Page 94: the Private Eye Podcast.
Andy: Hello and welcome to another episode of Page 94.
My name's Andrew
Hunter Murray, and I'm here in the Eye's studio with
Helen Lewis, Adam MacQueen and Saba Salman.
We are here to discuss the news of the last couple of weeks.
And because it's Christmas party season, we're having a Christmas party special.
I haven't told you all this, but we're gonna be talking about Your Party.
We're gonna be talking about the Reform party, right?
And later on we're gonna be talking about various corporate
parties who are buying each other.
Adam: So I thought for a horrible moment it was gonna be like a normal Christmas
party where everyone was gonna fall out with each other and, oh, no, hang on.
That is what it isn't it?
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Andy: Saba welcome to Page 94.
This is your first time on the show and you are, the new Tim aMinoguenal.
I'm, it seems what a billing anyone would
see any difference at all?
you are rotten boroughs.
Saba: I am rotten boroughs, me whole host of people behind the scenes Yeah.
cannot who we cannot name
Andy: I saw something really exciting recently because I know you do
a little Reform roundup section.
Given that Reform have just taken so many, councils across the country in
the, local elections, I saw a really exciting headline saying they've
managed to cut 331 million pounds of expenditure in total so far.
terrific
news.
How have they done it?
Saba: I think the answer is rhetoric over reality, Okay.
yes, Reform.
Reform has control of 10 local authorities.
they have been shedding counselors left, and center.
or Right.
we say, since they started and they've lost about 40 and rotten boroughs,
has on behalf of the nation been keeping an eye on how many and why,
the war on waste that you mentioned?
So there's 331 million pound, saving efficiency, that is their big mantra
nationally and obviously local government, they've taken that upon themselves
to prove to Nigel that it can be done
. When you actually drill down, this is complete guff.
Basically, to put it in technical terms.
Thank you.
in the current issue, we, mention Kent and Kent is fascinating
because it's the flagship borough.
the person in
charge is Lyndon Kem Caron, who's a very firm leader and she's very big on taking
Nigel's word to, the absolute Maximum.
So she's been doing her war on ways and she's claiming,
she's saving tens of millions.
they've cut councilor's allowances, by about 5%, which is great.
Sounds, sounds brilliant, very generous.
but actually what they've done is they've used that money and they've
put it into the community fund, which again is fabulous 'cause
it's more money for local people.
So what's the commu-
What is the community fund?
The, community fund is all local authorities have a fund, which counselors
can use to give money to good causes.
So local projects, kids, animals, nice warm fluffy things.
Okay.
Important things.
but the point here is that by cutting council's allowances,
which is a good thing,
that could be an efficiency.
It's not because actually that money's being siphoned off into this.
Community fund.
So it's not a saving,
I presume it's because they can't underspend that money.
Is that it?
As in they have to put it somewhere rather than They do.
local authorities, as any organization, you have
a certain amount of money and you have to spend it within the year.
So I
think as you get towards the end of the financial year,
mm-hmm.
you are
left with these pots of cash.
I'm not sure if that's the case in this
Kent
example.
I think it's more
the case that it makes a great headline.
Adam: Can I just ask a really basic question that where
does the money come from?
Is it all from council tax?
Is there still some money that comes from central government?
to local government?
There is money that
comes from central government, although successive governments have cut that.
so by and large, yes, it's from, council tax.
Helen: Did Reform experience the thing which I think Adam, you predicted when
they got all those councils, which is that they went in going, it's terrible,
it's all being spent on putting the trans flag above the town hall.
And then they discovered, oh no, all the money's going on.
Adult social care.
Yes, I think that's absolutely right.
With Reform, they've come in guns blazing.
it's political earthquake, it's
gonna be fabulous.
We're gonna do all this, we're gonna cut this, we're gonna, get
rid of EDR 'cause it's so expensive.
and, we're going to, stop
spending on special educational needs.
We're gonna stop, take money from adult.
Adult social care doesn't quite work like that
because local
authorities have, a duty to provide certain things
and do
certain things, Now,
can I
check There's
been an accusation
leveled against the BBC, that reformer targeting its counselors in
particular by reporting
on all of the counselors who are
sacked
or resign
or, defect perhaps.
now are you doing the
same
thing?
they've said, the,
BB reporting on 90% of
reform
counselors who leave in some way or another, and actually only
about 15% of, labor or conservative counselors doing the same.
I
think there is a balance between a focus
on, this particular group of individuals because
they have stormed in
and they
are presenting some
wild
and wacky ideas,
and you have to hold into account.
In a balanced way.
We can't
do the same thing with all the other parties simply because
we actually do that in the
rest of the Borough's page.
Isn't it also the fact that because reform have only got a handful of mps and
have never formed a government in any of their various farages iterations, this
has been the first real chance to see what the party makeup is like and also
how the they handle, actual government responsibility in the same way that the,
green control cancel and brighten for a long time got, not an excessive amount of
scrutiny, but a higher level of scrutiny because this was a chance to see people,
for people to see what the greens would be like in government, which they weren't
gonna be able to do at the national level.
So if reform are currently top of the polls, which they have been on and
off for months now, Nigel Farage is auditioning to be the next Prime Minister,
and this is our chance to see what are his grand
Adam: troops
Yeah.
It's quite Interesting.
I'm pre the last election the complaint was constantly, oh, reform, don't
get the coverage they ought to.
And actually
there's an awful lot of support out for them.
But,
Helen: I think there's definitely something about, particularly
Saba: with, councils like,
Kent being the flagship one, that this is, the party of, government
potentially.
so there you have it if this is what they're doing on a local level
with
infighting,
conduct
problems,
the, leader
effectively
firing,
a bunch of her councilors that
was Lyndon Kem,
Andy: car.
Yes.
Saba: Kent.
they had 57 counselors elected.
there's now only
48 left,
so nine have gone.
So my highly analytical
maths
Adam: here tells me that if
you use that
Saba: rate,
they'd all be gone in
about three years,
Helen: But that has always been the problem with Nigel
Farage's parties, right?
That they are always the Nigel Farage show.
And when PP had a load of meps, the turnover rate among them was
extraordinarily high, far higher than it was for the, what were then the mainstream
parties of labor and Conservatives
Andy: But he gains them as well.
he's operating a one in one out
Helen: He's like a
nightclub bouncer.
Yes.
And
it's
operating a situation where there is a real cult of leadership there.
which the
Kent leader a copycat example of that.
She's, she has this sort of authority, she has the authority,
if anyone remembers Jackie
Weaver from of course,
Adam: years ago.
She definitely
Helen: has the authority.
She wants the authority
Saba: and
if she does not
get that authority.
She boots you out.
that is
where some of those counselors, some of the reasons that they've
left, so those nine that I mentioned the majority have been sacked,
but others
have
been,
suspended.
and there's a few that have left of their own volition.
and some of those have done so because they don't.
Agree
with that, sort of leadership cult.
Andy: I was gonna ask if you have other favorite councils
or other especially interesting
Helen: that
have cropped
up
Adam: your first
several
weeks.
Doesn't everyone have a favorite local authority?
Helen: No, it's weird.
I dunno.
no, Richard Brooks doesn't.
Richard Brooks hast side.
Like we,
we can, I think the
thing with
Rotten, are
Andy: talking about reform now
No, I'm in general.
So in general, I think
Saba: really difficult to pick a, favorite or, worse because, rotten
boroughs runs a whole range of cozy
cronyism, bad conduct.
Huge amounts of money
being spent.
I think one of my recent
favorites was over
in Northern
Ireland,
Adam: so this
Saba: Byrne and
Castle Ray, it's, a borough northern Ireland.
And, this is a typical,
example of,
bad conduct.
So this is a case where a counselor called Gary Hines, was in a council meeting
and he wanted
to talk
about
a housing
issue.
And the
chief exec guy called David Burns, said, no, could you wait?
Gary Hines was
not happy.
They
had a
bit
of
a row, bit of a
verbal,
disagreement, which ended with Gary Hines, the
counselor spinning the chair of the chief executive.
In a bit of a pissy fit.
that would be bad
Andy: enough.
But
then on top
of that,
It
got reported to the local government ombudsman over there,
the public sector ombudsman, Okay.
rightly But that cost money and also got,
reported to naca.
So
the police
Saba: were
investigating
Andy: this is council
taxpayer's
Adam: money.
Someone being spun on a chair, someone
being spun on a chair.
Now, And I put
it to you.
Can you imagine if
that happened in our office?
So there's dissent.
We're in the editorial
conference meeting.
Sure.
Our chairs
would
fall
apart.
I was gonna say, they'd just go off.
Helen: we've avoided that problem.
Adam: The Chairs would fall
Helen: apart, but it's
just not what you do.
And, I think that is the serious point and why I love Ron Burrows because
Saba: underneath all of these allegedly silly stories,
actually, there's a serious point to be made, which is
that these are elected members.
public monies, public sector money.
Andy: Yeah.
Saba: that's being wasted.
And these
are people who are
held to account
except they behave like
Andy: this.
Can I
ask you how about Yes.
Councilors themselves
are
not paid tremendously well.
You do see,
officers and
executives
at councils
receiving,
substantial
payments and, payouts, and
that's
all covered in
rotten borough's loads.
why
do
councilors
matter
if
one, if the, direction of party ownership
or if the
overall party ownership changes or if it's in no overall control,
what difference does
that make to me as a resident?
my
bins
are still
gonna be
collected, not live from
Birmingham.
Andy.
Good Point
Saba: You
Andy: Having any
bins collected there.
But is that to
do
with the makeup of
the
council or
is it,
No.
so
why do councils matter?
Yeah.
Saba: in a democracy, you need people based in communities
who know their neighborhoods,
and who are made up of
lots of different political parties.
So you have that,
range of representation.
and
their function is completely different
to the
offices, many of whom are on
absolutely massive fat cat salaries.
the, people that we write about who are on their salaries, they are entitled
to that money because the rules dictate they can earn that amount
of money.
It just seems to most normal
people, absolutely outrageous that someone gets paid, grand and a half a day,
to
come
in
to
an authority that is struggling
financially, Is in
deficit, has
borrowed hundreds of thousands
of money from the government or been handed out, funding to help it survive.
And
on top of that, you're then paying
Andy: someone a grand and a half a
day.
Yeah.
But it just, it feels so much So many of
the things they might have made decisions about in the past or had control over,
they now don't, Which is why you do get changes of party happening and
then people coming in and saying, oh, we're spending 75% of our budget
on adult and children's social care.
Yeah.
Adam: I think one of the problems, both for reform coming in was the
assumption that they would be able to make these sort of swing and cuts and
things and then finding out how little actually, local authorities do control.
And how much of it is with national government.
But I think also there's a sort of democratic problem in that most, council
tax taxpayers and voters also don't understand whose responsibility is what.
and it tends to get used in the same way that sort of elections to the,
European Parliament did as well as a sort of protest vote and a judgment on
the current national government rather than actually, this is a case where, you
can make a difference for the community.
You can change things that you will actually see on the ground quite quickly.
Yeah, and I think just to go back to reform on that, I think what's
interesting with reform is that a lot of these new councils who come in
are
very much towing the national party line,
which
is that,
hard on immigration.
net zero when the council and that.
But actually that is not relevant on the local level because councils don.
control immigration.
have nothing to do with the small
votes, in terms
of
stopping people from coming in.
So
I think that was a big wake up call, both to them and to voters again, Absolutely.
where they realized that actually they don't have the power to shut down
these asylum hotels, even if they are in their, in, in their local area.
That's just not a absolutely.
it's
a perfect
storm of, the elected members not understanding what the role is.
having no knowledge, no experience
of local government or,
any
kind of
representing any kind of constituency.
And that disconnect between what's happening on a national policy level and,
a local policy level in terms of what.
Can actually do.
and that changes as well, doesn't It there, there's already, a
division between borough councils and county councils with different
responsibilities, for different things.
A lot of that is being changed.
So there were a lot of
the local elections weren't held last year because they're being turned into
big mayoralties over when I lived down in, Sussex and we, were about to be
turned into a mayor for the entirety of both East and West Sussex, which
seems like this enormous ungainly area.
Certainly we,
you're taking it away from sort of Hastings Borough Council where island,
which is very, small and you'd think more manageable area that we are gonna
be bundled in with sort of Chichester and Gatwick and Haywood's Heath and things.
That's right.
It just seems to be,
Helen: not Chichester
Gatwick.
Andy: and not Gatwick
Adam: it was awful.
People in Hayward's Heath.
Yeah.
Speak a different
Helen: language.
They love doing that though, don't
Adam: Adam, You need to, involve everyone in this.
I think you know that, this LGR thing,
local government reorganization,
this
Helen: is where we're
Adam: dividing up.
local authorities in a different way.
And it's meant to be efficient and, it's meant to save money.
The problem is not only that I think most people don't understand what
Helen: it is,
Adam: why it's important, but then you've got the fighting in between
different authorities because, we don't wanna go with them 'cause
they are massively in deficit and
officers and elected members at loggerheads about how this should be done.
And there was The sort of first wave of mayors, wasn't there,
the sort of Ken Livingstone wave and then they were brought in.
Bristol has already rejected the idea.
They had a mayor for a while, didn't they?
Yes, They've decided to get rid of not only him.
the
con the concept of a mayor completely, isn't they?
That's quite.
And for very good reason.
And if you want to know about
that, look back at Rotten Boroughs and what we've been doing in,
Helen: Bristol and then didn't, I wanna say Doncaster elect, a football
Adam: mascot.
That
was
a
monkey.
Helen: Angus The monkey
Angus.
The monkey,
Adam: Yeah.
Yeah.
And then,
yeah,
who turned out to be rather good at it.
Didn't he?
Actually,
he didn't wear the monkey costume the whole time he was
Helen: mayor?
I
don't
think, Oh
okay.
Adam: But It's
interesting.
to think back of that first wave of mayors.
You're right.
Under the Blair government.
It was very much the kind of shiny new thing.
Helen: And it's,
Saba: you
Adam: relatively speaking, quite a sexy thing in
Helen: local government because, we
Adam: don't have mayors.
It's quite exciting.
You've got these, and there's, people are fighting and there's promotion,
there's campaigns, and then you compare it to what's actually, going on with
what these people have done or not done.
Yeah, I, to, to, expand on my point, that I'm not just a West Sussex phobe.
The, point then seemed to be devolution right down to kinda city level.
And now it seems to have moved into these sort of macro authorities who are
gonna take on enormous kind of areas.
And, also the other thing that we, that's common is going as well is police
and crime commissioners, isn't it?
Which is brought in by the camera government never
caught on no one like those.
And they're off now as well, aren't they?
And that's it.
That's a huge thing.
So I think there's, about 40 of these commissioners, police fir and
crime commissioners or police commissions depending where you are.
and they have been, said to be a failed experiment.
Helen: They
were on
about, they weren't quite a lot of money,
weren't
Adam: they?
Yes.
So some of them, I think the average is about 76,000 pounds.
but it goes up from that.
Some of them are part-time, they've got deputies
Saba: They, These commissioners come in and they scrutinize what's going
on, with the police now we have got
a story, coming up, which of course I can't go into because you have
to buy magazine to read it.
but
in Northamptonshire,
for example, there's been all sorts
of problems with the, commissioner there.
the
previous commissioner, got sack.
New commissioner came in and has been trying to turn around
what the police, are doing.
Not quite gone to
plan.
Helen: I guess notoriously reforming the police is very difficult.
Even if you're Theresa man, you're coming in as prime Minister
or you're s kh trying to sack the head of the Met.
these are really difficult things.
The idea that someone could bowl in, and go, lad, I've got some
great ideas and, be listened to.
I, think I was quite a ambitious from the start.
Yeah.
and I think there's also a cultural thing going on where you've got a lot
Saba: the commissioners are ex elected members.
they're coming in to oversee an organization which is
very different culturally.
there's a clash there.
Adam: One of the issues I had with that were right the outset was it
immediately divided along party political lines that you were voting for either
your conservative plea and crime commission or your labor or whatever.
And in a way, that's I think a problem with a lot of local government and
there's no actual real need for national parties to be involved in any of it.
Is there, would independent people who are concerned about local issues
not be better than possibly party appic who are looking to go onto the
House of Commons later in that career?
And,
funnily enough, a lot of the reform counselors who've quit, or been suspended
or expelled are, becoming independent.
so yes, a lot of, local authorities have these independent, or independent labor.
so you're not really aligned with the national, but you politically
and ethically, you are left leaning, so you are independent labor.
and maybe that's the answer.
Maybe all these councils we write about should be independent, and
therefore not be tied to their national political party lines.
I dunno.
Perhaps, we've solved the whole problem there.
We are, right?
We're sorted.
Andy: right
Saba: to
Adam: Early days.
Andy: in the next year.
Saba: issue.
Adam: Excellent.
Now for the next
Helen: section of today's show, we're going to talk about
a party that doesn't have
Adam: a leader
Helen: or
not
Adam: an effective leader.
And it
doesn't
narrow it down
much.
I
know.
Helen: So let's,
zero in and say, we're
talking
Adam: about two particular parties,
which I think
Helen: are very closely linked, talking about the Democratic Party in the USA.
Yes.
And we're
talking
about
your party in
the uk.
but these are parties which
don't have
leaders.
Your party
have
Adam: just
had their
first
Helen: conference and
they've
voted
not to have one single leader.
Yes.
By the cursed ratio.
We've almost pretty much 52 to 48.
Really?
Yeah.
It was really close to that.
And then
Andy: the other thing is that the Democratic party in the
States doesn't have a leader.
And I've always found it baffling.
I've never understood.
So you've got
your man in the White
House over here
and.
who
Helen: that's, that is the down one of many downsides, I would
say, to a presidential system.
The other massive one, of course, being different from a prime
ministerial system being that there's no incentive for the party in
government to get rid of a doff leader.
Whereas what happens in a Prime Minister,
they go, thank you Liz Trusts, but you've delighted us long enough.
and that's that
can't
happen
in the
same way in, in the States, even though even now in the remaking of the
Republican party, still the party's still full of republicans who are
deeply unhappy about his leadership.
But, sorry,
labor the point.
Yeah.
Why does a presidential system mean you can't have some kind of party leader,
Adam: even
in
a leader of the opposition,
Helen: essentially.
Yeah.
But what, official position would they hold?
Because that's the thing that constitutionally, we have her leader,
now his Majesty's loyal position.
They are in the commons.
They get the questions that prime minister's questions, like there is a
kind of constitutional role for them.
There's no version of that in America.
There are, obviously, there's the senate and house minority
leaders as they are at the moment.
So the, they're the most senior Democrats in the legislature, but they've got
three branches of government and no one, there's no executive version of them.
Although every, what's essentially happened is that people have tried to
make themselves into that person through
Adam: the medium of
podcasts.
How's
Helen: going?
actually not too bad.
as it goes so.
Obviously a very tough and rough defeat for, Kamala Harris at the last election.
She's vibing round.
She was thought to be running for governor of California,
but has declined to do that.
Tim Waltz, her running mate, is governor of Minnesota.
He's currently engaged in an ongoing feud
Adam: with Donald Trump, but then
Helen: who isn't?
Andy: Aren't we all?
Helen: I really do not rate his chances of, running again for
a number of different reasons.
you have these kind of bigger figures emerging.
Mostly governors actually.
So they, what people were for time, very excited about
Gretchen Whitmer in Michigan.
Gavin Newsom in California has just come off this big victory of
redistricting, which we can talk about.
I know you're excited about the gerrymander.
but also people like Pete Buttigieg who
served in, Biden's cabinet.
he was Secretary of Transportation.
He's, done a podcast around, essentially to pop up.
But, JB Pritzker, the governor of Illinois is another example
of a governor who is having profile raising battles with, Trump.
So that's what a lot of the Democratic governors are
doing, is trying to turn themselves into the leader of the opposition by being
the most effective anti-Trump voice.
Both in their own states and also
Adam: on, on,
on
tv.
Are they doing that though, specifically to take a run at being, at being
presidential candidate
Helen: next
time
round?
Because that
is
who
can say Adam?
they're not announcing, they're not running.
Adam: Who
can,
say
what
the
ambitions
of
It's is it not, I'm like, I'm, I do find it slightly bizarre.
I'm in a situation here
of arguing for a system of Kemi Bock.
But having no effective leader of the opposition is quite weird, isn't it?
we don't,
we, don't get a single figure who the party un unites behind until
the next round of president's primaries, which is two,
Helen: three
years
away.
Yeah, no, they'll be
a, after the midterms it'll begin to, the pack will begin to
mention that's November next year.
But is that where they have to have some bloody long choosing the,
candidate so that they can actually show their people to the electorate and
say, look, these are your
potential.
Yeah, the party, there is a real idea that the primary season is about really lots
of people, the core, various core votes for the parties getting their say and so
one of the thing, one of the big questions about next time is Pete, but is running.
He hasn't announced it, but everyone knows it is he's gay, married
to a guy, got two adopted kids.
There is a question over whether the democratic base, which is churchgoing,
black Americans, often in southern states are ready to vote for a, gay candidate.
And so people are very tense about him running.
But in 2008, people were very tense about the idea about whether or not white
Americans would vote for a black Democrat.
So one thing that you do is have that primary season, and Barack Obama
emerged through that primary season as just being the, obvious superstar.
And therefore people felt okay about sending him into the, general.
They
didn't feel it was such a massive risk because he had proved himself
through that long audition process.
is it not a big disadvantage
to whichever party is not in office at
Adam: the moment
Helen: that
you
have?
Adam: a
Helen: who is very well known and most of the electorate are not
paying a huge amount of attention
to politics, but.
Adam: but
Helen: they, will know
who the president.
is.
Yeah.
That's why they call it the bully pulpit.
That's the, that is the great, benefit of the American presidency is you get to
just be the one person who's in charge and there's no one with an equivalent stature.
And quite notoriously, when you have the first president versus contender debate,
that contender gets a bump in their polling ratings because for the first
time they're on stage with the president.
They move up from this sort of amorphous realm of opposition to
being like president versus would be president, the status increases.
and that's often about that.
when you narrow it down to that one person who is the nominee from the
other party, that's when they get secret service protection, for example.
There is a, just a, feeling at that point.
They ascend.
Yeah.
but this is compounded at the moment due the fact that the
Republicans control the presidency, but also the House and the Senate.
So they've got the, trifecta to use the, oh, I'm gonna use one of my
many nobby American words in this.
the midterms are such a big event that Trump has been very
keen to consolidate his power.
And basically if they lose control of the house of the Senate in
the midterms, that means that the opposition party gets to control.
The legislative agenda.
So what gets voted on, they get to be in charge of the committees, which
might do things like investigate some of the actions of Donald J.
Trump, Esquire, that sort of thing.
So he's very keen to retain control.
And so he's been pushing Republican states, red states to
change their congressional maps.
And you do that by basically taking a swing district and finding a bit
of red and cobbling that on the side.
That's the, gerrymander.
Okay.
However, this has gone not as well as he thought, and I thought we could
just take a moment to appreciate.
I love it when someone does something that's really ethically wrong and
then it backfires on them and this one looks like it might do that.
So it started really in, in Texas.
They, ma made another five seats that were really much more likely
to swing to the Republicans there, even though the Democrats all left
the state for the summer to try and avoid having to vote on it.
But that has been, stayed by a federal court basically because someone in
the Department of Justice, one Trump's appointees, wrote a letter saying,
we're doing this on racial terms.
and of course one of the things that's very much not
allowed is to do gerrymanders,
to reduce the power of minority voters.
legal.
Maybe
we're under the Voting Rights Act, we're against that.
And so she probably should not have put that in writing at the moment.
The, justice Alito on the Supreme Court has let that map go forward for now,
but not nailed on that will happen.
So that's five seats the Republicans were hoping to have and then what
happened in response to that is California are very blue state.
When.
Adam: well.
Helen: See how
you
like
Jerry.
You
can do
well.
The Gerry
becomes the Gerry Bandee, and
they've
come up with a new map that adds five Democratic leaning seats.
And being California, they
Adam: had to vote on this.
Helen: They love a ballot measure.
So Gavin Newsom, who very much does want to be president, put this to the people.
The only people opposing it really was Arnie, who was very in favor
of the independent redistricting, but he came out and said, terminate
the gerrymander, and then didn't really do any other campaigning.
So
Gavin
Newsom
won.
And so sure enough, you're in a situation where the Texas one might
not go through the California one.
Definitely has gone through.
Then places like Indiana, Donald Trump is massively pressuring the lawmakers there.
But I thought this was an interesting information point.
There's a, an Indiana state, senator who
responded very badly to Trump, sent a true social post over Thanksgiving in which he
Kamala Harris's running mate.
Tim was, he said he was retarded 'cause of all the things that
he was doing in Minnesota.
And this guy did a tweet that said, I've got a daughter with Down syndrome.
Words have consequences.
I will be voting no on the gerrymander.
And this is very rare, the Republican party, and particularly people at lower
levels who don't want to get fire bombed.
people in Indiana talking about their threats, their physical
safety don't de oppose Donald Trump.
You get primaried by MAGA people or you get threats to your office and your home.
And this was interesting to me that this guy said, oh, I'm sorry, this.
there
are still some lines in American politics.
We don't use language like that.
I wonder if it's the first cracks beginning to show, and a lot of
people thinking we're gonna get walloped in the midterms, the
incumbent party traditionally does.
And at some point, unless he really does
run for a third term, we're looking forward to this post-Trump future.
six months, a year ago, it looked completely hopeless for the
Democrats, but this is the kind of
thermostatic equilibrium
of
politics.
so when asked last month, who is
the Democrats leader?
Adam: do
you
know who won?
Andy: Have
Helen: Have
Adam: a guess.
Helen: I would've, I, I'd say Newsom Governor.
Newsom, governor of California has the most name recognition.
Nancy Pelosi.
Barack Obama, Oprah,
Kamala.
Don't know.
Oh
yeah.
I don't
know.
Came in a thumping.
21%. 16% did say Kamala Harris, in
third
place.
Nobody.
Saba: So
Helen: don't dunno, Kamala Harris, nobody
answer to
the
Adam: who
leads your
Helen: party
may actually, that's true.
Maybe Kamala Harris has got, she's not got anything else on.
Maybe she could run for
Adam: the
leadership
of
your party.
Helen: That's the answer that we've all needed.
Great.
So
just for any international listeners to
this podcast, we have a party in the UK called
Your Party,
which
is
our newest party.
It's, a very left wing party, maybe
explicitly a socialist party.
hugely exciting.
Got a lot of grassroots energy behind
it.
and the two leaders are Jeremy Corbin and Za Sultana.
And just for international
listeners, I
would
say imagine Bernie Sanders and
Adam: a OC.
Helen: If they hated each other, very, cut price version of that.
And they do not get along.
But also they're not the
Adam: two co-leaders
Helen: a result
of this.
Adam: which is probably a good thing because they really
Helen: don't get on with each other.
No.
So they've had a conference in which they've elected
not to
have a leader.
Yeah.
Adam: have agreed on that though.
That's the
one thing they
Helen: agreed
on,
that
they
won't
have a
leader.
No.
they'll have, co-leaders that are chosen
by, a long process that starts with the executive committee.
They will allow people to be members of other parties as, as well as them.
it's gonna be tricky because we've been talking a lot on this podcast the
last couple of weeks about the success of the Greens under Zach Polansky,
and that is a party that moved from
a dual leader model to just going, maybe let's just let one guy.
Or one woman have a crack at it, and then it'll be a lot more
easy to identify the party with a person and a set of positions.
The thing I would say that I really took away from watching, maybe too
much of the live stream of the your party conference is that there is a,
difficult split between the anti colonialist, pro-Palestine, bits of
the coalition and the socially liberal.
Younger, whiter activists part of the coalition.
So already two members of the Gaza Independence, two Muslim
mps, male Muslim mps, resigned from your party, say essentially.
'cause they're more socially conservative.
They said they had some concerns about the definition of
woman, all that kind of stuff.
and they were repeatedly attacked from the podium as being transphobes,
by, younger members, and the chair kept having to say, actually we're
here to debate the standing orders.
Thank you.
That, but those are the two who've already
left the splitters.
Yeah.
And that's also a bit where, Corbin sits uneasily between the two groups.
And he, did, when he was leader
of the labor party, have to bridge this divide.
but essentially your party grew outta the, these Gaza Independence, five male
Muslim MPS Plus ge, Jeremy Corbin, and then Zara Tana, who
is also from that background, but is much more socially liberal.
gen Z about it bolted onto that and it's a
Adam: slightly unhappy.
She boycotted the first day of your party's conference, didn't she?
yeah.
And that was specifically over, this amused me.
The problem always for parties on the left and for the left side of labor has always
been truism and kind of Trotsky sex.
Trying to worm their way in through membership and then
affect things in that way.
She was saying specifically right at the outset, we've gotta have ENT truism any,
anyone from any sex socialist workers party, whatever other cus want, they've
gotta be
a part of it.
And that's gotta be part of the foundation of the party.
Is that we allow these people?
in.
So good luck trying to decide anything with, no leader and a
committee in charge and then a load of different, different parties
worm in the way in there
as well.
Didn't
she also
say that it's a 40 year project?
Helen: The movement luck?
Adam: with that.
Maybe
by then
Helen: they'll have agreed.
it's good.
Like
the
years in
the
desert.
Yeah.
So
Adam: it's not,
a quick fix, this is
a, long term.
I'm pretty
sure that's what change UK was saying back
in the day.
Do you remember them,
Helen: I do remember the independent group
and
all
that.
Jeremy's gonna be
Adam: 14 years old
by
the time
this 14.
Yeah, he won't mind, he'll still be making the same speech.
and People will still be
chanting, oh, Jeremy Corbin, it'll be fine.
Now
Helen: as the
Adam: party winds down,
Helen: no, it's only winding up.
'cause there's something incredibly exciting
Adam: happening in British media,
Helen: there, Adam?
Andy: This
Helen: is huge.
Adam: Yeah, it's the sale of the Telegraph.
How long have we been talking about this?
This actually been running longer than this podcast now.
The attempted
Helen: to attempt to sell off
Adam: the
Helen: It's quite, yeah.
You do sense
Adam: of, oh gosh.
Are they,
it's Lexi.
It was July, 2023 when, Lloyd's Bank swooped in and said to the, the, Barclay
family, you can't pay your debts anymore.
We are gonna
Helen: take your newspapers off of you.
So the
Telegraph
has
been
languishing
without
an owner
for
good,
couple
of years
now.
And
there have been various
Adam: bids
that
have
come
and
Helen: gone.
It's
emerged
in
Adam: the last few
Helen: days that the
new prospective owner, of the Telegraph
Adam: he's
put in a bid
Helen: is Viant Rother, current owner of the Daily Mail
and, the parent company, the
Adam: Daily Mail
in General Trust.
Helen: Cameron, can I have a quick, can I have a quick recap?
So basically after that happens, they
then try and sell it to a
Qatari backed fund?
Adam: no, they, initially, Lloyd's Bank tried to put it up for auction before
they could do that, A fund called Redbird.
IMI swept in and said, we will pay off the debts of the Barclays in
return for receiving the newspapers.
And at that point, the spectator as well, the magazine, in, in,
in, security for those debts.
then the government intervened because there were protests across the newspaper
industry and from, journalists on the Telegraph themselves saying we
can't possibly have, a fund, which is backed by the government of the
United Arab Emirates coming in and taking control of a British newspaper.
And everyone agreed this would be terrible.
So the law, the, whole thing was frozen.
Ever since then, the Telegraph has been effectively being run by some independent
directors who were the people brought in by the bank in the first place.
So not people who
necessarily
know much about running newspapers, which has effectively meant editorially.
They've been allowed to go completely feral and do whatever they wanted
to do, which they have taken on with great gusto under editor Chris Evans.
They've
been to my, my reckoning.
Helen: Not the Chris Evans, the
Adam: or the one who was
Captain America.
No, neither of
those ones.
Captain America.
That's,
Helen: Captain America.
Adam: they
Helen: might
have done a better job,
but this
is a very
interesting point that
we've made
somehow in
all
three
sections,
is
Adam: Telegraph have not
Helen: had a
leader.
Adam: they've run
Helen: lots
of
leaders,
Adam: over the last
Helen: two and a half years.
You've got
your
party thing,
Adam: you've got, we've
got,
this is your policy of actually, you always come back to the Belgian
government having, they didn't have
one for three years.
Everything was fine,
Helen: we wasn't?
I used to say that, but then No, but there was a terra cell in Belgium and I
remember thinking, oh, maybe actually,
Adam: a year and a half is
too
long
not
to and there's Alistair Heath and Alice Pearson at The Telegraph?
I this is
Helen: Okay.
The rough equivalent.
But look, the ancient history is over.
Our slightly unstable friend has finally found a
new man, and the
Adam: man she's found
is.
one of the old people who were originally going to
Helen: bid for it in the first place, VI Rother, who tried to
go out with our friend.
I'm gonna continue the analogy.
20 years ago, he tried to
buy the
Adam: papers, but didn't
manage to,
he's had two ghost so far.
He tried to buy them, originally when the Barclays got them from Conrad Black.
that other, interesting businessmen.
in 2004 when he lost control of the Telegraph group, he came back
for another go at the initial auction before it went to, the UAE.
at that point, as I said, the law was changed so that no
foreign state would be able
to take a stake in a newspaper initially, at that point, the Daily Mail group,
Lord Roth ME'S Group, dropped out because they were talking, to the Qatari and to
various other governments in the Middle East about bringing some money in to
make a bid for them.
at that point.
that law has now been tweaked so that foreign governments are allowed to take
15% of a British, newspaper group now,
But
Lord Roth me back, is saying that he's not gonna need any
foreign state funding at all.
None of that will be involved.
which does beg the question, where is the money actually coming from?
Because the other strange thing about this is that he appears to be offering the full
500 million, which the current, impotent owners who aren't allowed to do anything
for it, want to pay back what they paid
Helen: in the
first
place,
Adam: which in recent months, Even the Telegraph had been admitting
that they are not worth that.
They've been saying that a more realistic valuation of the newspaper
group is 300 to 350 million.
Why is your friend before whack then?
Sorry
to ask a really
basic question.
It is a very odd question, isn't it?
Most of asked ter.
Yeah, it, it does seem a odd one.
the Telegraph is profitable if he's looking at a long-term
kind of investment in it.
there are ways of, making that money back there will be obvious as we like
to call 'em in the business world, synergies, or as we like to call
'em in the journalism world, lots of people getting sacked, particularly
if I were working in the sort of back, back room kind of things.
with, the IT departments Or HR
Helen: or, the business side of, or, even the picture desk and the
subs desk, right?
that's the classic.
We let's
Adam: the Back.
Helen: backroom.
Adam: I was gonna CC come onto that because the other thing that's been
going on at the Daily Mail Group over the last year as chronicled in the street
of Shame pages since January is massive job cuts at the Daily Mail, which is
Britain's bestselling Newspaper, still sells an enormous number of copies.
so the Daily Mail, mail on Sunday and the award newspaper for the newspaper
website, formerly known as the Mail online, now known as Daily Mail Co
uk, was shunted together and, and a load of, duplications and staff who
got rid of, at that point in January.
They've since made big job cuts all the other places that they, own as well.
So that's the ie. Newspaper, which people forget, is part of the mail group.
It's in a, sort of separate wing of the company to be kept separate, along with
new scientists, which they also own.
and then last week, literally a day before it emerged that he was offering,
hundreds of billions of hands for the Daily Telegraph Journalists at the
Metro were told that an awful lot of them were also at risk of redundancy
because they need to make massive cost savings, across the board.
, again, those cost savings probably still not quite enough
to raise that 500 million we're
Helen: talking
about.
Here
is the idea to try
Adam: and create
Helen: another massive media
block in the
style of Rupert Murdoch's,
Adam: Times Sun,
formally News of the
world.
This is the fascinating thing
actually.
It's gonna be much, much bigger than anything Rupert Murdoch has ever owned.
Rupert Murdoch, was enormous first back in the eighties when he took over the times.
and it was involved the Monopolies and Mergers Commission as them because he was
gonna be taking over two, major, daily newspapers and three Sunday newspapers.
This will bring together, when we've just mentioned them, it's, gonna
be four separate daily newspapers and a couple of Sundays as well.
So it in terms of a block and in terms of circulation as well,
Prescott has done some calculations.
they're gonna be a million ahead of Murdoch's titles in terms of circulation,
combined circulation of everything.
If this deal goes through And the mail group take over The Telegraph,
and keep all of the titles they've got at the moment, 2.5 million copies
a day, they're gonna be selling.
The other thing.
that's changed enormously is of course, is Paper circulation is a very different
beast now to what it was in the 1980s.
These are all essentially digital, operations, their websites and the
lot of 'em are international facing.
And Rod Me said specifically that the Telegraph, that's the bit he
sees as ripe for exploitation.
They're gonna turn it into very much an American facing thing.
They think there's a big market out there for a slightly classier than
Fox News, kind of broad sheety type,
but
very, right wing coverage, which is what is, the direction
the mail is moving in?
It's quite maga at the moment
Helen: under
Chris.
but the telegraphs the sort of a, b, c one version of that, isn't it?
That's the kind of heritage foundation
for the elites, for the kind of the, the Telegraph always used to be known
as the paper for the sort of retired kernel in the Shires, and those people
in the American context now are maga.
Whereas the American male is still pursuing, it's it's very strongly aimed
at like middle, particularly lower middle
Adam: class
women, It's very, yeah.
I think they'd see their competition as being things like, people Magazine
and Us Weekly.
they're much more kind of celeb focused, on, on, on their
American kind of facing stuff.
So
I think they've got any sense, and certainly Ron is talking about
keeping them as two, two very separate and distinct businesses, although
obviously there will be those, combinations to be done on, on, on,
staffing between the two of them politically, they're coming from a, sort
Helen: of similar sort of area.
Andy: I
just check?
Is
Helen: Sir Herbert gusset
now Maga,
If he's retired, Colonel
Herbert Gusset, fifth Platoon of the whatevers then Yeah.
he's got a massive American flag in his driveway.
He's in an SUV, he's in the gusset wagon, which does about
Adam: two
miles
to
the
gallon.
Oh, his grandchildren definitely bought in one of those
red, mangar hats a few Christmases ago and got him to pose for a selfie.
Wearing it backwards awkwardly, didn't they?
Yeah.
That's so
sad
Helen: to love it.
Adam: of the sidebar of Shame and the Telegraph website.
Yeah.
I don't think they're gonna be doing than the economic
pba.
Andy: I
Helen: but presumably, when this was first mooted, this merger, Lord Romy
wrote a piece in the Times, which was a sort of weird thing to see that
happening.
or
was
interviewed
in the
Times saying, essentially his argument
was thing, no one reads newspapers anymore, so it's fine if I own loads
Adam: of
them.
I think that
was
in fact, we've got a strange situation where the telegraph is saying,
we're not worth all this money, And the man who wants to buy 'em
is saying, oh, no one's interested
Helen: in
newspapers
anymore.
But essentially the argument was like, but people are getting their
news from a really wide range of
sources like TikTok and social media.
So although this looks like it's edging close, not to a monopoly,
but certainly to a huge market share, it isn't really.
But those things are not quite market in the same way.
That's the thing is taken up with Lord Romy.
Adam: it's likely that Lisa and Andy, the Secretary of State, for
cultural media and sport is gonna intervene in this one And probably.
Helen: as happened with,
Adam: the last big takeover we had was when Trinity Mirror took over the
express titles to create reach, PLC.
and she ordered, investigations by the competition and markets
authority and ofcom into that.
and then the effect that would have on the market.
That was way through.
Again, that was an enormous share of the market.
That was way
through, partly because those papers were at the opposite
end of the political spectrum.
Daily mirror, traditionally labor supporting, express, traditionally very
traditionally old school conservative
hasn't really carried on that way, given that they're sharing enormous numbers
of their pages now and have been shunted together, in a way that, is not working
out brilliantly for all the journalists.
that reach BRC.
Very definitely.
There's
very few newspapers that are particularly happy ships
at the moment, but, certainly the
ones owned by reach PLC are particularly,
unhappy
Helen: and slightly Quaye.
Saba: Quaye
Adam: at the moment.
Helen: That said, though, it is a good sign about the healthiness of our press
and democracy that Lisa Nandy will refer this to a kind of arms length thing.
Whereas if you think about
we've talked about this in the last pod, one of the things that Donald Trump has
absolutely done is just blocked media mergers that he doesn't like because
they've been mean to him personally.
So if this were America, Lisa Nandy would be going, I think
we could hate to stand to hear a few nice things about Lisa Nandy,
the Telegraph,
if you'd
like to get
Adam: approval for this.
Couple of things, just to add to that, the, we've talked about how most,
readership as migrated online and the difficulties of measuring that, which
is something that Lisa and Andy's gonna have to get her hair read.
In terms of profits, an enormous amount of it still comes from sales
of paper, copies of newspapers.
It's something like 75% of the reach titles.
I think it's up there.
The Telegraph, I think it's something like
80%. it's enormous amount of money still come.
they're quite expensive now, newspapers, and you've got a kind of loyal readership
who are getting them delivered to
their door every day still.
they are an older readership.
They are, sadly, the, nature of mortality means they're not gonna
be around for all that much longer.
So that is always going down, but that is certainly what brings the money
in much, much more than any online advertising in this country has ever done.
One of the reasons everyone is keen on exploiting an American
market for British newspapers, and all of them now have, certainly
all of the tabloids have launched specific US facing websites, which are
separate operations to the British ones,
is that in
America there's some valuable advertising out there which people
are willing to put on, on, on newspaper and magazine websites.
you can actually make some money off online advertising I hate, which
is a thing that no one has ever,
found a
Helen: way of
making work ever here.
It
is
also
the
case,
isn't it?
Adam: That
quite a lot of
Helen: people
in the
states
like
reading
about
Adam: rainy porridge Island, I think
that's a,
they like that.
and They like reading about doing that.
The hellhole that is London or Birmingham and how we're all
living under Schreyer law as well.
There is a big cell, You know how awful the old country has become?
and How terribly things are
going.
Still the rest of us after Dubai,
Helen: we?
absolutely
we are.
Yeah.
I'm really, you can't overstate that, that there is a kind of
weird
place for Britain and the American, like American Maga
Wright imagination.
to the extent that Elon Musk described us as being like the hobbits in the
Shire and we're like, and therefore we didn't realize that
the, like the Arks were coming and
Sarai was coming, Yeah.
And they need to be defended by the men of Gondor, which I think is him
Adam: With
Helen: Tesla.
With
Adam: Oh, he wishes he was aor, doesn't he?
Yeah.
Helen: he's barely
Adam: Gimli man in charge of
Helen: Army of trolls.
Yeah.
Adam: Yeah.
Helen: Meets back on
Adam: the menu last.
Sorry.
And the other thing I would just say is that, the
future does seem to be these larger and larger media groups
and these huge use takeovers.
even to come back to Rupert Murdoch, he realized a few years ago that with
Fox and Sky, he was just not at the
sort of scale where he could compete with
the really big streamers and the really big studios.
Fox was, sold onto Disney, sky to Comcast.
Now we've got, sky as part of Comcast looking at buying up ITV
that the broadcast side of thing.
So I think the future seems to be in everything getting bigger and bigger
in order to compete with, those tech giants like, kind of Facebook
and Google and people like that.
So we're gonna see a lot more, I think, of these, this kind of
like consolidation and growth
of, media
Helen: brands
going on.
I for one, I'm just hugely relieved that.
the telegraph's gonna be owned by
Adam: someone, at least at Viant level
Helen: because that
feels like
a
sort
of, you
Adam: you're
Helen: by that
it
at a settled
Adam: feels right, doesn't it?
Yeah.
Helen: but I'm reassured.
okay.
That's
it for this episode of page 94.
Thank you so much for listening.
Thank you to Adam, Helen
and Saba.
If
you
would
like
more
private eye in
your life,
the thing
to do is
go to your
local news
agent
or
TG
Adam: Jones,
just
so
I
Helen: give
them
a
little
show of hand
and
buy a
copy.
if
you want, find out even more, you can get a private
life nine.co uk and get yourself a
subscription.
What a
Adam: good
Christmas
present
it
Helen: would make
for
someone
in your
life,
or even the annual
are
Adam: here.
Oh, what a
good
idea.
If you have
two friends in your life, that's all your
Christmas
Helen: problems
sorted.
Isn't it easy?
Brilliant.
we'll
be
back
again
in
Adam: a
fortnight
Helen: with
another
of these.
And
the only
remaining Thanks.
I'll do Matt Hill of Rethink Audio for producing.
Bye for
Adam: now.