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Don't fight for attention. Buy it with Acast. Learn more by visiting acast.com slash advertise. As Keir Starmer cancelled, next week's Prime Minister's questions in a bit to avoid scrutiny for his appointment at the Notorious Peter Mandelson.
We unpack today's exchange between the PM and Kenny Beidner, which saw Starmer admit he'd lobbied for a plumb job for his disgraced former Comms Chief, Matthew Doyle. Welcome to the Daily Tea with me, Tim Stanley. And me, Kim and the Tomini. Tim Stanley, we're getting on to PM News in just a minute.
You just hop for it back from Parliament, but what are we going to be going on the road next week? We're on the road, starting on Monday in London, where we are going to have a special sort of question time, non-trade mark special, where we are going to be joined by Zia Youssef of Reform, James Cleverley of the Tories, and Rachel Reeves' right-hand man from Labour, James Murray. Exciting. Should be a good dingo.
Are you going to be Fiona Bruce? I'm going to be David Dimbleby. I just because it's funny. But the hell of it.
Just because it's funny. Just out in their faces if we get there. We didn't explain it. I was in a dress.
Well, we can do that. You can self identify as Fiona Bruce if you want. And I will be here to support it because you are my close colleague and friend. On Tuesday we're going to be in Cardiff, and that day's going to be exciting because that's when Morgan McSweeney is appearing before the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, so it'll be Emily Formberry, part two.
Yeah. And then on the next day, the Wednesday, we're going to be in Warwick with Jacob Reesmogg. Mm-hmm. And then on Thursday, we're going to be in the seaside town of Worthing, where we're going to be doing a royal special.
Yes. We're wearing crowns with Lady Colin Campbell and Phil Dampia, both purveyors of royal gossip. So that's that. Let's get on to a fairs of state and PMQs.
Now, this might be the last PMQs we discussed for a while, Tim, because controversially, what's going on in the background here? What's happening? It is widely believed that the Prime Minister is going to perogue, that is, suspend Parliament next Tuesday. Sorry.
He's not panicked and called it a military coup. No. This is perfectly normal. We have local elections coming up.
Parliament's going to go on break. It will return, like James Bond. It'll be back in October. Yes.
Or like Arnold Schwarzenegger. Yep. Very good. The issue is the date on which it happens.
Now, if Parliament rises on Tuesday next week, which is what it is widely believed, they're going to do, then that means there'll be no Prime Minister's questions on the Wednesday. Why would the government want that? Because it doesn't want people heading into the break and going off campaigning in local elections with the last PMQs being all about Peter Mandelson again. This is a bit dodgy, isn't it?
I mean, that's a long time to prerogue before the local elections, from the Tuesday to the Thursday the 7th, and this was the party that, in opposition, and particularly Kia Snarmas sort of led the charge against Boris Johnson for the prerogation to get the Brexit deal through. So, as you mentioned, more things will have come out about Mandelson by then, because Emily Thornberry, at the Foreign Affairs Committee, it's turning into the Watergate hearings of our time. Yes. Right.
She will be interrogating Cat Little tomorrow, who is the permanent secretary. So that's on Thursday. And then as you said, Morgan McSweeney on the Tuesday. Yes.
We'll be at the debate, not to screw to the... To take up whatever's come out of that. McSweeney's evidence. Right.
If Parliament is perogued, we're going to get a decision on it tomorrow at Business Questions, but it looks likely that this may have been the final PMQs for some time. Yes. And who knows what we'll have, who knows who will be at the dispatch box for Labor by the time we get back after the election. Indeed.
Could this be Kia Snarmas' last Prime Minister's questions ever? Would he be happy with it, Tim? I mean, I think it was... He went out on a bit of a high.
Yeah, because it was going to be a bloodbath we for, and actually, I felt he came out fighting today. What was his general mood and demeanor? Well, he always comes in and has a laugh. Does he?
You don't really see this because everyone chews in at 12. He arrives a minute early. And, of course, when he walks in, everyone goes, rrr. And he always finds this hilarious.
Does he? It has a good laugh. Him and Rachel about it. And then he puts on the deadly serious face.
Yes. But he's a man who finds cracker jokes funny, isn't he? I don't know. It just sort of speaks to he finds Parliament itself absurd, I think.
Right. I suspect. He's never been... Well, he's a part of it, isn't he?
Yes, he is a part of it. But Kia Snarmas has figured out a line. And the line is... So when...
Chemibabe Knox said to him, was due process followed. He replied, if you had listened to Sir Oli Robbins and his testimony, he said that process was followed. There was vetting of Peter Mandelson. The issue is that what was discovered was not passed on to the prime minister.
Therefore, as far as the PM is concerned, he's in the clear. Process happened. The issue is I wasn't told what the result was. And the person who didn't tell me, who bears responsibility for that, is Oli Robbins.
And that's why he had to go. Yeah, it's an interesting defence, that. I mean, he had a few stumbles, but he seemed very confident in the idea that Oli Robbins's evidence, rather than driving a coach and horses through his defence, had corroborated it. But we discussed this, didn't we, Tim?
And Badenock is going with the line, regardless of what you interpret from Oli Robbins' performance. How on earth can you insist due process was followed? If, as is alleged, your former chief of staff said to the former head of the Foreign Office, just get it effing done when it came to Peter Mandelson's appointment? Yesterday, Sir Oli Robbins said that the focus was on getting Mandelson out to Washington quickly.
He said the Prime Minister's team showed a dismissive attitude to vetting. And they even argued Peter Mandelson didn't need any vetting at all. This clearly wasn't proper process. Why was due process not followed?
Mr Speaker, let me do this directly, particularly this question of pressure in relation to the decision to appoint and to put into post Peter Mandelson. So Oli Robbins could not be clearer in his evidence yesterday. He said this. I didn't feel under pressure personally in terms of my judgement.
His words. Mr Speaker, he went on to say, I have complete confidence that recommendations to me and the discussions we had and the decision we made were rigorously independent of any pressure. Mr Speaker, on top of that, he was asked if any conversations led him to believe that Mandelson needed to take up the role, regardless of vetting outcome. He said, I can say with certainty, it was never put to me in that way.
No pressure existed whatsoever in relation to this case. What is unacceptable is that the recommendation of UK SV was not given to me before Mandelson closed. Now, some people came out of that and said, why did Kemi ask all six questions? Essentially the same about the process.
Yes. Why didn't she say, have three questions about Mandelson and then three questions about the cost of living? Well, that's a tactical issue which the Conservative Party has to answer for. But for those who say her questions were very much in the weeds, she's trying to catch him out on a technicality, rather than go for, you are a busted flush, you appointed a friend of a paedophile, why don't you just go, you have no judgement?
I think the explanation for that is this. The Tories only have one way of getting rid of Kia Stama. They're not going to get him out in a confidence vote. They're not going to do that, because Labour MPs, they're not going to be like Turkey's voting for Christmas, right?
They're not going to do that. The only way they can get him out is to somehow persuade him that he needs to go. Yes. And the path they're taking is on this question of has he misled Parliament?
They're trying to push and push and push him into a corner where eventually he can't deny that he has said something inaccurate. And then, by his own standard set out when he was the leader of the opposition, he then has to go. Yes. And this is the first time that Kemi Baidnock from the dispatch box said, you need to resign.
He knows he did not follow due process, yet he told the house he had. Mr Speaker, I cannot accuse the Prime Minister of deliberately misleading the house, but everyone can see what has happened here. This was not due process. Everyone knows the price of misleading the house.
Will the Prime Minister finally take responsibility and go? Yes. Her comments were echoed as well by Ellie Chowns of the Green Party. Mr Speaker, the Prime Minister appointed Mandelson in a desperate and doomed attempt to pander to Donald Trump, despite knowing about his friendship with the beautiful Epstein and his links to foreign states.
The Prime Minister resisted and then took a dismissive and extraordinarily incurious attitude to vetting, compromising national security. And now he's trying to settle under the bus to save his own scheme. All this from the Prime Minister who pledged to restore trust and integrity in government, but who's repeatedly betrayed the trust of voters and let the country down. Does the Prime Minister not recognise that the best thing he can do to restore trust and integrity is to take true responsibility and resign?
I thought the simple point Kemi Baidnock made about the Prime Minister failing to follow the advice of then-permanent Secretary Simon Case back in November 2024, saying very clearly to the Prime Minister, do not appoint Peter Mandelson before you've done the vetting. Is the kind of information that can cut through to the public? I agree with you that members of the public outside of the Westminster bubble are not kind of poring through the he said she said, Prime Minister said this, or you often said that, my new shy, like we are, because we're nerds. Okay, but that general thing, the question must surely always come back to the simple premise of why on earth did you appoint such a controversial figure whose associations were well known?
Against the warning of the top civil servant of the era, who said, absolutely don't do it this way round. In that case, she has got him on not following due process. She has, but I'm not sure many voters will follow her that far through this labyrinth to get there. It's too complicated.
And I think there's an alternative path which I would have taken if people had made me leader of the Tory party, which is to say this is not about misleading Parliament so much as it's about misleading the Labour party. Now, when we had Morris Glassman on, for instance, there was a voice from the right of the party saying, never like Mandelson, and there have been dozens of people on the left of the party saying, never like Mandelson. I think what I'll be doing is emphasising that, to keep bringing it back to the question of new Labour, Peter Mandelson, and why you backbenchers are still lending your support to this man who fundamentally doesn't agree with your philosophy, doesn't like the historical Labour party, and has brought back all these people who you just hate. I think if I was thinking about, in the future, what's likely to lead to a leadership election within Labour, I'd be emphasising that.
Now, some have begun to press that note because Ben Obese and his objective, the Tory MP, asked this question. We know that the Prime Minister has been playing fast and loose with the Ministry of Abointments in his Chamocracy, so I want to ask him about the first one. They're booing me nothing to me, Mr Speaker, I seem to make some cheer. The Prime Minister has appointed as the Prime Minister's Special Envoy to the British Indian Ocean Territories on the 6th of September, but throughout August, he held meetings with FCDR officials and was given access to classified information, including a meeting minute between the Prime Minister and the then Foreign Secretary sat next to him on the front bench today.
So my question is very simple. When was Jonathan Powell appointed as the Prime Minister's Special Envoy to British Indian Ocean Territory, and what security clearance do you have upon that appointment? Let me say that Jonathan Powell is doing an excellent job for this government, is respected across the world and playing a significant part in dealing with the huge challenges that we face. He is on the mark there.
People have pointed out, comparing contrast, the handling of Peter Mandelson with the handling of Louise Hague, former Transport Secretary. Who had a problem with her phone? It turned out some time ago had Miss reported the theft of a phone yada yada yada who cares. There seems to be a female there that carry on.
But the point is, she was a soft-left female minister who didn't click with the Prime Minister and the Prime Minister in a fit of moral perfection said, you've got to go. Compare that to the many ways in which they bent over backwards to secure the appointment of Peter Mandelson, of whom we knew so much already, including, as Kami Baidnot points out, his links to businesses associated with the Kremlin. The due diligence document said, Mandelson remained on the board of the Kremlin-linked defense company Sistema, long after Putin's first invasion of Ukraine in 2014. The Prime Minister told us on one day that he'd read that due diligence report.
Why did the Prime Minister want to make a man with links to the Kremlin, our ambassador in Washington? And this brings us up to another specter at the feast, which is Matthew Doyle. Yes, Kami Baidnot did refer to this idea that Downing Street and by implication, the Prime Minister agitated for Doyle, who is the former head of Downing Street Communications, to get some plum ambassadorial role. However, I actually think Ed Davey, when he followed up on the Doyle point, was more successful than Baidnot because he also forced the Prime Minister to admit that that had been his personal preference, not just the No.
10 thing. Mr Speaker, I'm sure many of us in this house were shocked by the new revelations from Ollie Robbins yesterday. He said No. 10 told him to find a plum job for Matthew Doyle, another Labour crony, friends with a convicted sex offender.
Speaker, the Prime Minister was asked on Monday whether No. 10 had proposed any political appointments other than Mandelson. Perhaps the last few hours have jogged his memory. Will he confirm today, did he know his office was lobbying for a diplomatic job for Matthew Doyle?
And were they doing it on his authority? Mr Speaker, as I said earlier, Matthew Doyle worked for many years in public service, for me as Prime Minister and other ministers. When people leave roles in any organisation, there are very often conversations about other roles they may want to apply for. In this case, nothing came of it.
Mr Speaker, the House and the public watching will note to the Prime Minister failed to answer my question. The Labour line on this is, and I like it because it sounds like they're channeling that in a trade union representative, that whenever someone loses a job or moves on from a job, there is a conversation about where they might go next. So the PM is framing this as, essentially, he asked, we said No. Or it was vaguely discussed, it went nowhere.
But that's perfectly normal. Yes, and to be fair, that's a strange line to take when Doyle himself responded to Ollie Robbins' claims yesterday, by saying he wasn't aware of any lobbying on his behalf. So that rather contradicts this idea that he was the one pushing for a plum job. No, it seems as if the Prime Minister wanted a plum job for his own close mate.
It's a non-denial denial. But either way, even if you want to be, and I think one should be charitable, both Doyle and the government, he left his job after there are any others. The government said we'll think about it, but no. So you could say no story here, except that this is eerily similar to the Peter Mandelson story.
Yes, and also another person who, at some point in his life, had an association with a pedophile. And to be fair, we must emphasize this, he was friends with this person while he was accused, but not after his conviction. I mean, you might want to argue to him that to promote one close friend of a pedophile to an ambassadorial role is unfortunate. To try and promote two is downright careless.
Yes. And indeed, possibly even a little incompetent. And of course, I just want to stress, it didn't actually happen. No, I know.
But in the eyes of the public, it's about democracy. It's about this is an administration which claims it's egalitarian, which claims that it's just all about ordinary people and it's trying to break down the old boys' network and 14 years, et cetera, et cetera. Well, it's a government of service, Tim. It's a government of service.
It's a government of the people and absolutely not one in the service of the Prime Minister and his own people. Right. Absolutely not. No, but when these stories add up, it looks like a government of friends.
Yes. It looks like the sofa government of the Blair is funny enough. Yeah. But why is that?
Because Peter Manlson is constantly choosing the chint. I think it's partly because of the absence of philosophy. Yes. This happened a little bit under Cameron too, who was notorious for promoting friends and especially people he'd been to school with.
Yes. But I think you do that when everything is about personal connections because what you're not bound together by is a sense of mission or ideology. When a party is motivated by ideology, you can take people from anywhere to be in that party as long as they share that ideology. That's when you can join in meritocracy within politics.
I don't care where you come from. You agree with me. It's the same page we're going to fight and make this happen. When you have no idea what you want to do in government, you've no sense of why you get up in the morning.
How do you choose who to hire? Yes. You choose friends of friends and people who you get on with personally. Well, also people who might be complicit despite their own reservations.
You have to have some loyalty there because let's just move to your point about should Badenock have made this about the more macro issue of the Prime Minister just being waffle. And this is what we're going to move on in the next part of the podcast to talk about a kind of bubbling up of, I don't know, circumspection around the Prime Minister's choices and his future within the cabinet and on the back benches. But I think the central point here is that for not just weeks, but months now. Pretty much everyone in Labour circles is having conversations around just how unfit.
Yes. Yes. It's the question of judgment. And my point is that for the left of the Parliamentary Labour Party, the lack of a philosophy is an element of that.
So the appointment of Mandelson, you could have gone with a career diplomat with a perfectly good wine place you could have stuck with. They chose to make a political appointment. But what were the politics of the person they chose? Someone on the right of the party but who was also expressly picked in order to suck up to Donald Trump.
Yes. Well, we're actually saying he's really good at flattery. Yes. Well, to be fair, they were saying he was a negotiator and he was a player.
And therefore, if we did have to do trade negotiations with the threat of tariffs looming over the place. I'm sorry, but for the few weeks he was in the job. No, but for the few weeks he was in the job. He was okay.
No impression that he was going toe to toe with Donald Trump and putting him in his place. No, of course. He gave the impression that he was getting on with him by saying everything he wanted to hear was happy to Mandelson has advanced throughout his life. Yes.
And at the time, many media commentators were saying, what a clever thing to do. But it doesn't look so clever. In retrospect, after Greenland and Iran. No.
Now your side of the thing. Hang on. Perhaps you've chosen someone of some substance. We might have said to Donald Trump, you're wrong about something.
Well, ironically, we interviewed somebody last week, Hannah Furnas and I, Robert Hartman, who's just written another book about the Queen formerly of this parish. He seems to have been more instrumental in questioning Donald Trump when he had lunch with him for his book. Right. In saying, is he really a good idea to invade Greenland?
And by the way, that whole Canada 51st state plan. It might really annoy the king. Trump turned around him and said, oh, that's a very good point, Robert. Thank you for giving me that tip.
You know, do we know if Mandelson had such conversations? Who knows? Yeah. I'll give on next to some quite good goss from our political editor Tony Diver and others about what the cabinet is really thinking, along with Labor and Peace.
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Get started at acast.com slash advertising. Tim, every cabinet has a safe pair of hands. And in Labor's case, that safe pair of hands is Pat McFadden. Now, Pat, who has been involved in Labor politics for so long.
Centuries. It could be Eons. And he looks it. He looks like someone hired a cottage in the countryside, found an old old book under the floorboards, read from it in Sumerian.
And he arose from the grave to serve in the Labor cabinet. Yes. Alternatively, he could be running the post office in Balamore. The point is, this is- Lovely man.
Lovely man. Very nice. He's a free-spoken Scotsman. Always enjoy having him on the TV news show.
Said to me at Labor, like doing your show. It's good to have some bands. So with my head from that, he likes to take on the fight. And that probably explains why he was chosen to go on the broadcast round this morning following Ollie Robbins' testimony.
However, should we just listen to him having a chat with Sophie Ridge on Sky News? Ollie Robbins claimed that number 10 pushed for an ambassador chip for nothing-door. The former Director of Communications now suspended Labor Pier. Is that true?
It's the first I'd heard of it yesterday. I don't know what conversations took place between number 10 and the foreign office about that. But it didn't come to anything. And I don't think Matthew had the experience to become an ambassador.
So I don't know what, you know, if he was about to leave number 10, what conversations were taking place between- I mean, you know, you're doing interview today. You must have asked them. Did it happen? Well, I don't know.
The implication is that it was Kistama, right? He was like, right, let's get this guy a nice post office. Look, it's not unusual if someone's leaving to see what do you want to do next. Quite what he was asked what he wanted to do next.
I don't know. I'm really sorry. Normally, I'm quite forgiving when people say, I don't know. In this situation, when it was this time yesterday morning, you must have asked the question.
Or if you didn't ask the questions because you want it to come in here and say, I'm really sorry, I don't know. I don't accept that. I always tried to prepare. So what did you do?
Did you ask number 10 what happened? The important point for me is- No, sorry. This is an important point for me. Did you ask number 10 what happened?
So I'm told no appointment was made. But did you ask number 10- Are we no no appointment was made? Did you ask number 10? It is true that Kistama asked for an ambassador to ask the question.
Did you ask the question? I don't think he would have been right for such a post. I think it's right that the no appointment was made. Did you ask the question?
Did you ask the question? What question? Did you ask number 10? If it's true, Kistama asked for an ambassador to ask the question.
Did you ask the question? I don't think Kistama would have asked for this. I don't know what conversation. Did you ask the question?
You know the answer to that question. Did you ask the question? I'm not asked if Kistama asked this. Okay.
And why did you not ask that? Because she wanted to come on here. I don't think the Prime Minister would be in a position of picking up a phone on a personnel matter like that. It's difficult for McFadden, isn't it?
To be fair, he has links to Mandelson because he has links to Blair and Brown. But at the same time, to have him now be put in a very uncomfortable position. Because of the lack of judgement the Prime Minister has displayed. Well, and for it to start to get the impression that McFadden has no judgement.
Exactly. Because what Sophie's implied is suggesting there is you should have asked. Yeah, why didn't any of you ask? And so either he didn't ask.
And so he can't just straightforwardly say I didn't ask because he's embarrassed by it. Or he did ask and he got a non-answer or something. So therefore can't drop the government in it by saying what he was told. Either way, it makes him look bad as well as the government.
Yes. And let's also reflect on Ed Miliband. We discussed this briefly yesterday. But there's a moment when Ed Miliband is speaking to Good Morning Britain.
I think it's his Anna Reid. Where he is doing a quick calculation about whether he wants to expend whatever political capital he has left. Yeah, you can see the cogs turning. Defending the indefensible.
Yes. And that's why he cannot bring himself to say that he supports all of the Prime Minister's decision making on Mandelson. Well, I think, you know, it was a very risky appointment. And it turns out to have been extremely risky for all the reasons that we had more.
I'm not sure. If I'm watching you, I'm not sure what else anyone needed to tell the person at the top of government about this individual that would have made it clear. It wasn't just risky. It was wrong.
What else did you need to know at that moment? Look, it's a fair point. I mean, look, it's a fair point. And he shouldn't have been appointed.
And, you know, that is right. By the way, the telegraph is quoting somebody saying that Miliband is spineless for failing to support Starna. Right. In that way.
But fair enough. Now, she had to cut shorter foreign trip to get back to Parliament. Yes. She's not happy either.
No, she's not. She told Parliament that she was concerned yesterday at the idea that they wanted Matthew Door to get an ambassadorship without telling the foreign secretary. It means Lammy, but I suppose it reflects equally badly in general on the idea that cabinet ministers can just be shut out of decision-making. Yes.
Even when it involves appointments to their own departments. Yeah. And, of course, it reflects poorly upon the diplomatic service as well, if they were even considering it, just dropping in a chum into that kind of job. The FT had a write-up yesterday suggesting that it was a case of people keeping their heads down at cabinet.
People were looking at the desk and the PM was met in virtual silence. Sounds like one of our editorial meetings. As I storm about the place, giving orders. Angela Raina, what has she been up to, Tim?
Your ginger favourite? Does she come above Emily Formry in the boy-crushes? Just slightly below. Could you confirm?
Because I know your fond of them both. Yes. But I think Raina's more likely to become Prime Minister. I'm going to show you what you mean by that.
Obviously. You're attracted by her power. 90% of the crush is about power, of course. Right, of course.
She's talking so much about Tim Snellie. There you are. She spoke. I don't want her to be in charge of me.
She spoke of something called the Good Growth Foundation. Interesting speech. Good speech. She said there are more important questions out there other than Robbins, of course, but called on the government to go further to help people.
Now, it's one of those speeches where she just repeated good stuff the government's doing. So technically, it was a pro-government speech. But there was such a lot in there about how people are struggling and have been let down. Nearly two years in the administration shouldn't be doing a Trump and saying it's all going amazingly well.
So I think there was a subtle nod there to people listening to say, I know we're not moving fast enough and I know that people are angry with us. Yes. I must say that an organisation in the UK calls the Good Growth Foundation may be a breach of the trade descriptions. There is an irony in all of this, as much as I do admire Angelorina and believe she is, if anything, overqualified to be prime minister of this country.
That he or she in the speech is calling for faster, bigger growth. But she is responsible for, for instance, the renter's rights legislation, which is about to come into effect. And the employment rights bill, which businesses say is stifling growth. Yes, and I'm sure we will discuss both at some point because we really must, because while the Madison story is humiliating, embarrassing and makes this question in the prime minister's judgement, Labour is quietly getting on with revolutionising aspects of how this country's economy works.
Revolutionising or ruining a moot point. Our political editor, Tony Diver, he's well-named, isn't he, because he has been doing a deep dive. And he's found he's got some great stuff in today's paper. Now, get this, I love this, I love this quote.
An MP told Diver that secure was now a quote, dead man walking and could be challenged for the party leadership. Quote, how long can this zombie administration continue, they said? It's over for him, he can't come back from this. Someone needs to put an arm around him and say, it's over.
Some MPs have been speaking out publicly, including Imran Hussein, Labour MP for Bradford East, who said that a culture created by Kirstana had divided his party. Now, Imran Hussein and MP, I always enjoy his contributions, he shouts them, so he's unaware that there is a microphone available. And so it's at the heart of this is a toxic and dismissive culture at number 10. Ian Byrne, the Labour MP for Liverpool West Derby, said Mandelsohn's appointment quotes, reflects a wider direction under the Prime Minister, instead of toxic culture had been allowed to, quote, take hold of number 10 and the governing of our country.
And we've also heard in the last hour on GB News, from a Labour MP called Jonathan Brash. Never heard of him. Is that a real name, Jonathan Brash? What did he say?
Well, he said that the Prime Minister should resign. Yeah, I mean, I've got to be clear, I am completely fed up to the back teeth of this cycle drama in Westminster. We've got young goals that are coming from the heart of this government. Meanwhile, we've got fantastic Labour Councillors, Councillors, activists up and down the country working hard and delivering for their constituencies, like mine and Hartley Pool, facing local elections in the shadow of this absolute mess.
They need to get a grip. I'm completely fed up about it. And I think it's got to the point now where I genuinely think that, you know, as far as the Prime Minister is concerned, it's not a case of if it's when. And I just think we need to get a handle on this, because people out there are worried about their cost of living, they're worried about their NHS, they're worried about crying on their streets.
And we're completely consumed by this scandal and it's completely unacceptable. And I'm sure you can tell I'm quite angry about it. You're saying it's if not when the Prime Minister should resign? Yeah, I mean, ultimately we're in a situation where I don't think anyone reasonably expects the Prime Minister to leave the party into the next election.
It's a very this intake of Labour name. They're often called things like Bob Chop and Susan Lauder. They made up. And the thing is, you'll find, because this is not our first time at the radio, is that coups against the Prime Minister disgraces scandals and falls are always a way of learning who your local MP is.
Yes. Well, who knows if more MPs go over the top, it'll be as Boris Johnson once described it as the herd moves. As the herd moves. And by the way, in more bad news, inflation.
Do you know what the percentage rise to marches? No, what is it? It's 2.3%. So that whole hope of we're going to get inflation down to 2% has gone awry because of the Iran war.
So says Rachel Reeves. Global headwinds. Nothing to do with me, Gov. In an echo of the Prime Minister's.
Nothing to seek here. What could they do about the Iran war? Nothing. You should have just opposed it like you did so weirdly.
Wouldn't have made any difference to petrol prices or energy costs, but hey, they could have taken the moral staff. They would have felt a bit happier about themselves. So much more to come on this story. We'll be back tomorrow 5pm.
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