Coffee House Shots
Coffee House Shots live: election special
The stage is set. Get a front row seat in the run-up to the election by subscribing to the spectator for just £3 for three months. We'll even send you a free election mug. Go to spectator.co.uk/mug. Welcome to a live recording of Coffee House Shot from here on Westminster. I'm Fris Nelson, I'm joined by Katie Bowles and Kate Andrews and we're delighted to be joined by 200 readers here in Venue just around from our office before we go for a G&T later on. So we are almost a week from the general election and I will show you some slides. The first slide is going to show you, you can typically we've got the bookmakers odds, which is now taking on greater resonance. Now they're all, they're all book-booking on these things, right? Now this is what the, what we learned from the various manifestos about tax. The Obio forecast, that was Jeremy Hunt's last budget. Now Baturis are saying they were tax less than they originally threatened to tax us in March. That graph is still going upward, so the Conservatives would increase tax. So every time we're saying lower taxes of us, higher tax with Labour, sadly it's just simply not true and I suspect almost every single version knows it's not true as well. Labour intends to tax a little bit more than, and Baturis intended to, although not that much more and we're talking about the end of five years, 0.3% of GDP more than Hunt's original plan. And by the way, I take Hunt's plan a lot more seriously, but I take what Baturis said during the manifesto because by that stage they would know and they'd be never implementing it. And then we've got the good old Lib Dems taxing, even then relatively constrained only 1% of GDP higher after five years. We were going to put you, give you the green party, but they're literally off the charts of stuff they want to do. You just don't want to know about that. But nonetheless, this country is taxed the highest that's ever been taxed on a post-war history. And we have got a choice of next general election between three parties, all of whom intend to tax us even more. The only question is degree. And that's been, I think, one of the big problems with the conservative messaging. When they say to you we will cut your tax. Nobody believes them anymore for two reasons. One is that if you look at the track record of the last 14 years, it has not been one of lower tax. And also when you look at their plans, they actually intend to increase it. So to me, this has been quite an interesting example of what you do with the message, which isn't true. You get rumbled nowadays. And I suppose that's a good thing overall for democracy. Now, this is what, you know, when Sunik was saying that he was going to, that Labour would tax you 2,000 pounds extra, he'd done this in a very sort of sneaky way, where he meant 500 pounds extra over four years, that was multiplied by four. And on that same daft basis, his last budget proposed 3,000 pounds extra. And I've been going after them quite a lot about this. Now, and again, people ask me why I'm doing this. Do I hate the Tories or something like that? And it's not, I think the journalists have got a basic duty. Our role isn't particularly hallowed, but we are there to try to tell people what's happening and what's not, what's true, and what's not. And when a politician is exaggerating, a filter journalist to point it out. So we're simply saying that if you do this maths in the same strange way that Sunik did, then you're looking at 3,000 pounds extra per household, not that I agree with that methodology. Now, all of us might be thinking, well, we've always been proved wrong before, maybe we're all going to be shocked. It's possible. Of course it's possible. But let's look at the opinion poll lead. So this is nine days ahead of the elections, where the various parties were. No party in our post-war history has, a government has ever been 21 points behind in the poll and gone on to win the next general election. In 1992, the Tories were two points behind, and famously, John Major did go on to win that election. But other times, if you're behind in the polls, you're not going to win. And if you're 21 points behind in the polls, you're almost certainly not going to win. Now, as you will know, our former colleague James Versailles, he was on these panels quite a lot. And now I'm going to call him up, "Ah, James, how's it going?" You know? If he's almost cruel to ask him that, you know? Because James is always so optimistic, "Ah, if it's our narrow path to victory, I'll be..." You know? Now, I would love to sort of live dial him right now and put him on and ask us to explain why, actually, things are brighter than they might seem. I think even he may struggle to see the silver lining in this whole rack of clouds. And this is where they are right now. You'll notice here that the top line, the labor popularity is going down. It's now at 40%. That's where the lowest starmer has been for about 12 months. Now, this is, by the way, is relatively low for governing parties. I mean, he might get the mother of all majorities next week, but he has not had the emphatic endorsement of a country which is turning towards him. His own popularity ratings are about as low as Gordon Brown's were in his last year of government. He's starting from this position. So let's make no mistake here. The starmer has not won hearts and minds. All he has said is, "I am not the Tories." And he's tried his best to play intellectually dead, to say as little as he possibly can. And all that Davey's done has fallen off his waterboard or tightrope or whatever it is. But, you know, these guys haven't been making arguments to win you guys over. They haven't been trying to convert the country, even trying to convert the country to any agenda. All they've said is, "Time for a change. We're not so scary." And you can see the purple line there of a Faraj effect. Now, the Faraj effect, well, basically, he's sure he's dented the labor, in my view, as he's dented the conservatives. He has taken votes on both. But the way that our electoral system works, Faraj is predicted to get something like three MPs. Labor is predicted to get 450. And the Tories, anything between 50 and 150, depending on what point you look at. But either way, the Faraj effect serves to be purely destructive of the conservatives under the Westminster system. And the irony, of course, is that it's some of this culture of a Lib Dems opposition. And it's a strange Faraj effect there. He says in his debates where he has said, "I am weary of the opposition now." He wouldn't have enough peace to fill a taxi. Let alone take the fight to the labor party. So, that's still interesting when you see the way that that is going. Now, this is what we'll probably be getting this time in two weeks' time, the leadership election. I'll be surprised. I expect where she's next to resign at about nine o'clock. I don't think he's going to go straight off to California, as he wants to put it, the flights are cheaper than Tuesdays anyway. But, you know, but obviously, in our democratic system, if you've presided over a massive defeat, you'd spend not too much time before you resign, because they'll come for you anyway. And you can see these are the likely challengers. Penny Mordent there on 11%, she's four, she'll be lucky to keep ports with North. Faraj at 10%. This is for the next conservative, leader. Now, by the way, I'm making new predictions on this, except I would say that, look at Kelly Baden again, our former colleague on 23%. Normally, in Tory leadership elections, the front runner never wins. Normally, Tory leaders are elected for who they're not, as opposed to who they are. So, you get a front runner who everybody starts to hate, and there is anybody but the front runner. So, you get John Major because he wasn't Heseltine, you get Ian Duncan Smith because he wasn't Michael Bratillo. So, that is the kind of pattern. Now, I haven't seen a stop-kemme campaign, but, you know, we'll see. All I'm saying, as I wouldn't want to place any bets, not that I imagine any conservative will be very soon, on any of these prospective candidates. And with this, I will pass over to Katie. I guess the first question I would ask you is, do you think Starmer is going, because right now, he's being very, very careful. He's got the Mingvaz strategy. He's saying, I'm not going to do anything. I'm not going to raise any taxes. In about 10 days' time, he might will, or the mother of all majorities, to do whatever he wants. He'll be able to fire any Labour MP that gets annoyed with him. Do you think he's going to govern in the cautious way in which he's campaigned? I mean, I think it's the million-dollar question properly, which is, you know, what does someone do with that size, or we can call it a super majority. I think the spectator first actually used the term super majority, was it a few months ago? It was, but do you know what took you there at my copy this morning? Because I said it was a stupid phrase. Right, but we did put it on the cover. I'm not changing styles. But no, I mean, I think if you're Starmer, I mean, if you look at what the average on recent polls would be, it is that the Labour Party won an election held now, would have a majority of 200. You know, larger than 97, huge possibilities. And the Tory attack line, I think because they're struggling so much, has just been, don't give them it. What could they do? You know, it could be a one-party socialist state. I think that's probably a stretch in terms of what Kirsten would do. If you look at those who surround him, Rachel Reeves, very much on the right of the party, we're treating. That's her, would be his, you know, Chancellor and Health Secretary, Pat McFadden in the Cabinet office, you know, a long-term Blair right. All three of those politicians refused to serve under Jeremy Corbyn. Yes, Jeremy Corbyn, sorry, yes, because Starmer did. But I think, you know, that is a statement of the fact that he wants to keep the right of the party close. You also have a lot of Blair rights returning to the fold, including Tony Blair, which, again, you can read two things from him. One, which is, you know, at the very least, Kirsten is not allergic to Blairism. But also, he likes to have experience around him. And the problem you have if you're a Labour leader who values experience is you have to go quite a long way back to find a Labour politician of an experience of power. And when you look at the Blair rights and the Brown rights, I think you can argue that Blair rights have more success. So I think you'll have those elements, which mean, while Kirsten himself or someone has always switched positions in what suits him in the moment, perhaps of a long-term aim, those he is surrounding himself with, who are dictating lots of messaging, including Morgan McSweeney, his most senior aide, are very much, you know, in the centre of the Labour Party to the centre right. And, you know, were you to suddenly axle those people? It would, that would be problematic, even if you have a 200-seat majority. Kirsten's team will say, okay, the super majority is not scary because it means that we have stability. But I also think it does mean that Kirsten can ultimately axe troublesome MPs very quickly. And we also know with the candidate selection, we did stormtroopers, I think last year, you know, they have purposely picked candidates, they've used the cover of vetting. And some of the vetting has been about have you done a post that could be as seen as anti-Semitic, but also, you look, there's not very, there's not many, you know, hard-left candidates. And the ones that looked like they were going to make it across the lines, as far as the Shaheen, were cancelled at the last minute. So I think this is going to be something where he can cut the left. In terms of promises, though, I think we saw from the issue of fiscal studies, and Kate will have more to say on this, that none of the parties are being particularly honest, and they're manifestos on spending or tax. And you can say the Tories are being dishonest, too. We've seen the slides. It's not really a problem for the Tories. Given the idea, they're going to have a chance to put in mandatory national service. So, you know, I think there are lots of, I think the odds are, it's more likely Michelle Obama is the next US president, then where she's seen out polls of this victory. And it's going to be a labor's problem if they cannot get the growth that they're talking about to suddenly have to go back on some promises. And I think what we might see is labor almost pursuing a doctor's mandate, whereby they get in and say, "Oh, the books are even worse than we expected," even though nearly all the information is already out there. And so, now we're going to have to make some decisions just to improve things because of the evil Tories. And I think, how far can they get away with that by the public being taken by surprise? And Kate, we saw the seniors' manual Macron call the general election, the French markets tanked, because they worked out it wasn't going to go his way. There is ever a chance of national rally we're going to become the victors in this. When Stormra wins, and we've seen the markets have successfully overthrown one prime minister, Liz Trost. Do you think we're going to panic him? I don't think the simple act of electing a labor government which has spent years now insisting that they will uphold fiscal credibility in and of itself is going to trigger a spectacular market reaction. The huge question is what they do with it. So, they've put in their manifesto that they're going to stick to Jeremy Hunt's fiscal target. And this gets very technical, it means that in the medium term debt has to be falling at the end of a five-year rolling period. What it actually means in practice is that you have a very, very loose target where you can keep spending and spending. And as long as you promise that five years down the line, you're going to have a dramatic shift and start slashing public spending or hiking taxes, you can get away with it. The numbers add up. So, labor delightfully, we're like, "Oh gosh, this really strict fiscal rule that makes us look credible. We'll take that please and put it in their manifesto." As long as they don't start messing with things on day one and going back on those manifesto promises, I'm not sure you've seen a immediate market reaction. The huge question is what they do, and Katie brought up what the Institute for Fiscal Studies has been pointing out for some time now. Based on the current trajectory in the next parliament, we have a 20 billion pound black hole for departmental spending. That translates to real spending cuts. Do we think a labor party is going to implement real spending cuts? Maybe we do, but if they don't, they only have so many options. They can try to borrow the money, but Liz Truss taught us a lot of lessons on that. They can hike taxes. We know from a leaked document to the Guardian, there are options on the table they are looking at. That document showed that labor was looking at changes to capital gains and potentially changes to inheritance tax, or you go for growth. My suspicion is that the labor party really does want to implement some pro-growth policies, especially around housing, where they seem most serious about making change. Perhaps the labor party is the party that has to make that change, because it's in those traditionally leafy seats where we need to build some homes, because that's where a lot of the big cities are. That's where the jobs are, certainly in terms of commuting. But if that miraculous growth plan doesn't work out, if we continue to have the lackluster growth that we've had for the better part of a decade now, what's labor going to do? I think that's the real question on the table. The markets are really their next challenge. Fraser, you've written about this for the telegraph. Voters are pretty convinced they don't want the Tory party. That means we're going to have a big labor majority. Once that battle is won and quite clear for the next five years, the next battle is the markets, and confidence is going to be key, because there are multiple ways to spook the markets. You can try to spend 100 billion pounds on price controls, like Liz's trusted around the energy price guarantee. You can also have flailing governments, right? You can have change after change of prime minister that makes people quite nervous. We're probably not going to see that kind of chaos going into the next couple of years, although we should never say never, given what we've experienced over the past few years. On some points, I think the markets will be relatively calm in any democracy. You have to have some kind of political change. 14 years is a long time for one party to be in charge. I don't think markets will initially be opposed to the idea of a left-wing government that is less left-wing than the previous one was. But what they do with that could change things quite quickly. If we do get a sense that they want to try their hand at borrowing a lot of money, which they've said they're not going to do, but if they get in there and go, "Oh, my gosh, we've actually really limited ourselves, and we're going to need to borrow more money," that's when they could be in trouble. Katie, one of the things I've noticed recently is Kio Starmer is using this phrase a decade of renewal. That's what he's promising. Of course, that suggests labor is going to be in power for 10 years rather than five. I imagine that might be one of our takeaways when we see the results of a general election. If the Tories are down to fewer than 100 seats, then this does look like more like 10 years of labor government than five years of labor government, and that phrase a decade of renewal. To me, it's quite interesting because it's almost dampening expectations for the entire next five years, preparing to say, "Well, it was such a mess. We were never going to achieve everything in five years. The real election is going to be in the second term." So do you think he's already starting to position for a kind of a two-term strategy where this is almost being explicitly billed as the cautious first term? Yeah, I think it's definitely something in that because ultimately they think that financial restraints mean that lots of things they won't be able to do in a drastic way. Often there also is a history of second terms being the more radical, so I think there's something in that. But then I think, you know, you think about things like household laws reform. So we were told, Kirsten was going to abolish the household laws. Now he's going to fill it with labor with friends. But that's probably just the first step before you get to abolishing it, of course. But they are potentially going to stop hereditary peers and things. There will be some measures. But I think the argument would be the country is in such a bad state. We have to do some of these immediate things. And then we can go back to some of the bigger plans, which is going to take up lots of time. I still think it could be quite leeradical in some ways. I mean, we had the cover piece last week talking about what they might enshrine in law on a qualities act that hasn't been already. And you could actually, you know, perhaps it's not the big spending things, but the changes they can do in terms of cultural issues that could be the most impact majority of 200 if there is. And then we'll have all these pieces saying the Tories are out of power for, you know, a decade, two decades, five decades, forever. They take your pick. But this was said after the 2019 election, you know, there were countless pieces. I'm not sure some of us may have written them. I'm not sure. But you know, saying the labour out for at least two terms, Keir Starmer could be a kinnock. They need to have a two-term strategy. And actually, one of Labour's big problems has been that they made all these pledges that they've had to scale back on early on, partly because they did think they were doing a two-term strategy or two election strategy to get back in. And we are seeing more and more voters are really volatile. I do think if you get to double-digit Tory MPs, it's really hard to rebuild. But at the same time, we're going to have a super majority potentially. I'll keep using the term even if not on the magazine. And then we'll have a leader. If Keir Starmer is prime minister, he will have the lowest approval ratings of any politician entering number 10 in British history because he's already a negative approval ratings. And then you have all those challenges. And quite, you know, for the vote shared, does the majority match? So I think that, you know, there's every reason to think he will get his decade of renewal. I just think politics has lots of surprise. And we're just seeing from the last one, you know, events can take over. >> Do you think that will inform Starmer's -- I mean, one of the things I'm thinking today was when the left split in the '80s, the STB comes along, and then all of a sudden, there are two left-wing parties, which gives Thatcher the license to be quite radical in a second term. So she, obviously, now, if you're of the right, you might say she revived, saved the country. But if you're left, you will say, well, she basically rigged the system to permanently favor conservatives. She promoted homeownership. She promoted share ownership. She promoted entrepreneurialism. She created an ecosystem which made lots of people who would want the continuation of conservative government and conservative policies. Now, if you're a labor person, you look back and think, you know, she rigged it. Mind you, if we're going to be in power with a 200-plus majority, then we can also change the landscape to make it more favorable to the left and less favorable to the right. But it's difficult to see whether you're economically given that taxes and spending are the highest they've been post-war. But did you think they might be -- I'm not quite sure. Once they win the market's confidence, do you think they'll be gravitating back towards the Italians with binomics to this £28 billion carbon pledge? I mean, do you think there's a -- that they're temporarily staying away from that account, first of all, voters in the markets, and that's ultimately where they're going to go next? I think that's where they'd like to go. I don't think they hide that. I think they look at what's happening in the states with real envy. I mean, most Western countries do when they see 4% growth rates. As it happens, Americans aren't convinced by them. Americans are -- when you pull them, say they're very upset with the economy. Everybody's asking why. A lot of that economic growth is a sugar high that is promoted by all of this spending and all of this debt. It is a privilege that America has as the reserve currency that it can do that. And I think to Katie's point, it was wonderful to fantasize about when they didn't think they'd really be in power. And now that they are, they realize they can't realistically do that. It is absolutely where they'd like to go. They'll need the money to do that. And to expand on Katie's point about, you know, this decade of renewal. And also, people weren't just saying labor would be out of power for forever. They were saying Boris Johnson was going to have a decade in number 10, right? They were saying that Boris Johnson was here to stay for at least a decade. So, yeah, you never know. But some of the tough tax reform that's actually probably necessary that we need to be looking at is so politically unpopular. It is not the kind of stuff that you're going to want to do in the first couple of years. When if you look at those polls, yes, 40% of voters are saying they're going to vote labor, but about 37% of voters say they're going to vote for the right-wing parties. They're going to vote conservative or reform. This isn't a country that has necessarily flipped on its ideas about what the nation needs to really get going to kickstart growth, to have a healthy and happy economy and society. It's a nation that's very angry at the governing party, and that is a different thing. So, if we were to talk about council tax reform, for example, which is well overdue to look at these tax bans. You know, if you're living in parts of London, you're having a laugh, and it's really quite silly compared to property prices and where demand is. Is that really the first thing labor wants to do on day one? I mean, I guess you could burn all your political capital on it, but as we were saying before, you need some political capital to build homes on the gray belt in areas where people are going to fight you tooth and nail to stop you from building new homes and apartment complexes. You're going to need some political capital for the NHS. I mean, just tackling the waiting list alone before we even get to the kinds of reforms that West Street has been talking about. They're going to need a lot of political capital to do the things that are necessary to get back on track. I think one of the healthiest things for the UK is going to be that moment of realization, maybe six months in, maybe three years in, when it's realized that so many of the nation's problems are not party specific. That is not to let the conservatives off for some pretty bad mistakes, especially around areas like housing and public policy, that they've got wrong for a long time. But it is to say that the NHS, the state pension, the national debt, being around 100% of GDP, these are issues of successive governments, that lack of investment, capital investment. We were all talking about broken Britain last year when the school buildings and the ceilings were falling in. That is an issue that goes back decades and decades and decades. There's no government when they enter. Number 10 goes, you know what will really win over the public is if we start really investing in capital spending, which they won't see the benefits of for at least 15 years. You know, they go, what can we build in the next three to four years that people will see? Do we think this labor party is going to be any different? If they have a super majority, I'll use the word too. Maybe we can hope that they'll make some of that more medium term, they'll have the medium term in mind when they're doing their decision making. But my suspicion is that they will remain relatively cautious. I think we're getting higher taxes and I think a lot of the taxes left out of the manifesto are on the table. But the stuff that's really necessary and that's also very politically painful, I think you can see them putting that off for a while, really thinking towards that next term. Okay, well, let's turn to you guys for some questions. Before we do, I'd like to do a quick sample opinion poll. You don't have to take part in it, but it might be interesting to see hands up if you go to the conservative of the last 2019 general election. Hands up if you go to for somebody else. We've got to tell the people in the podcast the number of hands. Well, let's guess it. What do you reckon? I look, I reckon, of those who actually picked up their hands, I would say about 80 percent. Yeah. Right. Okay. How many of you intend to vote conservative third and Thursday next week? And how many of you intend to vote for somebody else? 50, 40, 60. Yeah, I'd say 40 percent for the conservatives. That's the best poll we're going to get in a while. And about 60 for other people. Okay. How many intend to vote for reform UK? And how many tend to vote labor? Some more labor. More labor people here than reform UK and Lib Dems. Good at Davies, tumbling off of what it was working. S&P. I knew you guys were the right sort of thing. Sorry. Oh, yeah. I forgot. Green. Green. Green. This is after my jokes about the Greens. Not one. Okay. Well, okay. That gives some kind of flavor. So let's, so let's take some questions then. So yeah. So what about both of you ask a question and we'll try and answer. Okay. Just pick up this theme of anxiety from a conservative perspective of a stammer government with a 200 seat majority. And I know politics are volatile, but I just don't believe the Tories are going to overturn that kind of majority in one term if they get a hundred seats. Isn't the real issue with stammer that we don't really know what he thinks? So if you take Tony Blair, there was a fair consistency of message before he got his majority at least as regards domestic issues. With key stammer, there's been no consistency of message. I mean, there's an assumption that he's going to have a cautious approach in government, but maybe that's just because he's been advised that in order to win this election, you need to have a cautious platform in the same way that he was advised in order to become Labour leader, you need to have a kind of Corbinite manifesto. So we don't really know, and we don't really know what he's going to do with a lot of power for the next 10 years. You've talked a lot about the manifesto, obviously, because that's why they've laid out their plans, but there are other documents in existence which can give a clue. And I think with a super majority, as the phrase you use, but the inability to do some of the things you might think that his backbenchers had wanted to do with that, he might want to throw red meat at them in another way. And there's Gordon Brown's report on constitutional reform, which nobody has really spoken about in the lead up to the election, but which is a really sinister document. I'm wondering whether you have any comments on that? Okay. And the third question over there. Yeah. So given the amount of fiscal restraint that we have, we already have the highest taxes in a post-war government. The Labour Party wants to obviously increase spending on presumably the NHS, whatever else, housing. If you already have the highest levels of spending or highest levels of taxation since post-war, and our public services already, I think everyone in this room would admit, pretty dire. What room is there to actually do anything except to just kind of just do mass kind of taxation on kind of ordinary people? There is no room. Very good questions. Katie, do you want to take it? Yeah, I suppose what Mike Kirstama do that he hasn't said, and you're right in the sense. I think because he has changed positions so many times, and obviously the CCHQ attack line is the Jeremy Corbyn one, but he's in keeping to that leadership and all the pledges he made to the membership. Now every single pledge, you know, of bodished tuition fees and so forth, have been ditched. It does make you think that there are some things I could do to surprise. I think that there's obviously, I think there's a restraint belt in terms of the money, which means some of the things are just off the menu. But I mean, I think he's already said folks for 16. They've poured some cold water and votes for EU citizens, but I think that those kind of long-term changes to stack the cards are probably quite likely. And to make those 10 years, perhaps more likely, maybe 15 years. I think ID cards are something to look for. Officially, they will say, "Oh, we're definitely not going to do ID cards." But if you think about their plans to stop illegal migration, if you think about some of the past arguments in labour, I do think that this is viewed as something which would be too unpowered because of the Tories to bring in. But there were voices in labour circles who say it could actually fix some of the, you know, they're not going to do the Rwanda scheme. But if you want to, you know, track workers and then therefore deter offers from coming over, people whisper about ID cards and then say, "Oh, no, we're definitely, definitely won't." And then it just keeps coming back in some circles. So I think that could be something where you might get more of a surprise. And then I think it's a big question on Brexit, which is, you know, lots of people have to say, "No one cares about Brexit anymore. I don't know how the room feels." But I think it says something that none of the parties, not even really liberal Democrats, want to talk about Brexit much, which shows they're a bit scared of talking about other voters. And I think Labour is clearly trying to win back lots of voters that did not like their position on Brexit. But I think if you have a Labour government, the mood will change quite considerably. You have, you know, former arch remainers, David Lammy, where's Streeting? You know, people who really believed in the single market, the customs union, you look at, you know, some of the things they said during the time. I think you have businesses who feel as though they can now talk more freely about the problems they are having as a result of, you know, Boris's Brexit deal and so forth. And I think all these pressure groups will start pushing because they will think, you know, this is a door actually, you know, we can push out and open. So I think the single market is probably a step too far because it does touch on freedom of movement. And I think that would just be in seat as too risky for the coalition. But I can completely see some form of customs union. That's something where the Labour Party, you know, there's not really any ideological opposition within Labour on that. It's just a fear of voters because they're not talking about trade deals in the way you have Tories saying that's why they back Brexit. So I think those are a few things I think, you know, not in the manifesto. It could be quite big changes and come in. So I'll take a question about Gordon Brown. I think the return of both Gordon Brown and Tony Blair is something to watch out for. Gordon Brown's constitution reform agenda, you're right. That's exactly the case study or something. We didn't become up in the campaign because nobody's promising it. But I suspect with the most significant things Kyostarma will do in his first year will be things that he didn't rule out because nobody thought to ask him, but there'll be other things. I mean, Brown knows very well just the power of constitutional reform. It was Labour government that brought in devolution, for example, and look at how that changed things there. It was Labour government that introduced the Supreme Court and look at all the various traps that conservatives get caught in right now because Labour had rigged the system very effectively. So there was part of the little part less room for conservative manoeuvre. And Tony Blair, let's not forget, has got the Tony Blair Institute, a massive organisation. Blair himself has bought the mansion next to checkers. So yeah, it's really weird. And apparently he hangs out there in a Sunday night, just like he was prime minister with the sort of red box given to him and goes through papers, you know. So in his head, he's like one of these, you know, the bit Mary Poppins with this old major right at the end who still thinks he's fighting the war. It's going to be like Blair. He's going to still think he's actually still running the country. But I think he might be in several regards because, in my view, a lot of the guy's researchers and the Blair Institute are going to all become special advisors very quickly. There's nothing lobbyists love more than somebody with power and no ideas, like your starmer. And that vacuum will be very quickly filled, I think. We know that Blair has been backing with the digital eddy industry, you're itching to get the energy cards back on. And there's other schemes he's gone out with, pretty weird ones, like how to divert pension money, etc. But keep an eye on that. But I do think that the things that we, the dogs that haven't barked in this campaign, will be the most significant ones. Yeah, and I would just add very briefly, I mean, lots of lay people say, oh, the real intellectual thinking is being done by the Blair Institute. So if you want to see what might happen, just looking at the papers, I also think enough of him to look out for his press freedom. And his starmer hasn't completely ruled out Levison too. And we know that is an issue that he feels strongly about. Now, while you're seeking an endorsement of lots of papers that might not particularly want to give you the endorsement because of past behavior, I don't think you're going to go screaming from the rooftop, oh, we're going to bring in this thing of potentially is going to bankrupt you and cause you lots of problems. But I think that is, you know, something he would want to do if he had the space. And I said, come up once in the campaign, press freedom? No one's up. No, exactly. So he might think if he does is, who cares, right? I mean, you guys will care because you hear, but even then your average person doesn't really care about press regulation that much. So that's an undefended area that would not surprise me if he does move on because then who really is going to protest? How many newspapers are still going to be there in 10 years' time? And we won't be allowed to, we'll see. Okay, okay, when you, we are taxing and spending at record levels. Public services are on their knees. What do you do except try to grab more cash? So, you know, I'm both an optimist and a real pessimist on this. Real economic growth can solve this issue. Real economic growth is not, you know, it's technical in term, but what is it? It's higher tax receipts. It's higher wages. It's more job opportunities. It's increased prosperity. It's higher living standards. Real economic growth can really help to fill in some of those gaps. Hypothetical growth fills in zero gaps. Hypothetical growth does nothing. And what we've had for a really long time now is politicians on the left and the right. I mean, labor's doing this all day long. It's not just the Tories. It's not just Boris Johnson and Liz trust quite famously for it. They are talking about growth as if if they say it enough. It'll appear out of thin air. It's the new magic money tree. It's, you know, the growth fern. I don't know. We can come up with a name for it, but it's not real. You have to see the policies realized in order to get the economic growth. And that's the really hard stuff. In addition to that, even if you get substantial economic growth and that really is going to help, you can't keep making all of these unrealistic promises to the public about what the state is able to provide. If we look at health care and we look at the state pension, this is only going one way. Changing demographics means it's only going one way every year. These things are getting more expensive. And we basically live a lie on the state pension. I mean, absolutely, workers are paying into it their whole lives. I think they deserve to see the benefits of that. But it's not in a pot with your name on it with a little locking key. It's a pay-as-you-go system. Today's workers are paying for the state pension payouts today. And if we are lucky to see it, I really don't know if we will be. I think anybody under the age of 45 should be questioning whether or not they're going to see that and be making alternative plans. It will be tomorrow's workers paying for what we get. So you have to grow the economy. You have to be realistic about reform when it comes to public services. And I don't mean, you know, just toss them all out and have no safety net. You have to be really realistic about the systems in place. They're going to save money rather than incentivize the state to keep spending money. So, you know, I don't think higher taxes are an inevitability in every circumstance that they just have to keep going up and up and up. But they will, if we can't tackle some of these other issues, or some of these services are going to disappear. And that would be a very painful, very blunt process. And I think what we saw in the austerity years, I mean, the austerity years are such an irony, right? George Osborne stood up and claimed himself to be the austerity chancellor. And the UK cut roughly 0.5% of its spending every year for five years. You know, from a percentage perspective, it wasn't very much, but it was disproportionate. The areas that were cut really felt it. And we know what happens when those cuts are blunt and disproportionate, it's painful. So you've got to get the growth side of the equation, right? And, you know, in the manifestos, are those policies there? No. Maybe a little bit on housing for labor. Otherwise, no. Let's take some more questions, see lots of hands. So let's, let's try and take four this time. Surprised at how little foreign affairs has been mentioned at all. I think on the day Russia and North Korea got together, the front page of the times was Tony Blair saying a man had a penis. And this passes for news. Big issues, as you say, are not being debated. And I wondered if the panel is surprised or has any sort of views on that. Which policy from any party's manifesto do you think is the most interesting or innovative for solving the UK's challenges? Yep. I read your article by Matt Ridley. Yeah. About democratic deficit and all the Quangoland's. And obviously you published his article. So I guess you agree with it to a certain extent. But I wonder how much each of the three of you agreed with his point of view. Right. And let's take a moment. I was just wondering if the worst case scenario happens for the Tories and they've become a rather small party in parliament, how likely they are to break up into several smaller parties and how you think those small parties will form themselves. Okay. Great questions. And Matt, can you say that if I agreed with every article I published, I'm a deeply conflicted person. But anyway, I actually do agree with Matt Ridley. But Katie, why don't you take some of those questions? Sure. And you're writing on the WhatsApp route this morning. How I write Matt Ridley once. Completely is. No matter who you vote for, the government always gets in. Yeah. So that was the discussion of that. What's that? So Tory breakup, I think that, you know, the lower they go, they're more likely. I personally think if you have a situation where the Tories are on 120, 150 MPs, I think there'll be a big effort to hold the line against Nigel Farage and to stop Nigel Farage from joining the Tories or having some kind of pact with the Tories. Already, that's a conversation on those MPs who look at the MRPs and think, well, I survive a vice party party. Tory party doesn't exist. And, you know, they're talking about what you would do in terms of, you know, you know, potentially an alliance where, let's see if they can actually do it, because unity hasn't been a good word for them recently. But, you know, alliance, we have different parts of the Tory party to show they're a broad church and they don't need Nigel Farage. But I think if you start to get below 50 or even 60 MPs, if you have 12 Tory MPs who want Nigel Farage, it's quite a big number in terms of the percentage. I won't try to do the percentage right now. And also, if you think about in these, you know, in the coming Tory leadership contest, all of a sudden, I was speaking to a former chief whip about this, the swings in those parliamentary knockout rounds are going to be insane. You can suddenly have, like, you know, you'd have the most sophisticated whipping operation normally to try and make sure your candidate gets in. Rishi Cinek had a good one. Theresa May had a good offer in someone called Gavin Williamson is involved. I think if you suddenly get down to 50 MPs, you know, he had five MPs going behind one person. It starts to get incredibly unpredictable who is going to go to the membership. And I think if you get to a point where there are two candidates going to the membership, and one says, that's Hug Farage close, I think there's a very decent chance that candidate is the candidate picked by the membership. So I can imagine Spinta groups, and I think if Nigel Farage, as expected, becomes an MP, talk of reformed affections is going to, you know, be a daily activity. And you can just imagine, I won't talk for too long, because there's a lot of time, but you can just imagine, you know, they're having a hosting for the 1922 meetings every week. And all of a sudden, Nigel Farage just strolls down the committee corridor, you know, makes an ominous comment to the journalist and everyone's centre, frenzy, or has tea with Jacob Rees-Mogg and PCH before. It's going to be an absolute circus. So in short, the lower the number, I think the higher chance of a breakup. OK. And on foreign policy, I'll quickly come to that. I do think it's striking. I mean, Europe's at war right now, and nobody seems to be mentioning this. I mean, the implications for defence are huge. You're sitting next to any defence, up to 2.5% of GDP. That'll be relatively low by the standards of the more ambitious native countries. And I think it's the case that neither Sunik nor Starmer cares that much about foreign affairs. I think that is simply the fact that I think they want to both do enough to show that they're not resiling from the commitment to Ukraine, et cetera. But to bore us, Johnson, Ukraine was absolutely a battle for the future of democratic freedom. I think both Sunik and Starmer don't see that as much. But then again, you tend not to get very much foreign affairs discussed in general election campaigns in most countries. That just tends to be a bit of it. And I remember there. When Woodrow Wilson was elected president, he said that it would be a great irony of history if my presidency were coming to be dominated by foreign affairs. And that was 1913. So it goes to show that, you know, you may not be interested in foreign affairs, but foreign affairs can quite often be interested in you. Just to follow on on the foreign affairs point, I don't think they disagree on very much. And I think that's why it's not brought up very often, because there wouldn't be much of a debate. Yes, the Tories have committed to a date for higher spending. Labor hasn't. Now, that could be evidence of Fraser's point that if their opinions don't differ very much, maybe that's because they're not thinking about it properly and it's not at the top of their agenda list. But if this were in the US where the Republican party being elected and Donald Trump being back in the White House could mean something drastically different, not just for public policy in America, but for the outcome of what happens to Ukraine, I think it would be a much bigger debating point. But they largely agree they're going to continue to support Ukraine. What's the most interesting public policy being talked about? It's tricky the way you worded that because, sorry, I'm trying to find the lady who asked it. Tricky, the way you worded that without a doubt, the most interesting thing being discussed and pushed is shadow health secretary West trading on NHS reform. Labor will be in a position to make real change. It's the only party that can. Streating seems very genuine about wanting to. He was a patient, a cancer patient himself. He understands the frustration of what patients are going through. Easily the most exciting. They didn't put the good stuff in the manifesto. Who did the reform party reform in their not manifesto contract with the people, talk seriously about looking at European countries, neighbors, and what they're doing differently. Now, I can't in good face say it's my favorite manifesto policy because I think it's very unhelpful that that stuff is in there. When you put NHS reform next to ridiculously wild tax and spend promises that you have not costed and you can't realistically deliver, it makes the whole package feel like a fantasy. NHS reform should not be a fantasy. It's tricky the way you worded it. That's the area of public policy. I'm most interested in what labor to be elected. >> Let's get some more questions. Lots of hands up. >> Just to stick on the tax point, I'm a Gen Z who heavily worries about my tax burden. Now, just for a bit of context, I think when Gordon Brown raised the top rate of income tax to 50%, tax revenue actually went down. Sorry. What do you think happens when first people start to fill the real effects of the personal income tax thresholds being frozen? And two, when sort of graduates like me, come to start paying that 9% student loan back, which is effectively a tax. Do you think they'll be a brain drain? Do you think tax revenues will go down? >> What a great question. Sir. >> Hi. What effect do you think Farage's Ukraine comments will have on their vote? And is there any polling evidence out yet to indicate one way or the other? >> Great question. Let's take two more. >> I'm thinking if Stalin gets in with a super majority, with a reduced or small percentage of the vote, what sort of pressure will there be for some sort of constitutional reform like proportional representation, which I think, you know, the results could be completely crazy. And he could have a very, very high proportion of power relative to the people that actually want to give him that power. >> And let's take one more. >> With hindsight, was there ever any path for Russia should not have won from whenever he took over a team obstacle? >> Such great questions. I reckon that the path for him to have won, in my view, was that those pledges that he made would come good. I mean, right now he's a bit of a technocrat, and he saw when he was at Treasury, he was able to do things in Furlough, get all of these schemes working, and they're amazing. And he thought to himself, well, I'm quite good at this government market. I'm going to go in there and lay my hands in other departments, and I'm going to get results. If he had got results, he might have been able to say, look, I'm a bit of a nerd. I can't really campaign, but look how I deliver for you. And I don't know if you remember his five pledges back in January. He was saying, either I'm delivering for you or I'm not. He made it very emphatic. Judge me by these things. And none of them worked, apart from inflation that was coming down anyway. So I think had he been able to demonstrate that his reforms were working and had he not had to rely on these basically fake claims of what Labour would do, he would have had more of a chance. But then again, in my opinion, the part of the polls, he would have to be only 10 points behind at the start of his year for it to really have been in contention. Now, perhaps he would have been, but I just think his plans didn't work contrary to what he says. I think some of them will actually work just after the election. I think we are going to see immigration coming down fast. We are going to see small boats that policy might work as well. We're going to see NHS waiting lists coming down quite fast by November, December. But it's going to be a stammer government that collects the credit. And why he didn't wait until later on to have the selection, I just don't know. Yeah, I think on to Farage, Putin. I mean, certainly when Nigel Farage started talking about that in that Nick Robinson interview, and then doubled down, has kept talking about it since, I think that you have had the Tory party pretty, you know, but there's not much enjoy at the moment in conservative campaign headquarters. But I think this was a light ray of joy, just in the sense of something that wasn't a complete disaster for them. And therefore, they thought that was a way to kind of try and dissuade some of these reform switches. Do we think it is having a big impact? Well, Fraser and I might disagree slightly. I mean, I think the fact that Nigel Farage has kept talking about it. Some say, "Oh, he's leaning into it. It's, you know, genius rau." I think there's a bit of a sense to you that if he keeps talking about it, I think it's because they're a little bit nervous about how the comments are landing. And therefore, Nigel Farage is trying to defend his position by trying to stop the smears that he is a Putin apologist. There is a little bit of polling. Anecdotally, Tory candidates say on the doorstep, it's probably the best and they've got to try and stop some switches. Some voters are going to vote reform, whatever. But I think with some traditional Tory voters, it's enough to get them back. And there's only, you know, one poll, what can we read from it, but JL Partners had a poll out yesterday, but suggested the reform vote had gone down two points in the past few days. The Tory one had gone up. And on Nigel Farage, there was negative feedback on this. But some of the focus groups are also saying, you know, "He's amazing." So, but I think it is certainly having a little bit of a negative effect and making the Tories argument a bit easier to land. To the lady at the top about what may happen, we are definitely starting to push this tax burden to, we're pushing it to testing levels, you know, just how high can it go? You know, the laugh or curve is real. And at some point, you're going to run into some trouble. I could see some brain drain. Countries like Australia will benefit from what's happening here if that tax burden goes too high. It is, of course, difficult to emigrate. You know, that is tricky. Getting the visa uprooting from your family and friends, it can be really hard. I think business is going to be the one I'm going to be watching in the beginning. Labor almost protest a bit too much about how great it is for business and how, you know, what big fans, businesses of labor, some of those employment reforms that they're talking about may really take a hit. But, you know, I think the biggest long-term impact may be that Gen Z embraces quite classically liberal ideas and opinions, you know, coming into the workforce with the tax burden and where it is, that those tax thresholds frozen. You know, I think you, your generation may realize that there are real benefits to living in a slightly more liberalised economy. And, you know, you guys can save us in a couple of decades. That'd be great. On constitutes a reform, just quickly. I mean, I think the sum in the labor party, you like the idea of switching to PR. Kissed Armor is not one of them. And I think that if you somehow win a 200-seat majority on a relatively small portion of the vote, is that going to turn you against the system or make you more of a supporter? Okay. Well, last set of questions of all you're in for a drink. Thank you. So, north of the border, the SMP, if I had a pretty rubbish time, and just looking at some very familiar problems such as the ferries fiasco, the issues they have for the NHS, the issues they have with the education system. I wonder if you could talk a bit about what a potential labor majority would have on Scotland and the SMP. Okay. Great question. Is there any credible possibility of the Tories doing anything to make them a possibility in the following election? That's how desperate things are. Is it anything that can happen, a narrow path to 2039 victory? Okay. This might be like a strange question, but let's say the Conservatives and the Labor Party were playing a game of chess, who do you think could get a checkmate first? And setting aside public opinion of them, because evidently it's leaning towards one party, but because they're policies and et cetera, who do you think would get a checkmate first? In my opinion, the Conservative policies, if they had the courage to stick to them, would absolutely checkmate anything Labor's got to offer. But the problem is here, the Conservatives don't have a full set of pieces on the chessboard, they're all just collapsing, they've only got like a pawn left and Starmer's got like 10 queens. It's a bit of a kind of strange match. And you think to yourself, look, hang on a minute, if you were writing, thinking that the Conservatives by the policies should be able to get that checkmate, if you should be able to prove it, then what went wrong? I mean, maybe I'm wrong to think the Conservative policies work better, but then again, if you look at the spectators' articles for the last 10 years, we've always been saying to the Conservatives, stick by your principles, you know this works, just try to reduce tax, let people spend their own money, societies are fairer and better if people can get more power. And instead they went the other way, they tried to, every single time they got in trouble, more money to be NHS, let's expand the state and have a look after 9 month old babies, let's expand the state and look after rich people who want to have their hair over a piece of bed. So every single way they got into trouble, they basically moved to the left, they moved away from those checkmate policies and onto the great kind of incinerator which they're going to walk into next Thursday. Sorry, I saw on Scotland, you know, if you have that big Scottish Labour recovery, I was back in my home constituency where my parents are of east-Lovian and the campaign began following Douglas Alexander around who's making a comeback. I think that's the number one target season, so they don't win there, they're doing very badly, but it looks like, you know, a shoe in. I think that you could see Scottish Labour do really well and then I think the next goal is 2026 and the Scottish Parliament elections and having a Labour First Minister, and that, you know, I think just in terms of devolution, in terms of obviously being more drawn out, in terms of some of Gordon Brown's points, I think it'd be really interesting, and I think as for the SMP, well, the SMP and the Tories are quite a lot of common in this election, you know, both are incumbent governments, yes of course Scottish Parliament, not exactly the vote here, but you know, both are parties that I think are wearing, you know, the weight of incumbency, what we've had in terms of pandemic, and the scandal that comes particularly near the end, you know, when your time is up, and yeah, I think the SMP have had a better campaign than the Tories, you know, the SMP have managed to, you know, I think, land their message, not have everything run down, whereas the Tories have almost had everything wrong that could go wrong, and therefore I think the result might not be quite as bad for the SMP as it could be enough of us. It strikes me that one of the things that's gone so wrong for the Tories is they've spent a lot of time trying to move away from or apologize for what they did between 2010 and 2015, the irony being that's when they were winning elections based on some pretty solitary ideas leveling with the public about tough decisions that have to be made, and I think one of the reasons they haven't got any benefit from these so-called, well, yet they are, they're real tax cuts, those cuts to N.I, those are real tax cuts, people can feel them, but they haven't got the benefit of it because they keep saying they're cutting your taxes, and they're doing everything that they know not to do, they're actually dramatically lifting the tax burden through those freezes on tax thresholds, so I think they could maybe return to leveling with people a bit more. In terms of the checkmate question, you'll get your answer, the debate starts right now. Now, I've got the great pleasure of saying something I'll never be able to say before, we're probably never able to say again that all of you are now invited to the spectators garden for a drink. I've always wanted to do that, a great pleasure that we can invite you next door. Meanwhile, please join me in thanking our panel. [Applause] [Music] [MUSIC PLAYING]