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and smart perspectives from Bbc journalist

1:01

around the world. Find us wherever

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you get your Bbc podcasts. Bbc

1:14

Sounds Music Radio podcasts,

1:17

Hello! This is going to be an episode

1:19

of Reunions for me. First of all, I'm

1:21

going to be reunited with Laura K to

1:23

talk about what earth is going on in

1:25

Scottish politics. And then I'm going to be

1:27

reunited with my specialists subjects brags it because

1:29

the big new book out about it. That's

1:31

to come on this episode of Newscast Cast.

1:33

News cast from the Bbc, hundreds

1:36

of old. Man scrapping over a

1:38

single broken time. And he's not a

1:40

leader. He is a human weather vane

1:42

to. Jinx of the same

1:44

backside. Know China Titians and listening to

1:47

what's happening way a sense they need

1:49

a bigger physical. Why do you always

1:51

think that the way you live is

1:53

better than the way will. Have the

1:55

ai will be do everything he

1:57

appalling Willy Wonka experience. Get a

1:59

knife. Hello!

2:02

Is Adam in the Studio and the

2:04

first subject when a focus on this

2:06

episode is the fate of the First

2:08

Minister of Scotland and Leader of the

2:10

Snp Hamza Yusuf. We sort of refer

2:12

to this a bay on Thursday night

2:14

but didn't go into any detail because

2:16

he was such a fluid situations like

2:18

a really really dramatic one with potentially

2:20

quite big consequences and a lot of

2:22

drama do next week, but we thought

2:25

we'd do it justice by saving it

2:27

till this episode when we could a

2:29

speak to the right people and be

2:31

a little bit. Of the dust. Had.

2:33

Settled and I'm pleased to say with definitely

2:35

got the right people. Laura. Kuenssberg

2:37

their hi Laura hello. Adam

2:39

hello nice guy says I'm in a

2:41

taxi helpful. Classic though. Classic am I

2:44

also Bbc Scotland that it's and very

2:46

good friend of newscast teams Cook as

2:48

they are. Hi James hello Adam Hi

2:50

I'm in the studio and dandy but

2:52

I've not been for many years. Okay,

2:54

but everything's I got his press back.

2:56

Have been there today for reasons real

2:58

explaining to San Bus and James that

3:00

says we wind little bear arms do

3:02

we now know for definite why this

3:04

break up between the Snp in the

3:06

Scottish Greens actually happened and how how

3:08

that happened? Yeah, I think it's pretty

3:10

clear. I mean let's say maybe we'd

3:12

be. Wind even a tiny bit farther

3:14

fire and say that this started with

3:16

Seth. An agreement on the necklace starts

3:19

in his first minister and Twenty twenty

3:21

One that was called the Beats has

3:23

Agreement named for the Grand Adam Brat

3:26

residents which is the official home of

3:28

the first minister Us That's when it

3:30

began. The Greens were broad sense of

3:33

power sharing with the Snp. This form

3:35

a majority rather than a minority government.

3:37

That meant the zebra to green party

3:40

Msps, the coup leaders of the green

3:42

party. patrick harvie and lorna slater

3:44

who became ministers and what was

3:46

that color sergeant government and then

3:49

became hamza yusuf government parts that

3:51

had been tense and really sir

3:53

outs and certainly in the last

3:56

year under mr youssef quite a

3:58

lot of tension quite a

4:00

lot of people within the SNP who

4:03

were frankly a bit sick of the

4:05

Greens because they felt that they hadn't

4:07

implemented some of the policies for which

4:09

they were responsible very effectively. There were

4:11

things like a bottle deposit

4:13

return scheme. Some

4:16

people that was very important but at the lower end of the

4:18

big political scale and then at the upper end

4:21

of the scale there were

4:23

disputes about the highly contentious

4:25

issue of gender which

4:27

seems to just keep reeling its

4:30

head in Scotland. It keeps coming up

4:32

and there was a feeling among some

4:34

in the SNP that they had allowed

4:36

the Greens to push them too far

4:38

down a progressive road. Not everyone in

4:40

the SNP I have to say. Some

4:42

people who agreed with the direction of

4:45

travel. So there were policy differences and

4:47

disagreements and then came a big humiliation

4:49

really for the Greens which

4:51

is that the Scottish Government had to

4:53

accept because it was plainly true that

4:55

they were not going to meet key

4:59

climate change targets reducing emissions of

5:01

planet warming gases by 75% by 2030.

5:06

The Greens swallowed that but

5:08

it was a difficult moment for

5:10

them and their party members said

5:13

wait a minute we want to

5:15

vote on whether to continue in

5:17

this government because with a Green

5:19

government abandoning a climate change target

5:21

and at that point Hamza Youssef

5:23

faced about a month potentially of

5:25

waiting for that vote, potentially looking

5:27

weak, waiting for the Greens to

5:29

decide his government's fate and I think in

5:32

the end he thought I can't have this,

5:34

I'm being damaged, I've got to kick them

5:36

out first. But did he foresee

5:38

what would happen then? No. And

5:40

what it looks like is going to happen next week or

5:43

maybe it is completely definitely Is

5:45

some kind of vote of confidence. James, just

5:47

explain to us what we know about what

5:49

that vote will actually be because I've heard

5:51

different people saying it might be in the

5:53

government overall or just him as a person.

5:56

Which one is it? There Are two things

5:58

going on. the Scottish Conservatives have. Proposed

6:00

a motion of no confidence in

6:02

the first minister himself. We expect

6:04

that to be hard next week

6:07

and then just something into the

6:09

makes the Scottish Labour Party have

6:11

proposed the motion of no confidence

6:13

in the government. Snow on the

6:15

first minister vote of confidence. The

6:18

numbers are incredibly finely balanced that

6:20

are sixty three a sin. Pms

6:22

Peace in the Scottish parliament. Not

6:24

if you add up the opposition.

6:26

The Conservatives, Labor, the Liberal Democrats

6:29

and the Greens. He get to

6:31

sixty four opposition M S P's so

6:33

Hamza Yusuf would be and trouble but

6:36

that is also as rican of the

6:38

pro independence our but party whom the

6:40

seeds of actually defeated severe simply leadership

6:42

before she jumped ship. Unless the nationalist

6:45

know if see votes from the uses

6:47

that's a tie and the newscasters me

6:49

know and parliament's in these situations when

6:52

this a tie it is the status

6:54

quo which prevails which would mean he

6:56

would survive. And Laura business so

6:59

much focus on ass Reagan and there's

7:01

a whole lot history between her and

7:03

the Snp Ads even goes by to

7:05

other big people this and be like

7:07

like when Alex Salmond was the leader.

7:10

Oh yeah, I mean you could not

7:12

make this sounds right. I mean newscasters

7:14

know this that that several sense and

7:16

Uk politics in the last years there's

7:18

been some kind of thoughts that would

7:21

have been pardoned dying by a publisher

7:23

for being sought to ridiculous and for

7:25

their his vengeance and grammar done this

7:27

I'm afraid Tier lists there is another

7:29

one of them because as Reagan was

7:31

not just an Mp who run against

7:33

him, they used to see the datasets

7:36

see but it with somebody who spoke

7:38

up against the Us and please. plans

7:40

to change the gender recognition eyes

7:42

and see sale and those ten

7:45

people who supports has that she

7:47

was absolutely sit of ostracized and

7:49

castile and put on the edge

7:51

of the sort of snp mainstream

7:53

while people like hamza yusuf were

7:56

busy being closed and pally with

7:58

nicola sturgeon and And he became

8:00

her sort of continuity candidate. When

8:03

she walked away, who did she walk into

8:05

the political arms of? Alex

8:07

Sammond, who leads the party, Alba,

8:09

that James has been talking about.

8:12

Who, of course, having been a

8:14

political best friend of, then became

8:16

the absolutely deadly rival of Nicola

8:19

Sturgeon. And now, for

8:21

Ash Regan to have Hamza Youssa's political

8:24

fate in her hands is

8:26

something, as I said, that even Jeffrey Archer

8:28

couldn't have come up with. Maybe it would

8:30

be more a sort of Valm and

8:49

what's happening to him now. Yeah, he was

8:51

supposed to be doing a speech in Glasgow.

8:53

He cancelled the speech. He came to Dundee

8:55

instead. He made an announcement, said he would

8:57

invest another £80 million in housing over two

8:59

years. That

9:01

is a green priority, affordable

9:04

housing. It's also something

9:06

that I think would be welcomed by the

9:08

Alba party. That is surely not

9:10

a coincidence. I mean, I was chatting to him

9:12

and I was saying, you know, your audience, he

9:14

was saying, oh, I want to, you know, make

9:17

this, get this message out to the public. I

9:19

said, it's not the public you need to get

9:21

the message out to, is it, though? It's the

9:23

politicians. It's the people who could decide your future

9:25

next week. And it was interesting

9:27

pressing him on that, Adam, on the

9:30

on what had happened in terms of

9:32

those personal relationships and the and how

9:34

people felt they had been treated because,

9:37

you know, I put it to him

9:39

that he had been pretty disparaging in the

9:41

past about Ash Regan. And he had hardly

9:43

treated the Greens well. And he was now

9:46

saying that he wanted to work collaboratively with

9:48

them to progress as

9:50

a minority government. And I put it to him that

9:52

that wasn't necessarily the best way of going about things.

9:55

Let me say that I Believe the

9:57

End of the Butte House agreement was the right thing. Head

10:01

office with anger the opposite from

10:03

a green cultures and put one

10:05

meets the eye to eye to

10:07

get it was mix of said

10:09

that was with anger that movie

10:11

secluded has been deleted. File Maxwell

10:14

be writing Harvey Alone as.unless. I'm

10:18

also I'm also smith's the think we have a

10:20

what happened and of how much as and have.

10:23

The why we see I'm specifically at it sounds

10:25

like you're saying you've aggressive and you're going to

10:27

apologize or not. I say that I believe that

10:29

ended up sitting here to graduate with done to

10:32

look again you regret the way it was Some

10:34

forget for the who's your favorite words into my

10:36

my know I won't let me know via let

10:38

me speak and my was a few if you

10:40

don't mind And my work with a see very

10:42

clearly that I do understand that emphasizes a position

10:44

because I understand how they must be feeling. A

10:47

Laura This is just another reminder that

10:49

the Scottish and political system whether it's

10:51

the electoral system or whether it's higher

10:53

the actual parliament is configured is is

10:55

very different from Westminster. When

10:58

it is, I dissent from necessarily

11:00

should say that it's not unusual

11:02

for the government in Hollywood to

11:04

be run as a minority, and

11:06

in two thousand and seven than

11:08

it happened. even understand the surgeon

11:10

and two Thousand and sixteen during

11:12

a moment when politically she was

11:14

just as oh my seats. So

11:16

the context of minority governments is

11:18

not something that's alien. it's not

11:20

something that is necessarily disastrous. However,

11:23

the political landscape is so different,

11:25

not just in Scotland, but also

11:27

across. The Uk that whether or not a

11:29

minority government is viable is something that is

11:31

very very different Equations you don't do. We

11:33

think that lay by the is dominant nipples

11:36

in the Uk and research and and Scotland

11:38

is really gonna wake up and saying in

11:40

a while I really fancy helping out homes

11:42

and east has today know this is it.

11:44

They're on the collapse the whole government and

11:47

coffers costs election as well as a general

11:49

a that since the he really think that

11:51

the tories are gonna look favorably on trying

11:53

to help her Hamza Yusuf when he's been

11:55

struggling to have authority and. His own

11:57

party and they're fighting the Snp. From

12:00

constituencies when it comes the general

12:02

election day, we really think also

12:04

that the Independence movement itself isn't

12:07

the same kind of fighting sit

12:09

form than it was and Twenty

12:11

six seen not a bit of

12:13

it. The landscape is very very

12:16

different and very very difficult for

12:18

Hamza Yusuf and he does not

12:20

have the confidence of everybody in

12:22

his own party, so trying to

12:24

appeal to other parties. To

12:27

help him is not some yeah it's

12:29

gonna be easy asshole. Now I'm not

12:31

suggesting that every single person is gonna

12:33

want to be a mountainous and t

12:35

I think you'll be very very interesting

12:37

in the coming days to see what

12:39

other potential leadership contenders paging Kate Forbes

12:41

have to say about all of this

12:43

and it may well be that they

12:45

will just one a bide their time

12:47

but my sense and stay centered a

12:49

huge agree and Anon do not terrible

12:51

thing of of of speculation but my

12:53

senses even if you get through this

12:55

humvees half is a politician. Who is

12:58

kind of carrying lots of

13:00

wings now? He's not been

13:02

in office that long, but

13:04

his credibility is in a

13:06

really. Bad. Place

13:08

and but he is innocent. Point: different,

13:10

prefer for it. Move on. If you

13:12

look at the polls, this if she's

13:15

nowhere near as dominant as A as

13:17

they once were, but actually compare to

13:19

have the Tories are so far up

13:21

hind the Labour party, you might even

13:23

artsy remarks. It's very striking how much

13:25

they aren't as steep always behind the

13:28

lead Foxy and the two parties a

13:30

source kind of the you know level

13:32

pegging at the moment, that the climate

13:34

is. Pretty. Bad for the Snp.

13:36

natural. sorts of reasons yes it is

13:38

isn't that i i've been fundamentally do

13:41

agree with that about analysis laura and

13:43

just a few little things titbits maybe

13:45

to share with newscasters along those lines

13:47

i mean everybody is asking homsey cities

13:49

of interview after into after interview today

13:51

and everybody was saying that even if

13:54

he survives haven't you proved yourself and

13:56

to to be a poor political strategist

13:58

who live weeks and who will not

14:00

be able to carry on with authority.

14:02

I mean these are the questions he's

14:05

been repeatedly asked. There's some Scottish, senior

14:07

Scottish government sources suggesting to

14:09

me that it's over, that even if

14:11

he survives his authority is gone. Another

14:13

couple of things, sources in the Scottish

14:16

Green Party are insistent that they're not

14:18

going to change their mind here, that

14:20

they're not going to back down, that

14:22

they do not have confidence in him

14:25

after the way as they put it they

14:27

were treated. Ash Regan I talked to yesterday,

14:29

she was smiling and laughing and

14:31

having a very happy time with her

14:33

colleagues. It seemed in the

14:35

bar at the Scottish Parliament, she was drinking lemonade

14:38

I should say. She insists she's

14:40

not made up her mind, she genuinely

14:43

wants to see what Mr. Youssef has

14:45

to offer. But just finally on your

14:47

other point Laura, I think that's really

14:49

striking as well. A lot of the

14:51

problems that the Scottish Government has been

14:53

in power for a long long time.

14:55

Does it have the best leader it's

14:59

ever had in that period of time it's

15:02

been in power? You know you can debate

15:04

and discuss that. The

15:06

travails it faces in terms of the

15:08

public services, in terms of getting some

15:11

legislation through effectively and pushing it through

15:13

time and again. You could

15:15

take all of that and apply quite a

15:17

lot of it to the Conservative government and

15:19

the Conservatives are 20 points behind Labour in

15:22

the polls and the SNP while they have

15:24

fallen back and are probably at their worst

15:26

showing now since the independence referendum in 2014

15:28

are neck-and-neck with Scottish Labour.

15:30

So to a certain extent there is

15:32

still that feeling about the Constitution with

15:35

if you strip out the people who

15:37

say they don't know or won't say

15:39

how they would vote on independence and

15:41

that's important but if you strip them

15:44

out you're getting into the high 40s

15:46

closing in on 50% support

15:48

for independence and although some of that

15:51

support has gone from the SNP to

15:53

the Scottish Greens and Alaba there's enough

15:55

of it to sustain them to

15:58

a certain extent but there's... still weakened

16:00

and he is still in big trouble. Well

16:03

James, thank you very much. I think you've earned

16:05

something stronger than a lemonade if that's what you

16:07

like. So thank you very much. Yes, very much

16:09

so. Now

16:11

Laura, in a couple of minutes, Tim Shipman

16:13

from the Sunday Times is coming into newscast

16:16

because he's got a new book out about

16:18

the Brexit years, which is the third in

16:20

his quadrilegy of books about British politics. This

16:22

one's called No Way Out. It's a sort

16:24

of Tim Shipman version of Laura Coonsberg's State

16:26

of Chaos. But it

16:28

was an excuse for us to raid

16:31

the Brexit cast archives and we found

16:33

this bit of guess what, I was

16:35

on holiday naturally and you

16:37

were trying to work out

16:39

if Boris Johnson was going to resign or not. So let's

16:41

have a listen. Well we could do

16:43

reverse order or we could do chronology. So I'll try and do

16:45

it in reverse order. What's actually

16:48

happening now? Right now Boris

16:50

Johnson is in his official residence, which

16:52

he is about to be moved out

16:54

of because at three o'clock this

16:56

afternoon he quit his job, which was announced

16:58

first by Downing Street. He told the PM

17:00

on the phone he was leaving but he

17:02

hadn't yet finished writing his resignation letter, as

17:04

I understand it. Maybe he'd written

17:06

two versions. Joke inserted right there. Go

17:09

back to that. Takes

17:11

you to about ten o'clock this morning when I sat

17:14

down with David Davis who explained it in his view.

17:17

Are we really leaving the EU?

17:19

I asked him. I don't think

17:21

so, which could hardly have been

17:23

a clearer verdict that the PM's

17:25

Brexit means Brexit in his view.

17:27

Brexit does not mean Brexit,

17:29

which takes me back to

17:31

just before midnight last night

17:34

when David Davis,

17:36

after threatening to do so, so

17:38

many times actually left the government.

17:41

Laura, July 2018. July

17:45

2018. I still remember, you know, I'm so sad.

17:47

I still remember all those days really,

17:50

really well. And I also, I remember all those

17:52

moments also with the documentaries that we made of

17:54

being outside Carlton House and being in the car

17:56

on the way back from Checos because that's the

17:59

night then that David Davis she signed it I

18:01

remember being in the car and phoning every video

18:03

in the cabinet and the Brexiteers didn't answer the

18:05

phone and the Remainers did answer the phone and

18:07

that could tell you that would tell you what

18:09

happened that night what was going to happen the

18:11

next day. Well goodness me

18:14

I salute Tim for carrying on with all of

18:17

this. The thought of going back over some of

18:19

that again fills me

18:21

with horror. What an extraordinary

18:23

period it was. Laura I have two images

18:25

of you from that day. One is that one

18:27

you just mentioned of you in the back of

18:29

the car at midnight, laptop screen illuminating your face

18:32

and you're on the phone and your hands free

18:34

and you're like what what and the frantically typing

18:36

it all down and then the other one is

18:38

when you posted that picture of the dog at

18:40

the farm shop. The

18:44

Czechoslovakia I love that dog. And I was on holiday

18:46

in Spain and I was in the swimming pool and

18:48

I got out of the swimming pool and the

18:51

two English women at the next Sunline just

18:53

like Boris Johnson's resigned and I was like I have

18:55

to go and do an episode of a podcast now. Dear

18:58

me well have fun with Tim and I'll

19:01

talk to you all on Saturday which is

19:03

tomorrow. Who knows what we'll have by then. Bye. Bye for

19:05

me. This

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20:24

please welcome to the newscast studio star

20:26

of the sunday times tim shipman who

20:28

is the author of no way out

20:31

which is a book about what went

20:33

on in british politics going from just

20:35

before the start of the brexit negotiations

20:37

in 2017 to boris johnson becoming prime

20:39

minister in the summer of 2019.

20:43

he's also known in the westminster lobby as shippers

20:45

so i'm going to say hello shippers. hello now

20:47

you're in a slightly weird position at the moment

20:49

in that you've finished a book which normally would

20:51

be when you then relax but

20:53

actually you've got another one still to do

20:55

quite soon. yeah well i've been writing a

20:58

book for six and a half years and it

21:00

was so long that it's now two books but

21:02

when you when you turn one book into two

21:04

you then suddenly need two conclusions and you need

21:06

to rewrite the start of book four because there's

21:08

a lot of assumed knowledge that you

21:10

no longer have if you're the reader yeah they

21:13

were putting them out two months apart so i'm

21:15

hopeful people will just plow from one into the

21:17

next and it will be like a sort of

21:19

box set exactly yeah um has it been an

21:22

enjoyable process going back over all that sort

21:24

of yes and no it's kind of i

21:26

mean the line i use is that i've

21:28

endured theresa may's premiership for twice as long

21:30

as even she did which uh is punishment

21:32

for all previous worldly sins but um i

21:35

mean it's strange because a lot of it

21:37

seems deeply ancient and weird and kind of

21:39

the stuff we're obsessing about seems very

21:42

you know sort of distant from the lives we're

21:44

now leading but i think a lot of what

21:46

happened then shaped the world we're living in now

21:49

and and actually a lot of it was deeply

21:51

fascinating kind of interplay between

21:53

characters big big issues that

21:55

were dividing the country a

21:58

lot of kind of constitutional machinations if

22:00

you like that sort of thing, lots of

22:02

plotting and lots of people not

22:04

doing politics terribly well and

22:06

while some of that's depressing, it's also

22:09

quite interesting and having got a

22:12

large number of people to sort of talk fairly frankly

22:14

about what they were up to, it's always –

22:17

I've been in this business for 27 years I think,

22:19

been doing politics for 24 but I still

22:22

get a kick out of finding out new things and intriguing

22:26

little morsels that we haven't

22:28

heard before and there's plenty

22:30

in there even though it's basically a history

22:32

book that will I think amuse and entertain

22:34

as well as leave people in despair. Yeah

22:37

a few things, I mean I always say to people that whenever

22:40

people say oh why do we have to go

22:42

over Brexit again, I'm like well no, it was

22:44

an amazing real time class in how Britain

22:47

operates in terms of

22:49

politics with a small p with

22:51

a big p, parliamentary politics, policy

22:53

making, the civil service, how power

22:55

flows through our institutions, how the

22:57

country actually kind of is

22:59

governed and works and it was all happening in

23:01

real time and quite out in the open where

23:04

actually a lot of that stuff happens behind closed

23:06

doors and we rely on good journalists like you

23:08

to ferret it out in the papers. Yeah it

23:10

was like a full spectrum kind

23:12

of political challenge to everybody and

23:15

I think the

23:17

history I've written at least would suggest it wasn't

23:19

handled terribly brilliantly either by the

23:22

civil service or by the politicians

23:24

and you know people

23:27

ought to set off with some idea where

23:29

they're going and work out how they might

23:31

get there before they start their first couple

23:33

of steps along the path in

23:35

an ideal world and that didn't really happen

23:37

and then once you've chosen your path you

23:39

need to have the ability to take

23:42

other people with you and I think if there's criticism

23:44

of Theresa May which is pretty arguable I don't think

23:46

she was able to do that. It took her a

23:48

long time to work out what she was trying to

23:50

do. When she worked it

23:52

out she wasn't terribly frank with either the

23:54

people in her cabinet or with the country

23:56

and then surprise, surprise they weren't terribly persuaded by

23:58

what she came up with even though on the face

24:00

of it as a sort of negotiating exercise,

24:02

what Olly Robbins eventually got was

24:04

a pretty decent version of what

24:07

she'd asked him to do. The

24:09

problem was not many people shared her

24:11

view ultimately of whether that was the right thing

24:13

or not. And do you remember how much

24:15

effort you had to put in to decode a Theresa

24:17

May speech? Like you had to read between the lines,

24:20

between the lines, between the lines? Yeah, I mean, I've

24:22

interviewed probably, I think, sort of 260-odd

24:24

people for these two books

24:27

combined. And I

24:30

think with the possible exception of a couple of

24:32

people close to her in number 10, pretty

24:34

well every MP, minister, person in Brussels

24:37

that I spoke to, none of

24:39

them had a clue what she was really thinking when they were in

24:41

the room with her. You know, she made

24:43

a virtue of letting the cabinet all speak, but it was

24:45

just noise, you know, no one knew whether they were making

24:47

the point that was going to be decisive. There's

24:50

a quote from Philip Hammond in the

24:52

book, you could always go back because

24:54

she never definitively ruled and said, this

24:56

is what I've concluded as a consequence

24:58

of this meeting. You could always go

25:00

back for more, you could always go and try and lean

25:02

on her again, you could always go and try and impress

25:05

your point of view on her. And another of

25:07

the ministers said to me that under

25:09

David Cameron, you basically wouldn't

25:12

talk across him in cabinet, you'd go and see

25:14

him beforehand and say, this is what I think

25:16

that you should do. And Cameron would

25:19

listen. And if he agreed with you, that'd

25:21

be great. And away you went. And when

25:23

you got to cabinet, you'd kind of both

25:25

talk about the same thing. If he didn't

25:27

agree with you, he'd say, no, that's nonsense.

25:29

And the minister concerned would then go, okay, you're

25:32

the worst and shut up about it. But under

25:34

May, cabinet was just this talking shop. And people

25:36

felt they had to put stuff on the record

25:38

in front of their colleagues, because if they had

25:40

a private conversation with her, they had no idea

25:42

if it had hit home. So they kind of

25:44

had to say it in front of everybody else,

25:46

and potentially leak it to people like us as

25:48

well. Because that was the only way of sort

25:50

of getting their point of view across. And it's

25:52

a very, it's a sort of completely the wrong

25:54

way around of running a government, really. I just

25:56

remember one of those times when there was one

25:59

of those endless nine. hour long cabinet meetings when

26:01

I was in Brussels and all the ambassadors

26:03

from the 27 remaining EU

26:05

member states were in a room and

26:08

the Michelle Barnier's staff had a bunch

26:10

of cardboard boxes which basically had the

26:12

Brexit deal in them but because the

26:14

cabinet meeting was taking so long they'll

26:16

just have to go home and like

26:18

these ambassadors they're like they're like alpha

26:21

males. Yeah they didn't get to take their bit of

26:23

paper with them. Well they didn't get to see the

26:25

bits of paper and then Barnier's team had to lie

26:27

and say that they were just like not the Brexit

26:29

deal they were just cardboard boxes they

26:31

happened to carry and then you had all these

26:33

very seasoned diplomats going oh my you've just given

26:36

us the run around. Yeah. All

26:38

because she was just going around the table hearing

26:40

everyone's opinions multiple times. I started

26:42

reading it this morning and I'm going away for the

26:44

weekend to visit some friends and unfortunately for them I'm

26:46

going to be reading your book. No we can't so

26:48

I'll be very quiet. But what is

26:51

so useful for me is somebody who lived

26:54

through it all in real time but on

26:56

the other side is actually just having someone

26:58

saying these were the pivotal moments and it's

27:00

so useful that in your

27:02

first chapter the two pivotal

27:04

moments you identify there are

27:06

the joint reports in December

27:08

2017 where basically the

27:10

UK and the EU, Barnier's team sort of

27:13

summed up where progress had got to and

27:15

sketched out what would eventually become the backstop

27:17

and that was to allow Barnier to say

27:19

to the 27th head of state and government

27:21

of the EU we can start to think

27:24

about the future relationship now which is the

27:26

stuff that Brits were just desperate to talk

27:28

about and the other pivotal moment is

27:30

just when the government conceded and said the

27:32

meaningful vote in Parliament will be a meaningful

27:34

vote it will have real force behind it

27:36

and it will be on the deal. And

27:39

those two things. They were six days apart.

27:41

Yeah. That was what. And those

27:43

tram lines were kind of late. Those are the

27:46

twin spikes on which Theresa May found herself impaled

27:48

and frankly she was unable to kind of escape

27:50

from either as she went forward. And

27:52

at the time, I mean the second book ended with

27:55

the joint report and it

27:57

looked like a hurdle that had to be cleared to get...

28:00

things moving. But I think we would all

28:02

agree now that that was kind of absolutely

28:04

pivotal to the problems that she then had.

28:06

And she dug herself into such a hole

28:08

that she was unable really to climb out

28:10

of it thereafter. The main thing

28:13

I remember about the joint report day is that it

28:15

happened at the last minute very early on a Friday

28:17

morning. So no one else could – I was the

28:19

only person there because everyone had either gone home for

28:21

the weekend or was stuck in London because there weren't

28:23

trains to get there in time. And I remember doing

28:26

it for the 10 o'clock news in the dark outside

28:28

the EU Commission, the European Commission headquarters, and it started

28:30

snowing in the middle of my life. And you can

28:32

see me – and I've watched it back – and

28:34

you can see me start blinking as if there's something

28:37

really weird going on. It's because there were literally snowflakes

28:39

blowing into my face. So recollections

28:41

vary. Isn't it interesting, though,

28:43

that I talked about those being the two moments

28:46

where the tram lines were set and you said

28:48

they're the two spikes on which Theresa May was

28:50

impaled? And it just shows you that's two different

28:52

journalistic cultures there, isn't it? You go for the

28:54

bloodthirsty metaphor and I go for the nice safe

28:57

transport metaphor. I tend to respond to the way

28:59

that my sources speak to me, and some of

29:01

them are pretty brutal, to be honest. I mean,

29:03

I can tell your audience

29:06

that the swearing count is actually lower in this

29:08

one. The May years were slightly less sweary than

29:11

the early part of the May years. I think it's

29:13

fair to say in book four is the

29:16

count goes back up again. Is

29:18

that because Dominic Cummings makes an

29:20

appearance? Coming first, Johnson, it became

29:22

a rather more profane environment. Now,

29:25

I thought just to trot through some of the history,

29:28

a good way of doing that would be actually talking about

29:30

the different WhatsApp groups that you uncover. And you could just

29:32

tell me who was in this

29:34

WhatsApp group and what they were trying to

29:36

achieve. I don't need an exhaustive list of

29:38

every participant. Trains and buses. Yeah,

29:41

well, this was the key one that brought together –

29:43

this was the most important WhatsApp group towards the end

29:45

of 2018, early 2019 – that brought

29:48

together what I call the persistence, all the

29:50

different groups. People

29:52

who wanted a referendum, the people who wanted a

29:54

Norway option, the people who wanted to stay in

29:56

the customs union. So they

29:58

all were in trains. and buses and

30:00

it was so named because several of the

30:03

former transport spokespeople from the various parties were

30:05

in it. Justine Greening was

30:07

in it, Tom Brake, kind of Lib Dems.

30:09

I think Anna Subri had had a transport

30:11

brief at one point. But it was also

30:13

named trains and buses because apparently whenever they

30:15

were sort of plotting in the corridors and

30:17

somebody from the government walked past,

30:19

Anna Subri would suddenly burst out and go, the

30:22

trains are simply awful. I'm going to take it

30:24

up with a sector tape for transport. And that

30:26

was kind of her cover story. But they had

30:28

these sort of obtuse names because people would be

30:30

in the chamber or wherever, you know,

30:32

plotting on their phones and they didn't

30:34

want it to be blindingly obvious what

30:36

they were up to and trains, the people in trains and

30:39

buses. I think probably five or six

30:41

of them said to me, oh, there was this

30:43

group called trains and buses. You won't have heard

30:45

of it. It's never leaked before. I disappointed a

30:47

few of them by saying, I've already heard about

30:49

that. But they all thought they were the first

30:51

to tell me. And that was, you know, it

30:53

was one, it was quite an effective thing because

30:56

they were able to plot together without the rest

30:58

of us knowing about it. But that's why these

31:01

stories are so good, because that whole thing of

31:03

like, oh, I'm the first person to tell you

31:05

that suggests there's a little bit of naivety there,

31:07

which suggests why they maybe didn't win ultimately, because

31:09

they weren't kind of savvy or tough enough. Some

31:11

might argue. Well, they weren't necessarily organized enough. And

31:13

I think I mean, the book opens with this

31:15

quote from Bismarck, which is very famous, the very

31:17

dominant comings of you. He's obsessed about him. He

31:19

is obsessed with Bismarck. I mean, I found myself

31:21

when I was trying to find quotes for the

31:24

chapters and the start of the book, it's very

31:26

easy to quote Bismarck or LBJ, because they're both

31:28

pretty good at politics. But the Bismarck quote that you

31:30

know, politics is the art of the possible is very

31:32

famous. And I thought, well, I'll look it up and

31:34

check that I've got the wording right. And then I

31:37

didn't realize there's another line and it says, politics

31:39

of the art of possible, the attainable, the

31:41

art of the second best. Oh,

31:44

and I think if you're looking for an

31:46

explanation for why the persistence groups

31:48

didn't kind of get together, there was surely a

31:51

majority in the commons throughout this period for a

31:53

softer form of Brexit than the one we ended

31:55

up with. And they were unable to find it

31:57

because all of them wanted their

31:59

things. And they were not prepared

32:01

to compromise on the second best and the same

32:03

a little bit happened with the ERG who kind

32:05

of pushed May in a

32:08

certain direction. I mean a very tough Brexit here.

32:10

I believe they were ending ended up being slightly

32:12

more successful. But Yeah, I

32:14

mean There was no

32:16

referendum There was no soft brexit

32:18

and that's because people kind

32:21

of forgot that sort of basic of policies

32:23

And I don't think most people even know

32:25

that quote and I think it sums up

32:27

what happened Brilliant. Well,

32:29

they will now right back to

32:31

our whatsapp groups and mating porcupines.

32:34

Yeah, this isn't interesting This is I think he's a revelation

32:36

in the book as well So

32:39

during the cross-party talks may had lost three meaningful votes.

32:41

She then went off to talk to the Labour Party

32:44

but May and Corbyn were You

32:47

know difficult, you know like getting pandas

32:49

to mate and One

32:51

of the I think it was a Nick

32:54

Bowles blind making porcupines So Bowles

32:56

and Oliver let win and so he was

32:58

he was a Tory minister who I've never

33:00

got what his fate was Did he get

33:02

kicked out of the party? He ended up

33:04

flouncing out saying that his party was refusing

33:06

to compromise So he and Oliver let when

33:08

we're big believers in a sort of Norway

33:10

option remaining in sort

33:12

of bits of the single market and

33:16

He's big buddies with Michael Gove who was part

33:18

of the talks and they ran a sort

33:20

of back channel to try and

33:22

persuade Explain to

33:24

the Tories using a former sort

33:26

of Corbyn aid and various members

33:28

of the Labour Party It was

33:31

you know, what do they really mean when they

33:33

say X? What is their actual bottom line? So

33:36

they were kind of explaining to each side Spaying to

33:38

Labour what the Tories really meant and where they were

33:40

coming from and desperately trying to get a deal and

33:42

actually The close aides of

33:44

Corbyn and the close aides of May

33:47

Actually got pretty close to an agreement They

33:50

actually ended up getting as far as writing

33:52

something down and it was kind of May's

33:54

deal Moderated with you know workers rights and

33:56

lots of other stuff that would have been

33:58

a sop to Labour But

34:02

in the end, both sides concluded

34:04

that they couldn't really sell it to

34:06

their own teams. And if they'd put it up in

34:08

the chamber, you might have found that

34:11

the sort of extremists on both sides voted it down.

34:13

And they

34:15

didn't – May was refusing to have

34:17

a referendum, and ultimately that's

34:19

what stopped the Labour Party getting on board. But

34:21

there is a document of

34:23

their agreement in existence,

34:26

which I've seen. And it came

34:29

about in part because mating

34:32

porcupines were sort of keeping both sides informed and

34:34

trying to make things happen. There's a guy called

34:36

Oveleg Gordievsky who was a spy in the Cold

34:38

War, and he was working for

34:41

the Brits whilst working for the

34:43

KGB. And he famously briefed

34:45

Margaret Thatcher about the summit in Reykjavik

34:47

with Gorbachev, and he was also, as

34:50

the London resident of the KGB, telling

34:52

Moscow how to do business with Margaret Thatcher.

34:54

And he kind of brought the two sides together,

34:56

and mating porcupines was basically an attempt to do

34:58

a sort of Gordievsky and bring these two kind

35:00

of rather disparate fractions together. And they got quite

35:02

close. Well, this is classic Brexit because there's a

35:05

whole list of what – there's like another 15

35:07

WhatsApp groups we could talk about, but even just

35:09

talking about the first two has taken up so

35:11

much time. Last question

35:13

is the big historical one. Who

35:15

gets treated better by history than

35:18

they were treated by kind of current events? Maybe

35:21

no one. Maybe

35:23

everyone a bit. Well, look,

35:25

I think if – I would like to think if

35:27

you read the book that you will at

35:29

least understand where people were coming from and why they

35:31

wanted to do what they wanted to do. I try

35:33

and let people draw their own

35:35

conclusions about what people are up to. I'm

35:37

not taking moral decisions about whether what they

35:40

wanted was the right thing, which on

35:42

Brexit a lot of people do that. I

35:45

was trying to judge people in their own terms. Did they

35:47

achieve what they wanted to achieve? Were they canny about how

35:49

they went about it? And I think you can look at

35:51

– just take the two Dominics.

35:54

Dominic Greve, with the help of

35:56

Oliver Lippmann and others, did stop no deal from

35:58

happening. Dominic Cummings has done a great job. ultimately

36:00

rammed it all through in an edifying

36:02

but fairly politically adept way. I

36:06

think, you know, letwin and

36:08

grieve were very clever at how they

36:10

played the rules in the Commons and

36:12

the speaker. I

36:16

think there are people who you

36:18

can look at and say this person had

36:20

a sort of strong moral force, someone like

36:22

Luciana Berger, who was key to that breakaway

36:25

of those Labour MPs. It didn't

36:27

achieve in the end what it wanted but I think that's someone

36:29

who believes stuff and took a

36:31

stand and is admirable. But

36:34

in terms of politics being done well, you have

36:37

to look, you know, we're not

36:39

overburdened with options. I think, you know,

36:41

Johnson and Cummings kind of did ram it all through

36:43

in the end with a clever

36:45

strategy, which a lot of people

36:48

didn't like but did work. I

36:50

think you can

36:52

argue that a lot of the other people

36:55

took a stand too late. I think that

36:57

the remainers in the cabinet were too late

36:59

to get involved in the persistence kind of

37:01

activities. But again,

37:03

you know, behave reasonably nobly in their

37:05

own terms. The other,

37:08

I mean, the other example of good politics

37:10

was the Brexit party startup

37:12

ironically, which went from 0 to 31%

37:14

in literally about four weeks. And they'd

37:16

been very canny at polling messages

37:19

and slogans throughout 2018. And

37:21

they didn't launch until the last

37:23

minute, but they got their registration

37:26

stuff in. Contrast that with Change UK,

37:28

who just didn't start in time to

37:30

register for the local elections, let the

37:33

Lib Dems think Hoover up the remainder

37:35

vote. And had they got in

37:37

there, they might have been the ones getting, you

37:39

know, nearly 20% in the European

37:41

elections and might have then been a factor later

37:43

in the year, but they didn't

37:46

seem to have recognised that they needed to

37:48

launch two weeks earlier in order to get

37:50

the registration of the Electric Commission. And

37:53

then they were themselves divided almost immediately

37:55

into two camps and it was all chaos. Whereas,

37:57

Farage kind of barrelled things through. And it was

38:00

only when Boris Johnson became leader of the Conservative

38:02

Party that the Brexit Party kind of died. Its

38:04

work had been done at that point. But that

38:06

was the kind of masterclass in how to do

38:08

a start-up. So

38:10

I would hope everybody comes away with a view

38:14

at least of the humanity of people, and I try

38:16

and write about the pressure they were under. And I

38:18

don't think Theresa May got a lot right, but she

38:20

was obviously a noble person who fought

38:22

hard and has many admirable

38:24

qualities. And most of

38:26

the people working in politics

38:28

I think are decent people who are

38:31

trying to do what they perceive to be the

38:33

right thing, but all those right things clashed. And

38:36

ultimately it's about winning, and not

38:38

a lot of people showed that they understood how to

38:40

go about that. Well, I was going to ask you

38:42

about some of today's news, but actually as usual, Brexit

38:45

sucked us back in. We thought

38:47

we'd escaped, but it called us, but what's that quote? I

38:49

thought I'd got out, but I got sucked back in again.

38:51

I misquoted a famous film, but

38:53

never mind. That's why I don't write books. Anyway, Tim,

38:55

thank you very much. It's a pleasure. I

39:26

know what you love trains to. I

39:31

always thought the part, the reason that the Wi-Fi was

39:33

so sketchy and the signal drops out was just because

39:35

if you're going through on a train real quick, it

39:37

jumps from Wi-Fi supplies to

39:39

Wi-Fi supplies. Well, it's just the

39:41

windows are too dark. Is that how it works? Well,

39:44

since then we've heard from Alex Jackman,

39:46

who looks after network communications at the

39:48

mobile network EE, which is part of

39:50

the BT group. And he's here now.

39:52

Hello, Alex. Hi, there. I

39:54

suppose, first of all, we've got to talk about two

39:56

different things, Wi-Fi and mobile phone reception. What do you

39:58

want to tell us about first? Sure.

40:00

Well, both those comments yesterday are kind

40:02

of right. If you're a passenger on

40:04

a train, you access your signal through

40:06

one of two ways, either from a

40:08

mobile mass direct to your handset

40:11

or from the train Wi

40:13

Fi on board. Now, both of those systems

40:15

use mobile signal but slightly differently. So

40:17

if you're a passenger using your phone, the

40:20

network will try and put the signal into

40:22

the train. That's a problem because

40:24

the train is effectively a glass and steel box

40:26

with a few cushions in and access

40:29

the Faraday cage. And that

40:31

means a lot of the signal will get lost for actually

40:33

getting into the carriage. The train Wi

40:35

Fi works slightly differently or tend to have

40:37

a box or boxes on the carriages that

40:39

will pick up the mobile signal and then

40:41

it will repeat that signal into the carriage.

40:43

Now the limitation there will depend on what

40:46

the train company has signed up to or

40:48

housing its franchise agreement with government. And

40:50

Louise Hagges theory that the film on

40:52

the window of her train might be

40:54

interfering with her phone signal. Well, that

40:56

is definitely an element. As I say,

40:58

these are steel and glass carriages and

41:00

moving on a good day at 100

41:02

miles an hour, whizzing past all the all

41:05

the math and they do tend to attenuate

41:07

reduce the signal that can get into the

41:09

carriage. So she is like, Oh, okay, because

41:11

I was a bit skeptical. But my own

41:14

research has has confirmed what you

41:16

just said. And Alex, just I mean, why were you

41:18

just listening to newscast or watching it last night? And

41:20

you thought I must I must inform them. I

41:23

tend to inflict the newscast podcast on my son in

41:25

the mornings while I drop him off at school. So

41:27

I heard this and thought I'd I try and lend

41:29

the helping hand. That's going to

41:31

be one well informed kid. Alex, thank you

41:33

very much for your technical know how. You're

41:35

welcome. And that is it for a

41:37

ram packed episode of newscast. That was

41:40

actually a little Jeremy Corbin train reference.

41:42

If you want to think back to

41:44

the Brexit years, there will be another

41:46

episode of newscast with Laura Kay and

41:48

Paddy very soon. Bye. Newscast. Newscast from the

41:50

BBC. Well, thank you for making it to the end of

41:52

another newscast. You clearly ooze stamina.

41:54

Can I gently encourage you to

41:57

subscribe to us on BBC Stan?

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