562. The Right’s War With Itself and Burnham’s Prisons Challenge
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Why is the British right seemingly tearing itself apart and what does that mean for the Tories?
We spend an enormous amount of time asking what's happening to Labour, but I wonder if the stranger story in British politics isn't what's happening to the right. Two years ago, the Conservative Party suffered their worst defeat in modern history. And then things have just got worse. Reform overtook them, it stayed ahead, and at points the Conservatives have been projected to drop below 100 seats in a 650-seat parliament, with reform getting significantly more seats. What do they do? Well, that's one of the questions in the episode today. Kemi Badenok has decided that the answer is to move closer to reform, to become tougher on immigration, tougher on culture wars, and try to get back those voters.
But meanwhile, she's abandoned what I think would be the much more interesting constituency: a very large number of people in the centre, floating voters. voters who are going to be increasingly alienated if Kemi Badenok starts chasing reform. Or is there perhaps an even more tragic problem, which is the Conservatives may not be able to win back the reform voters, and they also may not be able to win back the centrists. In other words, they're in terminal decline. A story that we've seen again and again across Europe.
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Welcome to the Restless Politics Question Time with me, Rory Stewart.
And me, Alistair Campbell. And Rory, today we are going to be talking a lot about your former party, the Tories, but also the threat they're facing from other right-wing parties like Reform and Restore Britain. We're going to talk about Andy Burnham's first real big challenge, which is prisoner release. We're going to talk about US politics after Abdul El Saeed has become the nominee for the Democratic Party in Michigan. We're going to talk about catastrophe in the River Rhine. Ryan and we're going to you're going to tell me about a new gift that you've found for me. We had a lot of questions about what's happening. Not just the Tory party, but on the right of British politics more generally. And Sarah asks this.
Why is the British right seemingly tearing itself apart?
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
Why is the British right seemingly tearing itself apart and what does that mean for the Tories?
0:01–12:54
2
How is Kemi Badenoch’s strategy of chasing Reform and Restore voters reshaping the Conservative Party?
12:54–23:58
3
What are the prospects for an electoral pact among the right‑wing parties (Reform, Restore, Farage) and why might it fail?
23:58–35:27
4
Why are England’s prisons at breaking point and why aren’t governments building new facilities?
35:27–44:47
5
What long‑term solutions (sentence reductions, community sentences, probation reform) could ease the UK prison crisis?
44:47–55:54
6
How critical is the Rhine’s low water level for Germany’s economy and what are the wider climate‑economic implications?
55:54–1:03:48
7
What does the Michigan Democratic primary tell us about the future of the US Democratic Party and the role of DSA?
1:03:48–1:04:41
Speakers
2 identifiedMore from The Rest Is Politics
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