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at coriant.com that's Coriant dot

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com. Will

0:35

the economy save Sunak? Welcome

0:42

to Political Fix, your essential insider

0:44

guide to Westminster from the Financial

0:46

Times with me Lucy Fisher. Coming

0:49

up in a week where the economy seems to

0:51

have turned a corner. Will the

0:53

Tory plotting die down? Plus

0:55

Labour's Rachel Reeves sets out her

0:57

stall. With me here

1:00

in the FT studio are Political Fix

1:02

regulars Miranda Green. Hi Miranda. Hello Lucy.

1:04

And Jim Pickard. Hi Jim. Hello. And

1:06

we're also joined by the FT's Anna Gross.

1:08

Hi Anna. Hi Lucy. Anna's been

1:10

interviewing Labour's Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting

1:12

this week. But more on that later.

1:18

So Miranda, we

1:20

had a very wobbly week

1:22

from Rishi Sunak last week

1:24

into a very febrile weekend.

1:26

Newspapers splashed on stories of

1:28

penny mordant plotting, MPs plotting to

1:31

replace him. It seems to

1:33

have died down a bit and he's launched this

1:35

fight back hasn't he? He's tried to get back

1:37

on the front foot by talking about the economy

1:39

having turned a corner. Does that stand up to

1:42

scrutiny? Well it doesn't, it doesn't.

1:44

I mean politically it's the right thing for him

1:46

to do. He couldn't afford to have his MPs

1:48

go away on their Easter recess, staring

1:51

a sort of set of potentially disastrous local

1:53

election results in the face which are coming

1:55

on May the 2nd. And

1:57

the atmosphere getting more and more febrile.

2:00

So they had to do something to sort of, you

2:02

know, look at a bit more assertive. The

2:05

problem is this kind of unite or

2:07

die message that he's been delivering to

2:09

his MPs is

2:11

something that he sort of returns to at

2:13

desperate moments and has done now right from

2:15

the very first day, you know, of his

2:18

premiership. And it doesn't work. They don't get

2:20

the message. I think what's quite interesting here

2:22

is one of those kind of weird rules

2:25

of politics where newspaper stories

2:27

can actually have the opposite effect

2:30

of what they're reporting at the time, i.e.

2:33

if the plotting starts to look too

2:35

dangerous and you're about to topple a

2:37

prime minister, you can actually prompt a

2:39

certain amount of unity in a party

2:41

to sort of see off what they

2:43

think could be potentially disastrous, which is

2:45

ditching yet another prime minister, you know,

2:47

before the general election. So in a way,

2:50

I think the pendulum swung so far towards

2:52

Let's Ditch Him that it sort of had

2:54

to swing back through a feeling of wanting

2:56

some safety there. But it is interesting. It

2:58

hasn't gone away. And there are new names

3:00

in the frame all the time, it seems,

3:02

and even Robert Genreich saying that he will

3:04

run at some point when it gets to

3:06

that point. Well, come on to some of

3:08

the other names in the ring that are

3:11

emerging weekly. But Jim, there

3:13

was a standing ovation, much stamping

3:15

of feet and banging of the

3:17

tables at the 1922 committee, the

3:19

Back Bitch committee of Tory MPs,

3:21

when Sunak came and gave them

3:24

this address, this unite or die

3:26

message that Miranda mentioned. What

3:28

do you make of that? I mean, there's a much

3:30

talk of these perfidious Tories sort of clapping louder just

3:33

before they oust someone. But there has

3:35

been good economic news on both inflation

3:37

and potentially further ahead on interest rates

3:39

this week, hasn't there? Exactly. You

3:41

need to take the bang on the tables with a

3:44

pinch of salt, you know, the bang on the tables

3:46

for Theresa May, the bang on the tables for Ian

3:48

Duncan Smith, before getting rid of these far from successful

3:50

former leaders. The thing I

3:52

find interesting about all of this is that

3:54

when you stop and look at what is

3:56

the plot that got the newspapers so exciting

3:58

last weekend, what is the actual. consists of.

4:00

It seemed to me to consist of a very

4:02

small handful of people just sort of idly

4:05

shooting the breeze about potential scenarios replacing Rishi

4:07

Sunak. And there was a very telling line

4:09

in Times by the brilliant Steven

4:11

Swinford where he said that this was fewer

4:13

than half a dozen Tory MPs. Out

4:16

of 350, this is barely 1% of the Conservative party in the

4:18

House of

4:21

Commons. But what we have is we

4:23

have a scenario where we the press

4:25

and they the politicians are being led

4:27

by the opinion polls all the time.

4:29

Even though in my 17 years in

4:31

Parliament, I've seen opinion polls being wrong

4:33

all the time, almost all the time. Think

4:36

of all the times when they're given Theresa May

4:38

20-point lead and then she loses it or they

4:40

put the remain camp ahead. And yet everything we

4:42

do is through the prism of that. So if

4:44

you would have five Labour MPs sitting in a

4:46

corner saying, let's get rid of Keir Starman replacing

4:48

with God only knows five letters,

4:51

would we be splashing our newspapers with

4:53

it? And yet there is of course,

4:55

because the opinion polls are so bad

4:57

and the Conservative MPs are so depressed

4:59

that we have to take seriously

5:01

the possibility that something could happen. But I think

5:03

this is just a bit premature. I think it's

5:05

going to be May the second when the local

5:07

elections come through that actually all this fake plotting

5:09

could become something genuine. The thing is, I

5:12

certainly spoke to a lot of MPs that I would

5:14

call the sensible, quite cautious characters last week

5:16

who said for the first time,

5:19

the sense of panic coalescing the party

5:21

had made them themselves fear

5:23

for keeping their seats and start to think about the

5:25

question of whether rolling the dice in a new leader

5:27

would be worth it. Specifically the idea that Penny Morden

5:29

was in league with a load of right-wingers and they

5:31

were about to strike. Can

5:35

I ask you just, Jim, on this

5:38

question about the economy though, you know,

5:40

we've seen inflation fall faster than expected

5:42

to 3.4%. There's suggestion that although interest

5:44

rates were held at 5.25% for the

5:48

fifth time in a row this week, that a

5:50

cut is coming soon. Will people

5:52

feel better off about the pound in their

5:54

pocket by the time of an election this

5:56

autumn? Okay, so talking to Cabinet members this

5:59

week, this is... the race against

6:01

time that the Conservative Party is in, which

6:03

is inflation can come down, interest rates can

6:05

come down, and mortgage rates can come down

6:07

by the end of the year. They think

6:09

they're in with a much better shout at

6:11

the general election. But I feel a little

6:13

bit like the relationship between the general public

6:15

and the Conservative Party, you can overstretch that

6:17

comparison with an actual relationship between two different

6:19

people. But if you're in a failing relationship

6:21

and someone takes you to the Opera and

6:23

buys you fowls and chocolates and lovely dinners,

6:25

if you can't stand them and you

6:27

want rid of them, there's not a lot you can do. And

6:29

I feel a little bit like people aren't going to

6:31

say my mortgage rates come down, I suddenly love Rishi

6:33

Sino. It's really interesting Jim's

6:36

point about whether people

6:38

feeling more optimistic about the economy

6:41

actually will then govern their voting choice

6:43

at the election. Because in America we

6:45

seem to have seen that completely diverging

6:47

now in that your opinion on whether

6:49

the economy is okay or not is

6:52

led by your political allegiance rather than

6:54

the other way around. And it'd be

6:56

interesting to see whether that starts to

6:58

disconnect here as well. If I

7:00

can just come in on Jim's point, just

7:02

on your analogy about taking someone out for

7:04

a date and chocolate and giving

7:06

them flowers and things. In this case it's

7:08

more saying I will take you on a

7:11

date in six months. Because the reality is

7:13

that inflation is still going up by 3.4%.

7:15

So people are still having to

7:17

pay more for things. As Lucy said, the interest

7:19

rates are held at 5.25%. So there is still

7:21

over the next

7:23

few months thousands of people whose mortgages are going

7:25

to end and they're going to have to pay higher

7:27

rates and who've got debts to pay off. So I

7:30

think the reality is for a lot of people

7:32

as he said, are they actually feeling it?

7:34

No and they won't for a long time.

7:36

Anna I know you've been watching really closely

7:38

what's been going on with the Rwanda bill

7:40

now delayed again till after Easter its passage

7:43

into law. How big a problem

7:45

is that for Sino and getting those planes

7:47

off the ground finally? I think the government

7:49

has been really trying

7:51

to push this framing that

7:54

Labour and kind

7:56

of unelected peers are

7:58

trying to thwart the government and trying to... prevent

8:00

it from enacting this policy, which is ultimately

8:02

what the public wants. But I'm

8:05

not convinced. I think that, you know, the public

8:07

really care about migration. They're really concerned

8:09

about the levels of irregular migration, about

8:11

the number of small votes that are coming across. I

8:14

don't think that the vast majority of the public

8:16

think the Rwanda plan is the right way

8:18

to go about it. So I think that

8:20

they're not convinced necessarily by this idea that

8:22

Labour's thwarting this kind of great vision.

8:25

Because you're talking about just to my listeners who haven't

8:27

been following it closely, the bill was

8:29

back in the Lords this week. The

8:31

Lords swept through seven amendments, which means

8:33

that instead of it passing to law, it's got to

8:35

go back to the Commons. They've got to send it back to

8:37

the Lords. It's got to go through this ping pong

8:40

process. So you don't buy Rishi Sunak's spin

8:42

that it's Labour and Labour peers, crossbench

8:44

peers in the House of Lords who

8:46

are blocking it. Exactly. I don't

8:48

think that's going to particularly resonate with people.

8:50

But I do think that there's a good

8:53

chance that if, and it's a big

8:55

if, planes do take off, and

8:57

100, 200 people are sent to Rwanda, I do

8:59

think that could be a positive

9:02

thing for Sunak, particularly if,

9:04

as ministers claim, it does have a

9:06

significant deterrent effect. Because there is a

9:08

lot of skepticism about that. The public

9:10

is yet to be convinced of that

9:12

point. For me, one of

9:14

the big stories on Rwanda this week

9:16

has been the suggestion from Kigali itself

9:18

that actually it wants very much a

9:20

staggered start to this policy, a maximum

9:22

of 150 people to begin with. Anna

9:27

talked about you needing quite a sizeable chunk

9:29

of people to be sent over there for

9:32

it to have this deterrent effect. I mean, to my

9:34

mind, 150 won't come anywhere close, will it? No.

9:37

And I think it's notable that the

9:39

Labour Party thinks it's a great story

9:41

for them. So, Kia Stalmer

9:44

went quite hard on Rwanda at

9:46

PMQs this week, because if you

9:48

sort of start to break down

9:50

the cost per deportee, it

9:52

looks really expensive. There's also been stories

9:55

about actually paying people to get on

9:57

the flights, which is, you know, more

9:59

taxpayers than you. money. So I

10:01

think you're right, the more that the

10:04

policy itself delivers a small number, the

10:06

less it can help in the way

10:08

that Anna's outlined with their

10:10

argument that it's some sort of deterrent

10:12

on more migration into the UK. But

10:14

I mean, I think overall, what's interesting

10:16

about this is that both sides think

10:18

that this policy helps them. And

10:21

that is probably true because actually, if

10:23

you look at the opinion

10:25

polling as Anna has outlined, it's

10:28

something on which people are quite polarised,

10:30

Labour party support doesn't like the Rwanda

10:32

plan for lots of different reasons, they

10:34

find it cruel, ineffective, and also that

10:36

it's not good policy in terms of

10:39

cost effectiveness, etc. But there's

10:41

a segment of the Tory party

10:43

support that quite likes the

10:45

plan. So were it to succeed, were those flights to

10:47

get off the ground, it would at least be

10:49

a mark of some sort of

10:51

competence on the part of the CNET government

10:53

and satisfy that chunk of their potential electorate.

10:56

So I think there's a sort of polarisation

10:58

of opinion on it. Jim,

11:00

on Wednesday, we saw more than 500 people cross

11:03

the channel in a single day. And I

11:05

don't know what your sense has been, to

11:08

my mind, we in Westminster have talked a

11:10

lot about the Rwanda policy, the legislation, the

11:12

legality of getting this plan off

11:14

the ground. I don't think we've seen

11:16

on the TV screens, the kind of footage of

11:19

people arriving on the beaches that much this

11:21

year. And I just wonder now we're heading

11:23

into spring summer weather, if we start to

11:25

see these record numbers of crossing 500 in

11:27

a single day, it is going

11:29

to really reignite this topic in the public's

11:32

mind, isn't it? Yeah, I mean, it's

11:34

an interesting question, which is if the same thing

11:36

happens every day, Adam Finite, and does it stop

11:38

being a news story, because everyone becomes accustomed to

11:40

it. And I think the answer on this occasion

11:42

is up to a point, but as

11:44

we get close to elections, first the local elections, and

11:47

then the general election, the salience will

11:49

increase, and it will be Reform UK,

11:51

the Nigel Farage, Richard Tice vehicle, which

11:53

will take advantage of it a bit

11:55

the most. And it was one of the arguments

11:57

within the Downing Street team of Rishi Sinak as

11:59

to whether to do the election in May, whether to

12:01

go later in the year, they thought, you know, if you

12:03

do wait till the end of the summer, you could have

12:06

record crossings yet again. And I think as

12:08

to this argument earlier about the salience of

12:10

the Rwanda scheme and whether people like it

12:12

or think it's effective or not, I think

12:15

the British public aren't all like brilliantly numerous,

12:17

but most people can see the big gap

12:19

between getting a couple of hundred people in

12:21

the air and literally tens of thousands or

12:23

hundreds of thousands over several years of people

12:25

coming across the channel and how the Rwanda

12:27

scheme doesn't seem to be big enough, even

12:30

if it is successful. And

12:32

just on that point, Sunak has talked

12:34

again and again, as is the home

12:36

secretary, James Cleverley about boat crossings going

12:38

down by a third last year compared

12:41

to the previous year. They

12:43

just hammer it home. They talked about it again at PMQs.

12:45

They always bring it up. But pretty much all of that

12:47

is to do with a massive reduction

12:49

in Albanians coming over. And that's because

12:51

of a very specific agreement that was

12:54

made with the Albanian government. And

12:56

so what you might see this year is that compared

12:58

to last year, we're not going to see

13:00

the big declines. And Sunak won't be able

13:02

to necessarily point to it as the

13:05

strength of his policy and the Rwanda scheme, which

13:07

hasn't actually started yet. Really good

13:09

point. We could indeed see the numbers go

13:11

up year on year. Miranda, you mentioned earlier

13:13

that Robert Jenrick, the former immigration minister who

13:16

resigned over the Rwanda policy,

13:18

arguing that it won't work, that he's told

13:20

friends that he wants to run. There's

13:22

chatter about pretty Patel that I'm very

13:24

interested in. And noticeably to my

13:26

mind, Penny Mordent hasn't taken any

13:28

public opportunities to rule herself

13:30

out of trying to take

13:33

over before or after an election. So

13:35

the Penny Mordent plot is the

13:37

one that has this kind of feel of a sort

13:39

of Tudor plot against the Queen

13:42

or King about it. And

13:44

there was even a joke in PMQs

13:46

that she famously was holding that sword

13:49

during the coronation that she might be

13:51

the sort of human sword of Damocles

13:53

held over Rishi Sunak's head. But

13:56

then these other people actually coming out

13:58

of the woodwork are clearly... sort

14:00

of clusters on the right, the generics,

14:02

the pretty patelles, you know, obviously Suella

14:04

Braverman for a while was trying to

14:06

kind of position herself as a

14:09

potential leader in waiting for that wing.

14:11

The interesting thing about the mordant plot,

14:13

should it sort of survive, is

14:15

that there seems to be this idea that

14:17

she could be some sort of caretaker leader,

14:19

so not a leader for the long term.

14:22

Does that really fly? You know,

14:24

there's also Tom Tugenhart, who of course has

14:26

tried once before for the leadership.

14:29

So I think it is kind of picking up a little bit

14:31

of pace. And,

14:33

you know, the speculation has also

14:35

sort of started around, well,

14:39

what might Sunak himself be thinking, you know,

14:41

there must be a good job waiting for

14:43

him somewhere. I think it's quite interesting when

14:45

the conversation moves on to that as well,

14:48

because then it's trying to second guess whether

14:50

a prime minister will actually want to stick it out. I

14:52

mean, I personally think he looks like he doesn't want to

14:54

stick it out. But there is chat

14:56

about that. Yeah, I mean,

14:59

I think when I'm saying the penny mordant

15:01

plot, basically was this kind of fragile thing

15:03

that never took off and with a little

15:05

bit of a media invention possibly being egged

15:07

on by a few malconsents in the Conservative

15:09

Party. The fancy message, we know that penny

15:11

mordant would love to be prime minister. Okay,

15:13

so let's be clear about that. And I'm

15:15

fascinated by the fact that people keep forgetting

15:18

that she came pretty close in the contest

15:20

a couple of years ago, and another

15:23

five votes would have would have put her

15:25

ahead of Liz Truss first time around against

15:27

Rishi. So she missed out then. And then

15:29

when it was the next one along which

15:31

Rishi Sunak won, penny mordant was picking up

15:33

pace against him in that leadership contest. And

15:35

you'll remember that Boris Johnson came

15:37

back from the Caribbean flirted with the idea of

15:39

running, got a load of backers, and that took

15:41

the wind out of penny mordant sales. And I

15:44

think in other circumstances, if it wasn't for that Boris

15:46

Johnson maneuver, penny mordant would now be prime minister. So

15:48

she does want to be there. The big

15:50

question that we keep going round and round

15:52

to Antori and P's happy or unhappy keep

15:54

coming round to is if you dislodge the

15:57

Prime Minister, what you get instead and

15:59

does ludicrous having four prime ministers

16:01

in one parliament answer obviously yes and

16:03

does it win over

16:06

the general public replacing the Richardson

16:08

Act with another random Tory MP

16:10

when the party itself

16:12

seems to be massively unpopular, these

16:14

conversations go round and round in circles. Of

16:17

course there's always this sort of action, is it an

16:19

actual plot yet? Question mark. Well we

16:21

should also mention that Pennymordant's seat isn't all

16:23

that safe right down in Portsmouth which would

16:25

be another sort of potential factor against her.

16:29

Anna we've heard from Hunt the suggestion, the hint

16:31

that the election is going to be in October

16:33

when he used that as a hypothetical when discussing

16:36

when the public will go to the polls. Should

16:39

Sunak just come out and announce the date?

16:41

Is there now a rationale for doing that? There's

16:43

been so much back and forth he took so long

16:45

to rule out a May 2nd

16:47

general election. The public would

16:49

very much like him too, I think

16:52

us political reporters would very much like

16:54

him too, it would make our lives a lot

16:56

easier. I do think if

16:58

I was in his position I can understand that

17:01

there's a benefit to leaving it

17:03

a little bit open because if a confluence

17:06

of factors came together, if there was some

17:08

really good economic data that coalesced around the

17:10

same time as a flight was able to

17:12

take off to Rwanda and several other things

17:14

that kind of looked in his favour, I

17:16

can see that he could sort of strike

17:19

while the iron's hot and just go to the polls and

17:21

that is an attractive proposition for him. But

17:23

I think that comes back to your original

17:25

question doesn't it Lucy which is this idea

17:28

that even if the economy starts to

17:30

turn the corner people have to feel

17:32

it and you know there's

17:34

actually evidence from elections not just in the

17:36

UK but in the US that you do

17:38

need to leave it a while but there's

17:40

that wonderful famous quote from a member of

17:42

the public saying well whose GDP is it,

17:44

it's not mine. You want people to actually

17:46

experience their own everyday economy I think is

17:48

what Rachel Reeves called it doesn't she you

17:50

know there's an improvement for that to

17:52

work at all even to mitigate the scale of

17:54

your defeat. Well let's move

17:56

on to Rachel Reeves who this week gave

18:00

May's lecture. Jim, just tell

18:02

us about this lecture and why people put it

18:04

up in lights. So for the

18:06

financial community, or the financial-slash-political community, this

18:08

is quite a big deal. It's been

18:10

going on since 1978 and every year

18:12

a big figure from Central Bank, or

18:14

usually a politician, will stand up and

18:16

do a big speech about their economic

18:18

and financial vision. And I was fascinated

18:21

to discover that Anna-Lise Dodds, who used

18:23

to be the shadow chancellor, was

18:25

the first woman to give this speech in 2021,

18:28

which seems a little bit late in

18:30

history for that to happen. And so on Tuesday

18:32

evening it was Rachel Reeves, the current shadow chancellor

18:34

for labour, who set out her vision. A lot

18:37

of people were very excited by the financial rules

18:39

she set out. Those of us who follow the

18:41

Labour Party very closely know that certainly one of

18:43

them has been around for at least a year,

18:46

which was this idea that debt should be falling

18:48

as a proportion of GDP after five years, which

18:50

is echoing the conservative policy. And there is another

18:52

fiscal rule she set out, which is aiming to

18:55

borrow only to invest, which we've heard a bit

18:57

of before. But when you say to Rachel Reeves'

18:59

team, is this actually new or is it old?

19:01

They sort of say, well, we've kind of alluded

19:04

to this and we said it here or

19:06

there, but here we are announcing to the

19:08

Square Mile, in lights, in big

19:10

block capital letters, these are the golden rules

19:12

by which you can judge us and we

19:14

will be fiscally prudent. But of course, politically,

19:16

it puts Rachel Reeves very much in the

19:18

same box as Jeremy Hunt. And those people

19:21

who say, well, Labour sounds economically

19:23

very similar to the Conservative Party, I'm not

19:25

wrong. I mean, Miranda, another

19:27

theme that Rachel Reeves really played up

19:29

was stability. She talked about building

19:31

on the strength of institutions. Is

19:34

Labour overdoing the caution? That's

19:36

such a good question, isn't it? Because listening

19:39

to Jim there, and as your question alludes

19:41

to, Labour's got to walk this tightrope between

19:45

excessive or near excessive amounts of

19:47

reassurance so that that Conservative message

19:49

of don't take a risk on

19:51

Labour can't work. And they've looked

19:53

so closely at the Blair Brown

19:55

playbook from 1997, in

19:58

which Gordon Brown spent a lot of time in the lot

20:00

of time doing a similar process of

20:02

reassurance. I will be the iron chancellor.

20:04

I will guard these new fiscal rules

20:06

with my life. And she's doing the

20:09

same thing. Stability is the new black.

20:11

But they've also got to show that they

20:13

will make some sort of change to the

20:16

fabric of the country, which involves spending some

20:18

money on the public services. This is the

20:20

problem. So it's all going to be about

20:22

where the money comes from if they stick

20:24

to these very, very strict fiscal rules. And

20:26

of course, that once again draws attention to

20:29

the growth plan, they're going to

20:31

have to get money in through economic growth.

20:33

They're putting all of their eggs in that

20:35

one basket. And you can very much see

20:37

the kind of hand of people like the

20:40

Tony Blair Institute behind this sort of policy

20:42

stance, which is that we can't be seen

20:44

as a high tax party. We can't be

20:46

seen as irresponsible on borrowing. We've got to

20:49

get the economy moving again and get the

20:51

tax revenue from growth. And that sends you

20:53

back to their growth plan, where there are

20:55

quite a lot of holes and the 28

20:57

billions disappeared. So in a sense,

21:00

there's a sort of circular policy conundrum

21:02

about the labour plan there, I think.

21:04

Yeah. Jim, you've

21:06

interviewed Rachel Reeves quite a few times, haven't

21:08

you? And probably know her better than most. What's

21:10

your insight into what kind of chancellor

21:13

she would be? It's

21:15

a question which I struggle with this one, because

21:17

I think the answer I would have given two

21:19

years ago would have been a little bit different.

21:21

I think she has been on a journey. And

21:24

the obvious journey she's been on has been in

21:27

labour terms, she's quite moderate. But

21:30

if you go back a few years, I mean, I

21:32

remember when in the wilderness years during when Jeremy Corbyn

21:34

was leader, I remember going to a speech she gave

21:36

in the stand, where she was talking about how there

21:39

should be an enormous wealth tax every year. I can't

21:41

remember what figure it was, but I think it was

21:43

over 10 billion pounds a year wealth tax, because

21:46

kind of left wing ideas were on vogue

21:49

then, I suppose, and everything has taxed at

21:51

the moment. She has sounded increasingly cautious. Two

21:53

years ago, I would have thought on things

21:55

like the green economy, it was something that

21:57

she really believed in that was really going

22:00

to distinguish the Labour Party from the Conservative

22:02

Party, you would have thought that she was

22:04

more inclined towards nationalisations and genuinely believed in

22:06

things like these employment reforms that they've got.

22:09

I think at the moment, almost everything

22:11

she is doing is trying to drag Labour into a

22:13

position where it's a small target. And

22:16

therefore it's confusing. I'm torn between thinking that

22:18

they'll get into government and they will tack

22:20

a little bit to the left and

22:22

show some sort of radical-ish vision

22:24

and we will see ways of raising

22:27

tax which they hadn't ruled out and it

22:29

turns out they can raise some taxes in

22:31

order to boost public services. And

22:33

people on the centre-left will think, oh, actually she

22:35

is one of us. But I

22:37

also feel that she could just end up basically

22:40

firefighting the whole time against these incredible

22:43

economic storms that they're going to

22:45

go into from day one. Well,

22:50

on top of its plan for the economy, Labour's

22:52

been promising to fix the problems with the NHS.

22:55

Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting has been

22:58

speaking with the FT. We're

23:00

paying a hell of a lot for failure

23:02

and that's what happens when

23:04

you send people ever increasing

23:06

amounts of taxpayer money into a broken system.

23:09

And the person Wes Streeting was speaking to

23:11

was Anna. So what did you

23:13

discover about Labour's plans for the health service?

23:16

So one of the kind of key driving

23:18

pillars of Wes Streeting's

23:20

thinking on the NHS is

23:23

that there's an incredible amount

23:25

of inefficiency. He's described

23:27

it previously as a leaky bucket and

23:29

he described it to me as broken.

23:32

And so the whole idea, and he kind

23:34

of kept hammering this home, is that, yes,

23:36

we will give a bit of money to

23:38

the NHS and we've set aside 1.6 billion,

23:41

but it is all contingent

23:43

upon reform. And we

23:46

will only give money to this

23:48

big inefficient leaky behemoth

23:51

if it can prove that it's going to change.

23:53

So the kind of details of what he's set out

23:55

is 1.6 billion to

23:57

pay for 2 million more. appointments

24:00

and surgeries because there's a huge problem

24:02

with waiting lists that have crawled up

24:04

and up. They're now coming down very

24:06

slightly, but they're still very long.

24:09

And then he's also got this

24:11

kind of second prong, which is

24:13

around massively digitizing the

24:15

NHS. So he's going to buy

24:17

a load of new CT scanners

24:19

and MRI machines, but also he

24:21

talks a lot about enhancing the

24:23

use of AI. Critics, I should say,

24:25

would point out that, at least some

24:27

of that, and a lot of this

24:30

stuff around AI and about around digitization

24:33

isn't new. This is ultimately

24:35

what the Conservatives have been talking

24:37

about for a long time. And

24:39

there have been some

24:41

projects that have worked, some that have

24:44

massively stalled, but it's not necessarily the

24:47

kind of groundbreaking vision that he might

24:49

sometimes present it as. Yeah. And

24:51

often with these digital projects, introducing

24:54

AI, the software, the infrastructure itself

24:56

involves a big capital outlay at

24:58

the beginning. I mean, how

25:00

credible is it, this idea that you can

25:03

fix the NHS by reform alone? Some

25:05

people accuse Labour of relying on

25:07

the reform theory. Yeah. I mean, look,

25:10

I think that there are big

25:12

inefficiencies in the NHS. I'm convinced

25:15

as I think anyone who looks at the NHS,

25:17

including people who work in the NHS, think, yes,

25:19

there are things that could be a lot better

25:21

about how this is run. Most

25:24

of the health experts that I speak

25:27

to say, just look

25:29

at the data. And per

25:31

capita funding of the NHS has

25:33

stagnated, certainly since 2010.

25:35

The UK now spends

25:38

about 20% less per person on

25:40

health each year than similar European

25:42

countries. And it's quite important to

25:44

have that international comparator. And they

25:46

say, yes, we need reform, but

25:48

you have to address the elephant

25:50

in the room. The NHS

25:53

estate is really struggling. And

25:55

there are lots of buildings that are crumbling

25:57

or have, you know, literal

26:00

leaks. And there are

26:02

these big waiting lists as the issue

26:04

of pay for junior doctors and consultants.

26:07

And all of these things do cost

26:09

money. And I feel like that does have

26:11

to be addressed at some point. Hmm, questions

26:13

for Rachel Reeves. And I know

26:15

one thing you talked to Wes reading

26:17

about was the use of the private

26:19

healthcare sector, very controversial in many left

26:21

wing circles. What did he tell you about

26:23

that? And what did you make of his plans? Yeah,

26:26

so there's been a lot of reporting about the

26:28

fact that he would like to

26:30

increase, kind of controversially, increase

26:32

the use of spare capacity

26:34

in the private sector as he

26:37

tries to bring down waiting lists

26:39

and basically reduce the strain

26:42

on overburdened trusts. And

26:44

here's what he said. Although there are

26:46

some people on the left who criticise new labours

26:49

work with the private sector, use of the private sector

26:51

fell off the cliff under the last Labour government because

26:53

the NHS was so good that people didn't feel the

26:55

need to go private. And that's my ambition again, is

26:57

to make the NHS so good that no one feels

26:59

forced to go private. So what was

27:02

interesting is that he was sort of saying

27:04

the whole idea here is that we make

27:06

the NHS so good, work so much better

27:08

that no one needs to go private, no

27:10

one wants to go private. And ultimately,

27:13

you know, the private sector becomes a

27:15

lot smaller. And he made some really

27:17

interesting comparisons with the Blair

27:19

administration as he heard. So he

27:21

said that if you look back at the data, and I did, and

27:24

it is true that there was, partly

27:27

because there was a lot of investment in the

27:29

health sector under Blair, but there was

27:32

actually a reduction in the use of

27:34

the private sector by the public under

27:36

Blair's administration.

27:38

And he also, one thing, one of the things

27:40

I found really interesting and was that he

27:43

was trying to distance his vision, or

27:45

show how it was distinct from from

27:47

Blair's project. And

27:50

one of the things he said is

27:52

that he was not convinced by Blair's

27:54

ideological conviction that competition

27:56

drives up quality and

27:59

drives up. She

28:01

said the evidence for was patchy. It

28:03

seems interesting that he said that in

28:05

the same week that Rachel Reeves also

28:07

in her May's lecture was

28:09

trying to distance herself from new labour and

28:11

I was just wondering whether there was kind

28:13

of a plan there to try and set

28:15

out something that's slightly distinct. Miranda,

28:18

it's really interesting to me how Wes

28:20

Streeting is trying to redefine what he's

28:22

previously said about use of the private

28:24

sector because it's true that critics

28:27

from the left and critics from inside

28:29

the NHS workforce have been quite harsh

28:31

on Streeting, I think it's fair to

28:33

say, and I've talked about him as

28:35

a sort of fan of creeping privatisation,

28:37

as they call it. So he's obviously trying

28:39

to be much clearer about what

28:41

he wants in terms of a relationship

28:43

with the private sector using their capacity

28:46

but making the NHS so good that you don't

28:48

really need to opt for private care if you're

28:50

a member of the public. But in a sense,

28:53

it's quite smart of him to

28:55

distinguish himself against

28:57

those late Blair reforms

29:00

because under Alan Milburn, who was Secretary of

29:02

State for Health, in the late

29:04

period of the Blair administration, there was a

29:06

real ramping up of the internal market and

29:08

of that whole ethos of competition inside the

29:10

NHS. And I think a lot of people

29:12

in the NHS and health policy would say

29:15

we're still recovering from it now. So I

29:17

think that is an interesting change of emphasis.

29:19

I don't see how what he

29:21

said to you really addresses this underlying

29:24

huge structural problem, which is the ramping

29:26

up of both demand and costs

29:29

all the time, and therefore the scale

29:31

of the problem is so great. And

29:34

I was talking to a really senior NHS

29:36

manager who was saying, also, some of the

29:38

key things we've got to get right now

29:41

is access and equity. We know lots of

29:43

people aren't getting the right treatments under the

29:45

NHS. But of course, by definition, if you

29:47

find those people who need the treatment, that

29:49

also then adds more to the demands and

29:52

the costs. So I think the

29:54

problem is actually such an enormity when it

29:56

comes to the NHS. I'll be

29:58

really interested how his arguments election.

30:00

And one of my frustrations with

30:03

what Wes said and Victoria Atkins,

30:05

who's the current health secretary,

30:07

said and the former health secretary,

30:09

Steve Barclay, they all pay lip

30:11

service to the idea of

30:14

increasing investment in prevention. The

30:16

early services that are going to prevent

30:18

people coming in at crisis, which is

30:21

the really costly bit, but they didn't

30:23

really flesh out that idea. But

30:25

also with the Conservative Party, you know, one of

30:27

the main things they tried to do in preventative

30:30

health was basically trying to tackle obesity. And then

30:32

that just ran squared into the kind of libertarian

30:34

instincts of most Tory MPs, which is don't tell

30:36

people what to eat, all these kind of banning

30:38

bog offs and cefmarkets. The Conservative Party hates it.

30:41

And Boris Johnson tried to go down that path.

30:43

And he was pushed back out of it by

30:45

his own party. I wonder whether the Labour Party

30:47

might feel more comfortable with some

30:49

of those preventative, intrusive, inverted

30:51

commerce measures. And finally, Anna,

30:53

I asked the same question of Jim about

30:56

Rachel Reeves, tell us briefly about Wes treating

30:58

the man. Yeah, I mean,

31:00

I would say that

31:02

I found him to be, and I

31:04

do in general find him to be an

31:06

incredibly kind of effective communicator. He was quite

31:08

persuasive. I've spoken a bit about his strengths,

31:11

just to counter that a bit. I

31:13

would say that I think that he has

31:15

the capacity to kind of really frustrate people

31:17

and some of the things he said

31:19

have been quite dismissive. And I've spoken to

31:22

quite a few health leaders and health analysts

31:24

who feel like incredibly

31:26

frustrated by some of the positions he's taken

31:28

that they found to be very dismissive. My

31:31

concern would be that he kind of,

31:33

he loses some of that support, if

31:36

he were to become health secretary. It's

31:38

an incredible backstory, though, isn't it? And I

31:40

would be really interested also whether he actually

31:42

stays in that brief for very long, if

31:44

Labour gets into power, I could also see

31:46

him as an education secretary, maybe, where also

31:49

if he's turned against the idea of competition

31:51

to drive up standards in public services would

31:53

be something that would be fresh in

31:55

education as well. Because, I mean, you know,

31:57

he has this impeccable working class background which

32:00

she wrote about in an autobiography recently and

32:02

I think he's definitely one to watch whether he

32:04

stays at health or not. And

32:11

finally we have time for political fix,

32:13

stock fix, Jim, for you buying or

32:15

selling? I'm going to sell

32:17

Simon Case, head of the

32:19

civil service, after he was found

32:21

to be a member of the Garrett Club,

32:24

which is this exclusive coffin garden gentlemen's club

32:26

that excludes women and he has stepped

32:28

down claiming that he'd only ever been a

32:31

member in order to try to overturn its

32:33

all male policy from within and

32:35

I don't think everyone has taken this

32:37

excuse entirely seriously. Also

32:39

Richard Moore, MI6C, he's

32:41

had to resign in the

32:43

mini. Who else did you find?

32:46

You found another one for the one of the 54 bots. Robert

32:48

Cho, the former head of the OBR, former head of the IFS.

32:50

Not quite as big a name but still, you know.

32:52

Former FT writer. Former FT writer. It's a favourite

32:54

line of people when they're elevated the House of

32:57

Lords, isn't it? I'm going in there to abolish

32:59

myself. Miranda, who's your stock pick?

33:01

Oh, well I'm afraid mine is really boring snoring

33:03

so you can probably guess who it is.

33:05

It's Rachel Reeves because I looked at my

33:07

portfolio. I don't hold any Reeves, which is

33:09

a huge error considering she's probably going to

33:11

be the Chancellor of the East Echo and

33:13

I think she has proved herself someone of

33:15

stature who's capable of the job. She's been endorsed

33:18

even by Ken Clark. So you

33:20

know, yeah, I'm buying Reeves. Okay, but I'm watching

33:22

you. You're clearly trying to win this. That's

33:24

not what it's about, Anna. I'm

33:26

going to sell Penny Morden. I

33:28

think that she could potentially be

33:31

a credible leader of the Conservative Party but

33:33

I think that she was kind of

33:35

put on the table too soon. And

33:38

now she looks to people,

33:40

Sunak and others are going to look

33:42

at her in a very suspicious way. They've

33:45

already kind of passed on from her and moved

33:47

on to other people so I think her time

33:49

has gone. What about you? I'm

33:51

going to buy Pretty Patel. I've just

33:53

been very interested to hear that there's

33:55

chatter about her gaining support from Liz

33:57

Truss, maybe the right wingers. interested

34:00

in her making a return. She commanded

34:02

a lot of loyalty among

34:04

the grass roots. She really is a darling

34:06

of the party faithful. And I

34:08

just think she's played a good game,

34:10

bided her time keeping her powder

34:13

dry, but she's been a little bit more outspoken

34:15

lately on issues like immigration. And I

34:17

just wonder if she's weighing up a

34:19

comeback. Quite chummy with Farage,

34:21

quite chummy with GB news. That won't

34:23

hurt her. Yeah, one to watch. Miranda,

34:27

Jim, Anna, thank you for

34:29

joining. Thank you. That's

34:32

it for this episode of the FT's Political

34:34

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Fix was presented by me, Lucy Fisher,

35:00

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35:04

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