Tony Blair

So on a certain number of policies, I kind of can't help thinking that Keir Starmer, you know, digital ID, welfare reform, closer relationship with the European Union.

Those are all things that you've talked about in your essay.

The problem is that he has got a rebellious parliamentary Labour Party who don't want any of the kind of things about welfare reform where there may be uncomfortable choices.

And maybe when you were prime minister, you had a much more pliant Labour Party with people feeling they owed you a much greater debt of loyalty for having got elected.

You've bemoaned the psychodrama that is engulfing the Labour Party right now and the leadership jostling and whether Keir Starmer is going to be brought down.

I'm just interested about why you didn't write this letter privately to Keir Starmer, to Wes Streeting, to Andy Burnham.

Because if you look at the headlines today that you've created, a damning assessment, the Mail, a devastating attack, the Sun, a scathing attack, the Guardian, Starmer has no plan for Britain, the Telegraph, and on and on.

Isn't this feeding the psychodrama?

Yeah.

But, you know, go back going back to the Parliamentary Labour Party.

You've got a whole bunch of MPs who came to power in 2024, probably thinking they were there for only one term, probably thinking they were going to have to go back to their public sector jobs or charities where they came from or whatever aid agencies and the like.

And, you know, and so you get Keir Starmer standing up and say, we've got to have welfare reform.

And they go, whoa, there is a problem of governing right now, isn't there?

Good morning, I'm Nick Ferrari.

It's time to get to your calls.

Tony, I'm really struck listening to you by...

The idea that, you know, your argument throughout this essay is that we've got to put policy first and politics second.

But what you're describing a lot of the time is, you know, when you're talking about how you need to win over the backbenchers and how you need to make an argument, is actually Keir Starmer is really lousy at politics.

I just want to read you this from your essay.

The essay contains a series of policy proposals, almost a manifesto, and you say, the new workers' rights laws, the net zero acceleration and phasing out of the British oil and gas industry, the uplift in the minimum wage beyond inflation, and the nom-dom changes have given headwinds, not tailwinds, to British business, despite the macroeconomic gains for which the Chancellor is rightly praised.