Liam Byrne

Instead of a kind of generous conversation about what is it we build and share together, it becomes a mad scrabble to defend what I think belongs to me.

And who is going to deliver that for me best?

A strong man leader.

And so when you look at the kind of focus groups about Trump supporters, the thing that comes through in them is that I think he is strong enough to stand up to the rich and powerful, to take on the rich and powerful.

Indeed.

So why does that not become a problem?

Well, I think it will become a problem.

But in the first instance, if you're faced with a candidate who you think is strong, tough, who in the focus groups Deborah Manson ran, he's described as neat whiskey or a dump truck on the car compared to Kamala Harris, say, who people saw as a bit ineffectual, too weak.

What you're looking for, your best hope in that choice, is a strongman leader who can de-rig the economy in favour of working people.

Now, it's a myth.

It's a fib.

It's a lie.

But actually, that explains a lot of why people are seduced by the populist message.

Yeah.

And by 2008, we had begun to get really interested in why was it that there was productivity still growing in the economy, in the British economy, but wages had stopped.

And I remember going to see Joe Biden's team actually in 2009.

And you might remember this.

He'd basically just set up this middle-class task force.

And I came back to, and I said to Alistair Darling, God rest his soul, that Alistair, I think we've got something like this going on in our country.

I think we need