Chris Mason

Let's do this in real time.

He says, I think this is the headline.

Someone sent me it on WhatsApp, so I'm trying to work out what's what here.

I mean, that's curious in itself, because not tacking left or right might imply to some carrying straight on, which, you know, some in the Labour Party are wondering is wise.

I don't mean that to sound perhaps as flippant as it might sound.

But what else does he say?

He acknowledges that it was a tough set of election results and that, as he puts it, brilliant colleagues and local leaders have lost, will lead to much debate about the change in policy.

politics he talks about political uh fragmentation and the cost of living uh i'll keep reading and perhaps let you know the general election we earned the mandate to deliver change but we've not sustained the public's trust that we are doing enough that's quite a way and we've made unnecessary mistakes

Yeah, well, we must respond to the messages that voters have sent us.

This is great podcasting, isn't it?

That doesn't mean tacking left or right.

It means bringing together a broad political movement, being assertive about our values, blah, blah, blah.

Then he goes back, and we've heard this argument before about the crisis after crisis, the 2008 financial crash, austerity as he calls it, Brexit, COVID, the Ukraine war.

People are desperate to not go back to the status quo.

Yeah.

Sorry, parties have been desperate to get back to the status quo, but the status quo isn't working.

And then he talks about the dangers of Vladimir Putin and the need for a fair country.

Yes, I'm not sure that's going to change the weather wildly with those MPs who are not convinced that he ought to last much longer as Labour's leader and as Prime Minister.

It wouldn't be surprising, I think, if we hear from Keir Starmer in some sort of speech, some sort of event at the beginning of next week, and then we've got the King's speech, the state opening in Parliament on Wednesday, which is a proper kind of relaunch with all the bells and whistles.

We've counted up tonight, Adam, as we record it now, 11 o'clock on Friday night, 20 Labour MPs who have publicly called for the Prime Minister to go, some of whom said it for the first time today, some of whom had said it before.