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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
The Pat Kenny Show on Newstalk.
Keir Starmer is under mounting pressure after Labour suffered heavy losses in England's local elections, with Nigel Farage's Reform UK making historic gains across traditional Labour and Conservative strongholds. As the political map shifts dramatically, George Parker, Financial Times political editor, joins me now to sift through the rubble. George, good morning. Morning.
So just to give us in summary, what's the picture like?
Chapter 2: What were the local election results for Labour and Reform UK?
Scotland, Wales and England. Is it catastrophic for Starmer? Yes, I think it is. I mean, it's one of the worst sets of results we've ever seen from a governing party. The Labour Party lost 1,400 odd seats. They were defending 2,500. So a large proportion of the seats they were defending went down the drain. At the same time, Nigel Farage's Reform UK came up.
And what was if you sort of look below the bonnet of that, you can see the Labour Party being obliterated in some of the working class English towns, places like Wigan or Sunderland by Farage's Reform UK. And in Wales, where basically Labour's run the roost for the best part of a century, they've lost control there of the Senate.
And in Scotland, the SNP have continued a governance there which lasted for almost 20 years. So all across the UK, apart from Northern Ireland, the Labour Party has been absolutely hammered. Now, what about the Conservatives? I mean, they were looking like a party that was doomed in any event and that Farage would certainly eat their lunch.
Obviously, his appetite is broader than just the Conservatives. But how did they do? Really badly as well.
I mean, what you're really seeing is the breaking up, or at least we saw the breaking up yesterday, of the old two-party system in Britain, the sort of duopoly of the Conservatives and the Labour Party, who've dominated Westminster politics for the best part of, well, for over a century now, being broken.
And the Conservatives, like the Labour Party, were hammered in places like Essex, just outside London, which is where Kemi Badenock, the Tory leader, has her seat, and a number of other places. Tory bigwigs. Reform UK completely smashed them. They lost, I think, over between 500 and 600 seats.
The only thing that I would say about the Conservative Party is that despite the fact they did really badly, the spotlight has not been on Kemi Badenoch in the way it has been about Keir Starmer, just because she actually is slightly more popular than her extremely unpopular party.
Now, the statement from Starmer that I take full responsibility for these terrible results, but I'm not going anywhere. So what does taking responsibility mean? Well, that's a good question. And there are a lot of Labour MPs who would wish that he took responsibility, as you suggest, by quitting. But Keir Starmer's a stubborn man, he's a proud man, and he believes that he can turn things around.
He doesn't want to be dragged out of number 10 at a time when he's perceived to have been a complete failure, when his own administration is mired in the kind of scandals we've seen recently with the Peter Mandelson scandal.
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Chapter 3: How did the Conservatives fare in the local elections?
But the things people complain about, I mean, besides local facilities, libraries, street cleaning, garbage, everything like that, not being as it used to be an efficient service. But the NHS is also one of those topics. And the NHS was populated by many people who came from outside Britain to keep it going.
You have Brexit and a lot of people from continental Europe said, not staying here, might never get tenure, might never get the right to live freely here. I'm off. So, I mean, joined up thinking is something that you hope people will have, but that's not necessarily so. Well, I think you've made the point very well. I mean, the Financial Times was no enthusiast for Brexit, as you know.
And I mean, not just the fact that what are you going to do when people go home and you've got no one to work in the hospitals, but how do you think it's going to help your economy by erecting trade barriers? How can you be a party which says we want free trade and then put up huge trade barriers to your nearest and most valuable trading partners?
I mean, the whole Brexit premise was nonsensical, to be honest. But as you say, people weren't doing very much joined up thinking and probably aren't now. Now, finally, George, I should ask you about Farage. When he came out, where was it? In Havering in London after they had taken that council early yesterday morning. I think that's when I saw him.
And he was, you know, boasting about how the landscape had changed. And then he looked for questions. And one reporter, when he was talking about council funding, said, what about your own funding? And he cut him dead instantly because there is a scandal brewing for Farage if Everett is allowed to mature. Yes.
I mean, this is the, I think we can call it a scandal, the fact that he was given a gift of five million pounds by a cryptocurrency investor who's lived in Thailand for many years. It wasn't declared. It only came to light through the work of The Guardian. And it's hugely embarrassing. A £5 million gift is more than many of Nigel Farage's constituents would earn in multiple lifetimes.
You know, it's one of the reasons why I still think that despite the headlines that Farage generates, I still think it's unlikely that he will get into number 10 in a couple of years' time. I think there are too many problems in his party, too many problems around his own personal finances in this case.
And even if he gets to the starting line of an election in 2029 as the favourite, you can imagine there'll be massive tactical voting because Farage is very, very popular with some people, but also very, very unpopular with an even bigger group of people. And even the most recent results this week, the overall projected national vote share for Reform UK was about 28, 29%.
That still, I don't think, would be enough to get him over the line in the general election. So there's still a long way to go. George Parker, Financial Times political editor. George, thank you very much for joining us.
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