:40
changing PIP. PIP isn't even a benefit that
16:43
you get, you know, it doesn't, it doesn't matter whether you go
16:46
to work or not. So in a sense they said, oh,
16:49
here, here is our problem. Everyone acknowledges here is
16:52
the problem, but we need to save money, so we'll go over here to
16:55
do that. So.
16:56
So it's it's a very, very imperfect scenario that in the
16:59
end I think has caught them out really badly.
17:01
Paul I. Mean whenever we've been
17:03
discussing the government in its, you know, first year and
17:07
you know, maybe this is my short term memory not working
17:09
particularly well for the last government.
17:11
But I seem to think with this government, they keep banging on
17:13
about fiscal responsibility even more than the previous lot.
17:17
And so much of what they're doing, including this welfare
17:20
reform bill is about fiscal responsibility.
17:23
Now have I got the right impression here?
17:26
And, and good and, and now that they've got this £5 billion
17:30
hole, right, how are they going to fill it now?
17:32
How damaging is that to their fiscal reputation?
17:35
I mean. It's bigger than £5 billion
17:37
because you've also got the hole from EU from the other U-turn on
17:41
the winter fuel Which? Is have that was. 1 1/2 billion,
17:45
right? So now you've got an extra 6 1/2
17:47
1/2 billion pounds that Rachel Rees now needs to find and.
17:51
They're going to go to defense spending at 5% eventually, so
17:54
exactly. And the fear is not the fear.
17:59
I mean, that go back to the election, we actually didn't
18:04
hear an awful lot about what their plans, what their specific
18:06
plans were because they wanted to keep a little bit loose, give
18:09
themselves a bit of wiggle room. What we heard a lot was fiscal
18:12
responsibility and Rachel Reeves's fiscal rules.
18:16
Now there is one argument that the only reason, one of the
18:20
reasons that got them over the mind was 'cause they spent so
18:22
long looking like the party of financial prudence and that
18:26
would make them more electable. However, you now get to the
18:29
point where you're in government and what can you do?
18:32
You've given yourself the, you've got yourself in a fiscal
18:34
straitjacket. Now actually it's given, it's
18:37
deprived them of options and that's how we part of the reason
18:40
why we end up in this situation. I guess they were.
18:41
Trying to make the contrast between them and this trust, you
18:44
know, the, you know, the the latest experience of government
18:47
fiscal irresponsibility. But I wonder whether they, I got
18:49
that wrong because that was such an extreme example of fiscal
18:52
responsibility. You know, they, they kind of
18:55
needed to stop getting on about fiscal responsibility,
18:57
especially once they got into #10 because you're in charge
19:00
now. It's your vision that matters.
19:03
What is your vision? The line that keeps on coming
19:05
out from the, from all of the polling and the all of the focus
19:10
groups is we don't want to hear any more about what you
19:13
inherited. Fine.
19:14
Yeah, we get it. You're the government.
19:16
You've been in charge for a year now.
19:17
Whatever you inherited, it's your job now to deal with that.
19:21
That's what you wanted. That's what you campaigned for.
19:24
So what are you gonna do? I mean, we haven't even talked
19:26
about the two child benefit cap. That's the big one, isn't it?
19:29
Coming over the horizon, I mean. It makes it, when you look at
19:31
what's happened over the last week, it makes it very difficult
19:34
to see how they don't end up U turning on that too.
19:37
Just because what happened over the last week is that it seemed
19:42
to me that many of the the rebels got angrier and therefore
19:47
they squeezed more and more concessions until you had a bill
19:50
which now the Resolution Foundation will say will
19:53
actually make no same things, let alone, you know, the fewer
19:57
savings than they'd originally intended.
19:59
So it makes it very difficult. To see how there isn't AU turn
20:03
on that and I don't know how they resist it well.
20:05
Their argument is, I was talking to someone about this last night
20:08
was you've taken all our, you've just taken £5 billion from us.
20:13
We have no more money for this. That's it.
20:16
Your chips are spent. Speak to anyone at the moment.
20:19
There is so much anger from from all angles.
20:22
The rebels are still angry even though they've sort of got what
20:25
they wanted. The loyalists are really angry
20:27
because they were still more loyalists and also.
20:29
Because they were described as rebels.
20:30
They were loyalists. You know, I spoke to a couple of
20:32
loyalists and said, hang on a minute, I'm not a rebel.
20:34
I'm a loyalist, yeah. I'm just delaying this.
20:36
With a rebel brush, I just don't like this particular bit of
20:38
policy. Exactly that.
20:40
And then you've got something like the, you know, the
20:41
steadfast loyalists who are like we need to save this money and
20:44
now this lot have scuppered that.
20:46
So there is division all over the shop.
20:48
We've got two child benefit coming down.
20:50
There will be again this emboldened spirit among the
20:55
among backbenchers who are like, do you know what we've got AU
20:58
turn that we'll do it again. But #10 are adamant we have no
21:02
more money left. The fiscal headroom is gone.
21:05
They've got no idea how the how the finances are going to be
21:07
balanced. Come come the autumn.
21:10
They're in a tough enough position.
21:11
That could be the show that breaks the camel's back.
21:13
But at the risk of. Repeating myself, you know, for
21:15
for the people who will campaign to get that cap lifted it
21:20
returns again to what are we about as a Labour government if
21:23
not lifting children out of child poverty and all the
21:26
organisations that study this say that is the easiest way to
21:31
lift a huge number of families out of poverty is to end that
21:34
benefit gap let's. Talk about the political
21:36
consequences and, you know, the bigger picture, what this tells
21:39
us about this particular government.
21:40
Let's start specifically with Liz Kendall, the work and
21:43
pensions secretary. I mean, she looked terrified
21:46
yesterday as she was sort of flogging a dead horse in the
21:49
House of Commons. Is her head going to roll?
21:52
Jackie, I think that is probably, I don't want to tread
21:54
on Paul's Westminster toes here, but it's funny, I met an MP on
21:58
the way home last night from Westminster who was saying to me
22:02
that I know, get me on the tube and and meeting MPs.
22:07
But. Who said fundamentally this is a
22:10
woman who understands this area? As I said before, you have lots
22:15
of people in government who understand.
22:17
So, Liz. Kendall understands it.
22:19
Liz Kendall. They say understands this area
22:21
but was sort of forced to come out.
22:23
This is their view to defend something that she and herself
22:27
knew wasn't going to fly. And will she have to pay for
22:29
that? What do you think, Paul?
22:32
McNamara, what do you think the. More anger seems to be directed
22:37
at Rachel Rees, and it does Liz Kendall again.
22:40
Like so. Liz Kendall is someone who has
22:43
been studying the welfare system and been thinking about this for
22:46
a good long time. There's lots of this that she
22:49
did not want to do. The numbers were enforced upon
22:53
her and looking at how everything's played out, it
22:57
would appear that numbers have played more of an issue in this
23:01
than actual reform. And there's an awful lot of
23:05
support for Liz Kendall. The most what was so striking
23:09
yesterday was you had a moment where Liz Kendall is at the
23:13
dispatch box telling people how, look, you've got your
23:16
concessions. We've made these concessions.
23:18
We can't go any further. We are cracking on ahead.
23:22
And then 90 minutes later, her deputy was sent out to say,
23:26
actually, we've changed our minds.
23:28
We're doing a bit more of AU turn on than that.
23:30
And and they were really. Worried about the numbers
23:32
because they were. Really worried about the
23:33
numbers. So look, that tells you there,
23:35
it's not Liz Kendall who's making that, who's making that
23:38
choice. And second of all, the message
23:41
that that's sending out to other cabinet ministers isn't a great
23:46
one. We're going to make you stand at
23:47
the dispatch pools. We're going to make you say
23:49
stuff, and we might take decisions that make you look a
23:52
little bit silly afterwards. That can only get even more
23:57
toxic if at the end of it you punctuate it with and then we
24:00
fired you and. This is exactly what reminded me
24:03
of how the Tory government was behaving, you know, in the last
24:05
shambolic years. And it ended very badly.
24:08
And they, we know that they're very good at regicide.
24:10
And the Prime Minister messes up, you know, they get chucked
24:13
under the bus. The Labour Party doesn't do
24:15
that, apparently. So again, looking at heads that
24:18
might or might not roll. Rachel Reeves.
24:20
Morgan McSweeney, the Prime Minister's chief fixer there.
24:23
Is a everyone's looking at each other at the moment thinking
24:27
who's for the chop. They are like the Morgan
24:31
McSweeney seems safer than most. Keir Starla went into cabinet
24:35
yesterday morning and made a defence of Morgan McSweeney.
24:39
A lot of you, a lot of you are your position here to this man.
24:43
So, so he he's not on board with attacks on Morgan, Miss Sweeney,
24:47
but everyone else around that table, everyone else around the
24:52
senior leadership team around Keir Starmer is looking quite
24:56
nervous. Rachel, Rachel Reeves's position
24:59
is not looking great at the moment.
25:01
There is an argument talking to cabinet members yesterday.
25:05
There is an argument of but we still have lots more difficult
25:08
things. So maybe let her stay in place
25:11
where all the difficult things happen, and then maybe think
25:13
about it and who. Else would do that job, frankly.
25:15
Well, that's are there any obvious candidates that's.
25:17
Like that is one of the biggest issues that come up here.
25:21
There's no obvious candidate to take over being, which is not.
25:25
A chance saying an awful lot about the Labour Party front
25:27
bench is it I? Couldn't possibly comment TV
25:29
without Fry. OK, what about Starmer himself?
25:33
Do you know what? It was really interesting last
25:35
week. So OK, so the criminal
25:38
criminology of, of all of this right, you've got this has been
25:41
lingering on for months to months to months, backbenchers,
25:44
MPs going through their whips saying we can't gamble with
25:46
this. Whips going to down the street
25:48
saying you've got real problems here and down the street doing
25:51
this la, la, la, la, La La la, right.
25:53
But they all, they all crack on. Then you get this groundswell
25:57
last week and you get all these MPs coming out signing this
26:01
rebellion 120 odd and another two dozen in the background who
26:05
were, who were ready to to rebel.
26:07
And when you spoke to them, the the phrase that kept on coming
26:09
out was, look, we're all in agreement that it needs reform
26:13
and the the Prime Minister is trying to do his best.
26:16
They were, they were doing verbal gymnastics not to put the
26:18
boot into Keir Starmer. So I don't get the impression
26:21
that the knives are out and they and they want rid of him at all,
26:26
let alone soon. But by cracky, they are unhappy
26:31
as hell. I mean.
26:31
Jackie, the it's, I mean, you know, you think back to the
26:34
Blair days, the accusation levelled against Tony Blair and
26:37
new label was that they were too friendly with the rich.
26:39
You know, Gordon Brown famously said nothing wrong with making
26:42
lots of money. Oh, actually, Peter Mandelson
26:44
said it. There's nothing wrong with
26:45
making tons of money. We need people to make lots of
26:47
money. What they've done is they seem
26:49
to have upset the people who make lots of money, you know,
26:52
partly because of the non Dom thing.
26:54
They've all you know, they're headed for the exit.
26:56
You know, people are wired. Businesses are wired about tax
26:58
rises and then at the same time, the people that you would think
27:03
they would be on the side of with all this other people on
27:06
benefits, you know, the people at the bottom end financially of
27:09
society, they're also really upset.
27:11
I mean it. What do they need to do to get
27:13
their trust back? Well.
27:15
I mean, I think that issue of trust is really important
27:18
because as I say, you know, I've been talking to people with
27:21
disabilities who have been campaigning in the unbelievable
27:24
heat outside Parliament. And what they seem to feel is
27:29
that that fear that they feel that lack of certainty that that
27:33
that their livelihoods, their incomes will be protected has
27:38
been really, really damaging. One of the things I think is
27:42
important to say is that they're still arguing that reform will
27:46
go ahead of, of the welfare system.
27:49
They are now finally having people with disabilities on
27:54
board. In terms of the reform, the the
27:56
the Tim's review, as it's being called, led by Sir Stephen Tim's
27:59
will be Co produced. That awful phrase that they keep
28:02
saying with disabled people. There is one assumption that
28:05
because disabled people are Co producing it, there will be no
28:09
reform because they already the the critical thing that was
28:12
rolled back yesterday, this idea of the new eligibility criteria,
28:16
which would mean people not getting PIP in certain instances
28:21
was the thing that most alarmed them.
28:23
I put it to some people like yesterday.
28:25
Well, that'll never happen. Now, the argument from people
28:28
like Doctor Marie Tidbul, who is one of the people who fought
28:31
really hard to make changes to this bill, is that actually
28:37
disabled people, people on benefits, are on board with the
28:41
idea that it needs to be reformed.
28:43
As I say, you do not want hundreds of thousands of young
28:45
people not working, doing nothing.
28:48
It is bad for them. It really is.
28:51
There is nothing more dispiriting, I often think when
28:53
I see our coverage of GCSE and A level day and you have all these
28:57
lovely young people deservingly waving their exam papers around.
29:01
If you know, but if you're into, if you're talking to people who
29:04
will never get that chance, who, who are not in education or
29:08
training, who are doing nothing, believe me, the contrast is
29:13
awful. It is depressing so and it has a
29:15
ripple. Effect doesn't it on their
29:16
family on their friends I mean it's it's just it it's a whole
29:20
new crisis yeah and. And the.
29:21
Thing is, there is no doubt that people are on board for some
29:25
sort of reform that is proper reform.
29:27
That means those young people, people or or or older people who
29:31
are out of work can get into meaningful work for all the
29:35
benefits that that brings. So they are saying that just
29:39
people on disabilities are not going to go into that review and
29:42
say we're not, we're not accepting any changes.
29:44
But I think what is really clear is that reform will not be quick
29:48
now. Yeah, Jackie, you know.
29:49
You. You're talking to those
29:51
campaigners, especially overnight.
29:54
Do you think Keir Starmer can win them back?
29:58
I think all of this is going to be long and slow now because I
30:01
think the the the damage done. You know, I spoke to people who
30:05
were on PIP who when we chatted about their situation were
30:10
never, ever going to lose it. But it didn't matter.
30:14
Yeah, not least because they're they're not entirely selfish.
30:17
They're worried about the people down the line in the future who
30:19
won't get it for the same conditions.
30:21
That whole argument about two tier system really upset them,
30:25
but the anxiety that they felt even when it was clear they
30:28
weren't going to lose PIP, I think is really it's really
30:33
damaging in terms of trust. So, you know, often people on
30:36
benefits, often people with disabilities have a real
30:40
distrust of successive governments, of politicians
30:43
because of that lack of understanding of what it means
30:46
often to be left living on the margins because of your income
30:49
and just very. Briefly, do you think the public
30:51
and the way you describe it is so powerful?
30:53
Do you think the public gets that?
30:55
Do you think the public is on their side?
30:59
I think it's very, very difficult for people to truly
31:04
understand what it can be like to live on the margins.
31:07
And a lot of disabled people because of their income do live
31:10
on the margins and they live with constant uncertainty and
31:14
uncertainty around benefits. It, it is one of the biggest.
31:18
And so I think it is very, very difficult.
31:20
And I come back to that point. But that's why for me, you know,
31:25
the Angela Rayners of this world know really all too well what it
31:29
is like. You know, if you have Wes
31:30
Streeting talking about he understands what insecure work
31:33
means. He understands that work when
31:35
you do live on the margins, you know, is often insecure.
31:39
He talked about his mother had work, but it was often low paid
31:42
and it wasn't consistent. And when that work wasn't there,
31:46
benefits put food in the fridge, quite literally, and money in
31:50
the electricity meter. So for me to have someone who is
31:53
in cabinet, who knows what it's like, like, you know, to have
31:55
lived with an electricity meter, should say something, should
31:59
inform the. Public might not be able to
32:03
understand the lived experience of people on benefits, but they
32:05
are very able to understand a government in chaos.
32:09
OK. Listen, 10 seconds, 10 seconds
32:11
at the end because we run out of time.
32:13
Paul, you know this is not the way they wanted to celebrate
32:15
their first year in power. What does this Labour government
32:19
stand for? Give me one line.
32:22
Nobody knows at the moment. Everybody's still trying to
32:25
figure out what star Starmerism actually means, and nobody seems
32:30
to have an answer, including Sir Keir Starmer himself at the
32:33
moment, which is not great. A year in, is it?
32:36
Paul McNamara, Jackie Long, thank you very much to both of
32:39
you. That's it for this episode of
32:40
The Forecast. Hope you enjoyed it.
32:42
See you next time. Goodbye.