114. Question Time: Banks in crisis, Imran Khan, and Blair on The Simpsons

Could Labour inherit a junior doctor problem? What can be done about the rising costs of childcare? And what do Rory and Alastair really see in each other? Rory and Alastair answer all these questions and more in this week’s Question Time. TRIP Plus: Become a member of The Rest Is Politics Plus to support the podcast, enjoy ad-free listening to both TRIP and Leading, benefit from discount book prices on titles mentioned on the pod, join our Discord chatroom, and receive early access to live show tickets and Question Time episodes. Just head to therestispolitics.com to sign up. Instagram: @restispolitics Twitter: @RestIsPolitics Email: [email protected] Producers: Dom Johnson + Nicole Maslen Exec Producers: Tony Pastor + Jack Davenport Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:04Rory Stewart?

  This episode is brought to you by NordVPN.

• 0:06Alastair Campbell?

  And I must thank NordVPN because on my Grand European Tour with Fiona, I was away from the Hawthorns for West Bromwich against Burnley, but I managed to watch it. There you go.

• 0:19Rory Stewart?

  I actually had a NordVPN thank you. I was in the new Starbucks here in Crete. And of course, the thing flashed up, saying this is an unsecured public network. And I was able to go to my VPN. It was a little reminder of something we often forget when we're in all those cafes and things, which is actually genuinely, people can do all kinds of weird cyber attacks and spying if you don't have a virtual private network when you're sitting in that Starbucks.

• 0:42Alastair Campbell?

  Well, I think, are you not really sort of proud of me that I managed to do this? Or should I say Fiona managed to do this?

• 0:49Rory Stewart?

  I'm incredibly proud of you. That's a tech transformation. So to get the best discount off your NordVPN plan, go to nordvpn.com/restorspolitics. That's nordvpn.com/restorspolitics. And the link is in the episode description.

• 1:05Speaker 02

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• 1:33Rory Stewart?

  Welcome to the Restless Politics Question Time with me, Rory Stewart.

• 1:36Alastair Campbell?

  And me, Alastair Campbell. And I want to start, Rory, with a question that shows the unbelievable prescience of some of our listeners. This is a question that we got last October, the 3rd of October, from somebody called George Rose. How scared should we be about current Credit Suisse CDS levels? Did the global financial system learn anything from 2008?

• 2:00Rory Stewart?

  Well, I mean...

• 2:01Alastair Campbell?

  Why did we not answer that at the time?

• 2:03Rory Stewart?

  Exactly. So firstly, for listeners, CDS is credit default swaps. And that is what, six days ago, really began the collapse of Credit Suisse. But obviously, George Rose was on to it in October.

• 2:15Alastair Campbell?

  And is this related to the Silicon Valley Bank? Problems, is this a domino thing going on?

• 2:21Rory Stewart?

  Yes, absolutely. Basically, people were so panicked by the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank that they began looking around for other banks to be panicked by. And people began withdrawing money from one of the weaker of the major banks in the world, which is Credit Suisse, and essentially started a bank run. And the result was the Saudi State Fund refused to keep funding them. And in the end, the other great Swiss bank, UBS, has had to step in and buy out Credit Suisse. And they've bought it for a fraction of its theoretical book value. I mean, they've bought it for a few billion.

• 2:59Alastair Campbell?

  So does that mean if you have money now with Credit Suisse, that your money is now worth less or not?

• 3:05Rory Stewart?

  If you had certain kinds of instruments, more fancy instruments, not a normal deposit, a normal deposit should be insured by the Swiss central bank. But yes, people with fancy instruments may be in real trouble. And this is about people buying high-risk, high-return instruments, but assuming that they're safe, finding out that they're not safe.

• 3:26Alastair Campbell?

  And part of the reason, as I understand it with Silicon Valley Bank, is that you and I might have our money in a bank and we think that's where the money stays. But in fact, that bank will be putting it into other banks that may be less reliable.

• 3:40Rory Stewart?

  A whole series of things, you're completely right. So there's the issue of the credit default swap, which is a mechanism where a bank tries to insure itself by getting another type of instrument which ensures itself against credit default, ensures itself against losing money on a particular instrument. And these things get more and more complicated. And this was one of the problems in the 2008 financial crisis. But in this particular case, part of the problem is the way that we've regulated since 2008, and in particular, pushing people to put more and more, pushing banks to put more and more of their money into government bonds. And the reason why they did that is that government bonds hold their value. So in 10 years' time, you can cash in your government bond and the US Treasury is not going to default on the government bond.

• 4:24Rory Stewart?

  But in the short term, if you are forced to sell, because there's been a bank run, your government bond, you can be selling it for much less than it's worth. And this has also been affected by the fact that as interest rates have gone up, the value of the bonds have gone down. This is a weird mechanism, it's not that weird. But effectively, the price of the bonds is inversely related to the rise in interest rates. So Two things, the way in which these banks were regulated after 2008, and the second thing, which is the rise in interest rates, has created this real weakness at the heart of the system. And banks that were less well managed, Silicon Valley Bank seems to be one example, but Credit Suisse even more dramatically, they've been through three

• 5:07Rory Stewart?

  CEOs in three years, they've had a series of catastrophic scandals, they've lost a lot of money. So clearly, George Rose, who asked that question, was one of the people who, by October last year, was already-

• 5:19Alastair Campbell?

  And his point, have they learnt anything from 2008? What you're saying would suggest no.

• 5:23Rory Stewart?

  Well, unfortunately, the regulators would say they learnt something from 2008, but what they did then created a whole series of different types of problem. But yes, George is right, that one of the problems is the complexity of these things. And I was talking to a banker yesterday about the balance sheet of Credit Suisse, and he said, one thing that nobody ever explains to you is that these banks are so big, so complicated, that nobody understands them, literally nobody. You can read the balance sheet of these banks, and it makes zero sense. Because at one point, Credit Suisse had over a trillion dollars of assets under management, and they are every type of instrument, and it doesn't matter how big your brain is, or almost how big your computer system is, nobody has any idea

• 6:08Rory Stewart?

  whether Credit Suisse is worth minus 100 billion, or whether it's worth plus 100 billion.

• 6:14Alastair Campbell?

  And presumably the same, we could say the same for a lot of the banks that are not currently in a mess.

• 6:19Rory Stewart?

  100%, because they are, so long as nobody's withdrawing their assets, there's not a bank run happening.

• 6:26Alastair Campbell?

  There's a semblance of security.

• 6:27Rory Stewart?

  Yeah, nobody needs to really get into the question of what these things are actually worth. But yet again, we are being forced to confront the potential unraveling of our financial system.

• 6:38Alastair Campbell?

  Bernie Sanders is right, it's okay to be angry about capitalism.

• 6:41Rory Stewart?

  And it's going to get, I think, even worse, because since 2008, more and more and more of what's happening in these banks is, of course, automated, done by incredibly complicated computer systems, now reinforced by AI algorithms. So that almost nobody has any idea what's actually happening within these mechanisms. Yeah.

• 7:01Alastair Campbell?

  Okay. My favourite question of the week, Rory, Andrew Hoffman. Rory is the only person I know who says things like goodness and mercy me. Does he ever swear? You swore on the Iraq podcast.

• 7:12Rory Stewart?

  I did, I did.

• 7:14Alastair Campbell?

  How did you feel about that after you did that? Did your mother listen?

• 7:17Rory Stewart?

  I did, she, she did, she didn't tell me off for that, but you're right, I don't normally swear.

• 7:21Alastair Campbell?

  No, I swear a lot, I swear far too much.

• 7:23Rory Stewart?

  You swear too much, yeah. I don't normally swear, but that, that issue did wind me up. Yeah, the, the only other thing I swear about is we have a mutual friend that you keep raising and whenever you mention him, I tend to swear, but otherwise, otherwise I don't swear very much.

• 7:37Alastair Campbell?

  Do you want to out the person?

• 7:38Rory Stewart?

  No, no, no, thank you very much. No, thank you very much.

• 7:40Alastair Campbell?

  I'll tell him though.

• 7:41Rory Stewart?

  Thanks. You, you, you're very discreet. You're very good at keeping my relationships alive by not passing on horrible malicious gossip to stir up enmity between people.

• 7:49Alastair Campbell?

  I actually hate malicious gossip. I really do.

• 7:51Rory Stewart?

  Well, could you please not contact our mutual friend and tell him that I swear whenever his name's mentioned?

• 7:55Alastair Campbell?

  I thought you meant the her.

• 7:58Rory Stewart?

  Right, gone. Here's a question for you. Junior doctor strikes. Ben Evans, I was wondering to hear more of your thoughts on the junior doctor strikes. I feel like both the Conservatives and Labour are really underestimating that goodwill has almost run out. And the solidarity among doctors has never been stronger. The point here being that Keir Starmer and the Labour Government, understandably, because they're worried about how they're going to balance the budget.

• 8:23Alastair Campbell?

  Yep.

• 8:24Rory Stewart?

  Are not saying that they're going to offer the pay rises that the junior doctors are asking for. So the junior doctors are angry with both Conservatives and Labour. Do you think that both Conservatives and Labour are, are underestimating that goodwill has run out? And do you think Labour's making a mistake?

• 8:37Alastair Campbell?

  Oh, I think, well, I think on Labour, I saw Wes Streeting did a very, very good interview where I think it was with Sky News. And Sky were trying to get him essentially to say, well, that's all very well, but how would you pay for this? How would you pay for that? And Wes's line was, look, I'm very, very happy to tell you how we will fund the promises that we are currently making. What I'm not going to do is tell you how the government should be funding. What they are promising when they know they can't fund it.

• 9:04Rory Stewart?

  But Ben Evans, I'm a junior doctor.

• 9:07Alastair Campbell?

  No, no, I get that.

• 9:08Rory Stewart?

  No, no, this is the next question. I feel the press recently has been very anti-doctor, especially Wes Streeting.

• 9:14Alastair Campbell?

  Ah.

• 9:14Rory Stewart?

  Who among doctors sounds like he has no idea what he's talking about. E.g. self-referring to specialist is the worst health policy I've heard in years. I've been a proud Labour supporter all my life, but in the next election, I think I will have to change things. So there's you saying positive stuff, but this doctor is furious.

• 9:34Alastair Campbell?

  No, and I do think that I've got friends who are doctors, both junior doctors and consultants. And I think there was a real, oh, hold on a minute with that self-referral thing, because I think it's such a complicated idea. And I wonder whether that will survive the test of of time. What I do think about junior doctors, I think the phrase junior doctors is so weird. Because you think of a junior, you think of somebody who's young. You think of somebody who's like, you know, very low down the pecking order. Junior doctors are the people that we in the main rely on when we go into hospital. And their people are incredibly well-trained, not very well-paid. I've had contact from junior doctors I know, one of whom is the sister of another mutual friend, by the way,

• 10:15Alastair Campbell?

  who say that what they feel really angry and frustrated about, and they actually think the BMA has played into this, is that the whole issue is being made about pay. Whereas what they say, the reason they are protesting is because they feel currently unable to deliver safe, basic, decent healthcare. Now, that completely challenges what Labour are saying. Now, I get why Labour don't want to say we're going to fund this, this and this, I get that. But I do think on the politics of this, the public, I think, they were certainly behind the nurses. I think it's very interesting how the media are barely covering the junior doctors' strikes and protests. That march was extraordinary. It was a huge, huge thing. I mean, very rare that you see a march as big as that

• 10:57Alastair Campbell?

  in London during, on a weekday in particular, and yet it barely got any coverage. So I think that that's where the public are. They want these people to get a fair deal. So I hope that Labour will sort of maybe push this self-referral thing to one side, and that might make Ben Evans come back to Labour. But I do think on the politics of this, what the Labour are trying to do is to get caught in the same slipstream, and that question says to me that they're not necessarily doing the right thing on it.

• 11:22Rory Stewart?

  Well, maybe that you've sensed that the public actually want higher taxes and higher spending.

• 11:30Alastair Campbell?

  Which Labour don't want to promise, but well, they want the higher spending, but they don't necessarily want to talk about higher taxes. Or the other thing I think that's happened recently, which relates to this, we've had a few questions about childcare. Lorraine Pengilly, massively expensive in the UK, holding women back, want to know your thoughts on what the government could do to help parents and childcare costs. So the government announced something in the budget.

• 11:49Rory Stewart?

  And that's quite a big thing.

• 11:51Alastair Campbell?

  Quite a big package for very small children, yet again with this government, not clear how it's going to work, et cetera, et cetera. But I think that the reason they did that was because Labour, particularly through Bridget Phillips and the Education Secretary, has made clear that childcare is going to be a huge part of the Labour programme. So the government's trying to say, well, we're doing it first. I think Labour held back on the detail.

• 12:16Rory Stewart?

  That was a trick that you always did when you were in Labour Government. Every time the Tories in opposition came up with a policy, it's one of the great things governments can do. You nick a policy that's good, you implement it straight away.

• 12:26Alastair Campbell?

  What policies did we nick from the Conservative? What policies did we nick?

• 12:30Rory Stewart?

  Certainly from the point of view of the Conservatives, they felt, and the oppositions always feel that.

• 12:35Alastair Campbell?

  Yeah, you hold back, you hold back.

• 12:37Rory Stewart?

  If the opposition produces a bad idea, the government shoots it down. If the opposition produces a good idea, the government simply adopts it wholesale.

• 12:43Alastair Campbell?

  And the opposition stands there saying, well, it was our idea first, nobody cares.

• 12:47Rory Stewart?

  Yeah.

• 12:47Alastair Campbell?

  Totally get that. So that's, I think, this goes back to our continuing discussion about the Ming Vars strategy or the big bold strategy. Part of the Ming Vars is to say, well, we are going to do something big in this area, but we're not going to say what it is until we get very close to the election.

• 13:02Rory Stewart?

  But the government has sensed quite rightly that, and we've talked a lot about this, many, many questions on childcare, it is an incredible burden on people's lives. And the government has now announced that up to, I think, a hundred thousand pounds. Children over one, when this policy is implemented, will then get thirty hours of free childcare a week, which will make a huge difference to people. But the problem, of course, when you read the small print, is that I think it's, I hope I'm getting this right, it's children, I think, who are born after December of this year. So one of the tricks in a lot of these budgets from all these governments is to push things forward, change their fiscal rules, push things into the future. But I definitely think it's a policy that will be hugely popular and very, very welcome.

• 13:46Alastair Campbell?

  But I think that if childcare becomes one of the defining big debates at the election, I think that will end up being to Labour's advantage, I suspect. Here's a good one for you, Rory, which you can answer better than I can, although I do know the answer. Why do MPs stand up in Dyer? I've always wondered, why between an MP asking a question, the Prime Minister being called to answer, other MPs stand up? They seem to be asking for a chance to respond to the question, but of course it will only be the Prime Minister who gets to answer, so why do they do it?

• 14:13Rory Stewart?

  So in order to get to speak in the House of Commons...

• 14:17Alastair Campbell?

  You must catch the Speaker's eye.

• 14:19Rory Stewart?

  Exactly, the Speaker's got to call you. And the Speaker's only prepared to call you if you're on your feet, which means that you bob up and down endlessly. So every time anyone else stands, you have to stand. And in a long, in a long debate, when I was trying to get called, so, I mean, I got so infuriated by this stuff. I was one of the only MPs who'd spent serious time in Syria, and I was trying to get called in the Syria debate. And I was there for three hours and I'd written a really strong ten-minute speech on Syria.

• 14:52Alastair Campbell?

  You had to watch Peter Bone being called.

• 14:53Rory Stewart?

  And I would stand up and sit down, stand up and sit down, stand up and sit down, stand up and sit down, stand up and sit down. And John Burke never called me. And at the end of the three hours, I went up to him and I said, John, I am basically the only person in this chamber who's spent serious time in Syria. I'm a member of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee. Why did you not go, well, well, Rory, you know, sometimes, you know, customise. It's completely infuriating. And the other thing they do...

• 15:18Alastair Campbell?

  Can I let you in a little secret, by the way?

• 15:20Rory Stewart?

  Yeah, go on.

• 15:20Alastair Campbell?

  You know our motto? Disagree agreeably. Do you know who I got that?

• 15:25Rory Stewart?

  Oh, no, please. Oh, no, please. If it's not Alex Salmon, it's.

• 15:30Alastair Campbell?

  John Burgo. I was talking to him and he said, we've lost the art of disagreeing agreeably. And I thought, what a great line. Is that a whole thing to say? Dom, our producer's got his head in his hands.

• 15:40Rory Stewart?

  Oh, dearie me, dearie me.

• 15:42Alastair Campbell?

  So thanks, John. Anyway, carry on, Rory.

• 15:44Rory Stewart?

  Yeah, so the, and the other thing that they do, which I don't know whether the public watching understands is that as the debate goes on, the speaker keeps reducing the amount of time you get to speak. So on big issues that I really cared about, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, that I'd put huge energy into, I went to Libya the day after Gaddafi fell. You're popping up and down, it starts unlimited, then it becomes a 10 minute limit, then a nine minute limit. By the time they call me, it's a three minute limit.

• 16:13Alastair Campbell?

  Right, Rory, you've had a lot of love of this. Come on.

• 16:15Rory Stewart?

  And when you say, when you say to the, say to your colleagues, I cannot, or maybe it's a.

• 16:21Alastair Campbell?

  The honourable gentleman will sit down.

• 16:23Rory Stewart?

  I cannot, you know, within four minutes, make all the points that need to be made about what's going on in Libya when I've just come back from a visit to Libya. Everyone says, oh, no, no, no. Any member of parliament worth their salt should be able to make their points in four minutes. And one of the objections I had to the European Parliament is they had a 90 second limit on speeches. The idea that you can say anything serious in 90 seconds.

• 16:47Alastair Campbell?

  See if you can do it in a tweet, Rory. Right, we've got loads of questions to try and get through this week, Rory, so let's have a quick break.

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• 19:15Alastair Campbell?

  Welcome back to the Rest is Politics question time with me Rory Stewart.

• 19:17Rory Stewart?

  And me Alastair Campbell.

• 19:19Alastair Campbell?

  Now, here's a question from Rachel Pepeat. Yep. I would like to know what each of you likes and dislikes about the other. Let's go on the dislikes. The dynamic between you both is what makes the Rest is Politics such a success and I love it. So start with you Rory, what do you not like about Alistair?

• 19:34Rory Stewart?

  Okay, so I-

• 19:35Alastair Campbell?

  I'm sure you asked this the whole time.

• 19:36Rory Stewart?

  No, so the thing that winds me up most about Alastair Campbell is the fact that the only Conservative MPs he seems to like are real horrors like Alan Clark. Paradoxically, you're only comfortable with Conservative. You never talk about people I really admire like David Gork.

• 19:55Alastair Campbell?

  I like David Gork.

• 19:56Rory Stewart?

  You like-

• 19:56Alastair Campbell?

  I got David Gork to come and speak at the People's Road Rally.

• 19:58Rory Stewart?

  The people you talk-

• 19:59Alastair Campbell?

  And I was very nice to him, he brought his dad and I liked his dad.

• 20:01Rory Stewart?

  People you talk about are the rogues. You only like Conservative MPs when they're rogues like Alan Clark trying to hand over their Rolls Royces to you. That's my complaint about you.

• 20:08Alastair Campbell?

  Okay, okay. Uh, what do I not like about Rory? I really, it's not a not like, I find it disturbing that he knows literally nothing about sport. I find that really disturbing and it makes me feel sorry for him. And I don't like to feel sympathetic to somebody that I'm meant to be meant to be sparring with. And I think the other thing, you going about, so I think.

• 20:30Rory Stewart?

  Could I just come down there?

• 20:30Alastair Campbell?

  Yeah.

• 20:31Rory Stewart?

  I sort of feel that the hours that you spend watching sport, how many hours a week do you spend watching sport?

• 20:37Alastair Campbell?

  Sports twenty four times seven. No, not that many.

• 20:41Rory Stewart?

  It's the time when I can be, you know, reading books.

• 20:44Alastair Campbell?

  I do both.

• 20:44Rory Stewart?

  Developing knowledge.

• 20:45Alastair Campbell?

  I read while it's on.

• 20:45Rory Stewart?

  There's only that many hours in the day, right?

• 20:47Alastair Campbell?

  That's true. Yeah, okay.

• 20:48Rory Stewart?

  You've probably spent now, I would think, in your life, one and a half solid years of your entire life watching sport.

• 20:56Alastair Campbell?

  Yeah, but, you know, we spent almost a third of our life sleeping. So, you know, so, no, I tell you, I tell you something, I think that you're a very decent bloke for a Tory, okay? No doubt about that. So that that blows your theory about me completely in a hole. I wouldn't be doing this podcast with you, though you're a Tory, if I didn't think there was some sort of decency there.

• 21:14Rory Stewart?

  But you'd really prefer to be doing it with Alan Clark, wouldn't you?

• 21:17Alastair Campbell?

  Well, but I'd rather he was alive than dead because I thought he added a lot of gay energy to the nation. But I think you are, I've noticed, for example, that the two people you most despise, I think.

• 21:29Rory Stewart?

  Yeah.

• 21:30Alastair Campbell?

  One is Johnson.

• 21:30Rory Stewart?

  Yeah.

• 21:31Alastair Campbell?

  And I think the other is Sadiq Khan. And let me finish. And I think what they have in common is that you wanted the job that they then wanted you to get. So I think there's more of a kind of.

• 21:42Rory Stewart?

  Let me.

• 21:42Alastair Campbell?

  Steely determination, the killer instinct in you than you let on. So you, you're like, you remind me of my Fiona, right? In this regard, right? When we go about out and about, people see me and Fiona together and I'm like the big bastard and she's just the saint, right? And I think with you people that, you know, Alice Campbell is this horrible, hard bastard and Rory's the nice guy. And I don't think you're as nice as you let on. How about that?

• 22:04Rory Stewart?

  Can I just put on the record? I think Sadiq Khan is a much better person than Boris Johnson.

• 22:09Alastair Campbell?

  Okay, just cut there. Cut there. You don't need to say but.

• 22:12Rory Stewart?

  Very good. Okay. Okay, here's a question for you. Jacques Malherbe, what tip did you receive as a young journalist that you still think is relevant and important? How would you say that in French?

• 22:24Alastair Campbell?

  Quel conseil?

• 22:25Rory Stewart?

  Yes.

• 22:27Alastair Campbell?

  Vous avez reçu?

• 22:28Rory Stewart?

  Yes. As a young journalist that you still...

• 22:31Alastair Campbell?

  En tant que jeune journaliste.

• 22:33Rory Stewart?

  That you still think is relevant and important.

• 22:35Alastair Campbell?

  Qui reste toujours relevant. Relevant, relevant, yeah, I think. Was that okay?

• 22:43Rory Stewart?

  Very good, yes.

• 22:44Alastair Campbell?

  Why was it in French? Just because he's called Jacques, you think he's French?

• 22:47Rory Stewart?

  Jacques Malherbe.

• 22:48Alastair Campbell?

  Jacques Malherbe. He could be from Wigan. I mean, you just so hate the north of England.

• 22:53Rory Stewart?

  What tip did you receive that you think is no longer applicable in a much changed media landscape?

• 22:57Alastair Campbell?

  No, I'll tell you the tip that I received from my very good friend and mentor, Sid Young, sadly no longer with us. And I remember he once saying to me, and I absolutely believe there's a story in everybody.

• 23:09Rory Stewart?

  Okay.

• 23:10Alastair Campbell?

  Everybody you meet.

• 23:10Rory Stewart?

  That's still relevant. And what tip, he says in his second question, do you think is no longer applicable in a much changed media landscape?

• 23:17Alastair Campbell?

  I was going to say, I wonder whether you really need a 150 minute shorthand, given that, funny of these students I was with yesterday.

• 23:22Rory Stewart?

  Do you have a 150 minute shorthand?

• 23:24Alastair Campbell?

  I did. I don't now. But yeah, I still do shorthand, but I don't have a 150 minute. But I've noticed with all these students yesterday, none of them were taking notes. They were just tapping on the, on a keyboard. So maybe that, maybe that. I still think shorthand's useful to have, but I don't think it's as important as it was. You couldn't qualify as a journalist without shorthand back in the day.

• 23:42Rory Stewart?

  Yeah.

• 23:42Alastair Campbell?

  Right, I've got one for you.

• 23:44Rory Stewart?

  Well, I have one for you. Guy Elliott, UK Soft Power. Just over a week ago, incidentally, we both agree with every word of what I'm about to read, but I'm going to give you an opportunity to respond.

• 23:54Alastair Campbell?

  To agree with it.

• 23:54Rory Stewart?

  The UK's only full-time professional choir, the BBC Singers, was axed suddenly after nearly 100 years of extraordinary service. This has prompted calls from music fans and professionals to propose a boycott of the BBC proms. In the last year, we've seen huge cuts to the English National Opera, Glideborne Tour, the Britain Symphony, WNO and many other vital musical and art institutions. What can be done to stop this wanton destruction of our rich cultural landscape and heritage? How do we protect and promote the UK's position as a global leader in culture when the current government seems to be ideologically opposed to a diverse, high-quality music and art scene? And that is going, and the rest is politics manifested to challenge the Labour Government to reinstate when they come in.

• 24:38Alastair Campbell?

  Particularly at a time when everything else feels so S H I T. That there's always a danger that arts and culture gets hit first, when actually, arts and culture are fundamental to all the things that make life special. I thought that one of my favorite of many really moving bits of the the leading interview with Rahima Mahmood from the Stop Uyghur Genocide campaign. Was when she said that she's she's a musician, she's a very talented musician. She said that she saw her music as an act of defiance against the regime because they're trying to erase their culture and erase all joy. And I'll tell you how crazy this Louis Shackleton, who's David Miliband's wife, and she's a she's a musician, she's a violinist. And she's been sending me stuff all week, which is so wound up about this.

• 25:23Alastair Campbell?

  And she says to this, what on earth is happening with the BBC? The BBC had a headline, Dorset Farmer to Conduct Music at King's Coronation. This Dorset farmer happens to be Sir John Elliott Gardner, who's one of the greatest conductors there has ever been. And then there's an American composer by John Adams, American composer and conductor. He has come out and said, I just do not understand that this is happening in Britain.

• 25:52Rory Stewart?

  I mean, that is unbelievable, isn't it?

• 25:54Alastair Campbell?

  So, listen, we are, I've been tweeting away madly for the BBC singers. And of course, when you do, you get all these Lee Anderson types saying, oh, metropolitan elite, love your singing, all the rest of it. They want to portray all this art stuff as only being for kind of, you know, a wealthy elite. Like, you know, kids in working class areas don't like to, you know, do arts and culture. So I'm with you on this one, and I really do think, look, it's such an easy thing for Labour just to say, you know. Obviously, it's not their budget.

• 26:21Rory Stewart?

  Yeah.

• 26:21Alastair Campbell?

  It's the BBC. But if Labour started a campaign now for the BBC singers, I think they'd win it.

• 26:26Rory Stewart?

  I do think the John Elliott Gardner thing is absolutely insane.

• 26:29Alastair Campbell?

  What, the Dorset farmer?

• 26:30Rory Stewart?

  Completely insane. So this guy, for listeners, because we'll we'll put a clip on to, I don't know, English Baroque or the Monteverdi. But this man is an international superstar of music.

• 26:41Alastair Campbell?

  Yeah.

• 26:42Rory Stewart?

  And the one thing he's not

• 26:43Alastair Campbell?

  There's nothing wrong with Dorset farmers, by the way.

• 26:45Rory Stewart?

  One thing he's not known around the world for is his agricultural practices.

• 26:48Alastair Campbell?

  So there we are. Listen, if the BBC want to come back and say that was a fake tweet or a spoof or whatever, fair enough, but it was pretty ridiculous. Right. Max Ferreira. I've recently been watching The Simpsons and I came across the episode that Tony Blair featured in. I was shocked that Tony Blair actually voiced himself on the show. Could I ask Alistair how that arrangement came to happen and what part did you play?

• 27:08Rory Stewart?

  Yeah, go on then, tell us about that.

• 27:10Alastair Campbell?

  Would you like to be in The Simpsons? Would you, would you?

• 27:12Rory Stewart?

  Yeah, yeah, I would quite like to be in The Simpsons. Weirdly, the president of Afghanistan, Ashraf Ghani, was exactly identical to Homer Simpson's boss. It's really, really weird. Anyway, yes, come on, tell us about Tony Blair.

• 27:22Alastair Campbell?

  The reason why that question leaped out to me is because I do remember it. I can't remember how it got arranged. The Simpsons basically just asked if Tony Blair would be in it. And I don't think I've ever seen him quite as excited as he was. But no, I think Tony's three most culturally exciting moments, there was recording The Simpsons and then being on The Simpsons, he liked that. Meeting Barbra Streisand, he was genuinely a bit starstruck with Barbra Streisand. And the other one, he met David Bowie at the Brits.

• 27:52Rory Stewart?

  And that was a big deal.

• 27:53Alastair Campbell?

  That was a big deal. And I remember we got in the car on the way back from the Brits.

• 27:57Rory Stewart?

  Would you be more excited about meeting David Bowie or Mick Jagger?

• 28:00Alastair Campbell?

  Well, I met Mick Jagger.

• 28:01Rory Stewart?

  I see.

• 28:03Alastair Campbell?

  And I met David Bowie.

• 28:04Rory Stewart?

  Which was more exciting for you?

• 28:05Alastair Campbell?

  I think, I think David Bowie, I think David Bowie is a bigger historical. I don't know. I think they're both really impressive, aren't they?

• 28:11Rory Stewart?

  Pretty impressive.

• 28:12Alastair Campbell?

  I don't think, I think when you get to that level. Then there was, the other time was Tony was hosting a meeting of regional political editors in the Cabinet Room. And there was a knock on the door and Fiona, my Fiona, who was with Cherie at the time, said, is this important? And I sort of, regional journalists, so we've got a guest. And Cherie brought Paul McCartney in. So that was quite cool.

• 28:38Rory Stewart?

  That was pretty cool. Now, here's an interesting question from Colin Moody. Another podcast I listened to recently suggested that Tony Blair considered sending the SAS into Zimbabwe to take out Mugabe. How much of any truth is there in this? And I want to, just on that, talk a little bit about somebody that we both knew quite well, Charles Guthrie.

• 28:57Alastair Campbell?

  Yep.

• 28:57Rory Stewart?

  He's Chief of Defence Staff. So he was my neighbour when I was growing up in London.

• 29:01Alastair Campbell?

  Okay.

• 29:01Rory Stewart?

  Two doors down, I used to play with his sons. And I knew him, I guess, when he was first a young Colonel. And very sadly, lost his wife recently. And he, I think, is sometimes remembered as having got into conversations with you and Tony Blair about the feasibility of intervening in Zimbabwe. Talk a little bit about that. Is that something that you've been open about?

• 29:20Alastair Campbell?

  I don't remember the specifics of Zimbabwe and Mugabe. I don't think we would have done an assassination on Mugabe.

• 29:27Rory Stewart?

  The story at the time, though, is that, almost actually in the lead up to the Iraq war, there was huge anxiety about what was happening in Mugabe. And remember, Mugabe, again, for listeners, has taken over. And in 1983, had led this horrifying massacre of his political opponents called the Gurukhundi. He had then presided over rising inflation, expropriation of farms, and there was increasing pressure, wasn't there, on the Blair government to do something? Through the late 70s, early 2000s.

• 29:55Alastair Campbell?

  Yeah. And Charles Guthrie, by the way, was definitely part of that discussion that led to the intervention that we did in Sierra Leone. I remember him specifically coming over and explaining why he felt this was so important. And as you were saying in the discussion about Iraq, you know, the military have their own views, they won't do anything without political, you know, oversight. But I have no memory at all of a discussion about taking out Mugabe. I will say about Charles Guthrie, and I remember you said on the Iraq podcast that you thought I was a bit too sort of respectful and deferential to these military bodies and what have you. But I found him an absolutely fascinating character. As you know, I've got this thing about people who wear the

• 30:35Rory Stewart?

  Pinky rings, yeah.

• 30:36Alastair Campbell?

  Bloody pinky rings. But I didn't mind Charles's pinky rings.

• 30:38Rory Stewart?

  You didn't mind that, right?

• 30:39Alastair Campbell?

  And one of my proudest moments was when I was over at the MOD and he introduced me to some, I think it was an American guy who was wandering around the place. And Charles said, this is this is Alastair Campbell. He's the Escheesh of Spin.

• 30:54Alastair Campbell?

  Which I was, you know.

• 30:56Rory Stewart?

  It's a good compliment from.

• 30:58Alastair Campbell?

  So here's one for you, Pakistan, Edmund Rose. I think I know what you're going to answer this as well. Is Imran Khan pluckily fighting a government which is intent on staying in power? And therefore trying to prevent him from campaigning and being elected? Or is he a populist who is no better for his country when in power than the various other recent Pakistan prime ministers?

• 31:16Rory Stewart?

  Well, Imran Khan is definitely whatever you think about him. You know, somebody who was very, very well known in Britain, probably the most famous Pakistani leader I think has ever been in Britain because he was an incredibly famous cricket star. Married to Jemai Khan, Jemai Goldsmith. He undoubtedly has a lot of populist tendencies in the way he does politics. He's created a whole change in Pakistani political culture. I used to go campaigning with Pakistani politicians in the early 2000s. I remember driving around with one of the members of these Pakistani elite families. So she was campaigning in rural Punjab and she would, we drove in the back of a car.

• 31:57Rory Stewart?

  The car would drive up to some men sitting on a string bed outside a collection of mud houses. The driver would put down the window and he would say, in the back of this car is Lady so and so, the daughter of Mr. So and so, the daughter of Lady so and so. Will you vote for in the next election? And the men, it's a very feudal system, would basically stand off their string beds, pull their forelock and say Jihar. And then the car would drive on and that was political campaigning. So in those days, Pakistani politics was dominated by these feudal landlords who often went back to the British Raj, who were descended from famous saints from the Middle Ages. And what's happened is Imran Khan has created a whole new coalition based on new urban money and youth.

• 32:42Rory Stewart?

  He was brought in with the backing of the military, tried to fight against the military, the military essentially threw him out. And there is absolutely no doubt really that if an election was held today, he seems to have an overwhelming support, which would bring him in again. But the current government. Which is being run by the brother of the the previous prime minister is technocratic, focused on detail, efficient, and there is a culture war going on. Very classic culture war between somebody who's a sort of Rishi Sunak figure, you know, very thoughtful, serious, technocratic detail against Imran Khan, who absolutely represents

• 33:24Rory Stewart?

  public opinion and can deploy huge crowds into the streets. And in the middle of all this is the Pakistan military that still effectively runs Pakistan.

• 33:34Alastair Campbell?

  Yeah, yeah. Well, let's take this one. This both the main podcast and the Q and A have been quite gloomy. Let's try and inject a bit of hope. Alex, me, is there anything about the current political situation that gives you hope? Should I dare to feel hopeful about the future? Or are we just on a giant island-shaped Titanic, slowly sinking further and further?

• 33:53Rory Stewart?

  Okay, let me try first, go back to you. Thing that gives me hope is that we often talk about an age of populism, but actually there have been some very positive developments. We've talked about the fact that Biden defeated Trump, did well again in the midterms. We've talked about successes in Slovenia and Czech Republic, people fighting against populists, the teal independents in Australia.

• 34:11Alastair Campbell?

  Bolsonaro gone.

• 34:12Rory Stewart?

  Bolsonaro gone, Boris Johnson gone, Liz Truss gone. So I think populism is still a very, very powerful force in a world of social media, but it isn't always going to win. And perhaps the most optimistic of all is Macron defeating Le Pen. Back to you.

• 34:28Alastair Campbell?

  I do get hopeful when I do events like I did with the King's College guys yesterday who were engaged, interested in, okay, they're political students, but I think there are a lot of people who are really interested in politics at the moment, but just worried about it. At Manchester City against Burnley on Saturday, I went with my son Callum and we arrived in the away end and the guy next to me was a...

• 34:50Rory Stewart?

  You talk about this this match a lot, was it?

• 34:52Alastair Campbell?

  Well, it's because we played so well.

• 34:53Rory Stewart?

  Yes, you so well, yeah.

• 34:54Alastair Campbell?

  We played so well.

• 34:55Rory Stewart?

  Very, very good.

• 34:56Alastair Campbell?

  And as everybody said, as I think Pep Guardiola said in his after-match interview, they were lucky to get 6-0. But so the first guy who came and sat next to me was a guy called Mark, who I'd never met before, and we got chatting about this, that and the other, and eventually started talking a little bit about politics. And he said, look, don't be cross with me, but I've actually, he was in his 40s, I'd say, he says, don't be cross with me, but I've never ever voted in my life. I've just never bothered, but I'm going to vote this time because we've got to get rid of these people. That gave me hope. Put it this way, if this government does hang on for another term, I really would feel hopeless about the future.

• 35:37Rory Stewart?

  You'd get, you'd get depressed.

• 35:38Alastair Campbell?

  Yeah.

• 35:38Rory Stewart?

  You'd, you'd, you'd move off to France or something.

• 35:40Alastair Campbell?

  And I do, honestly, I'm sure you get the same. I think it's hopeful that we've, that, you know, I know you've seen it when you just back in London the last couple of days. The number of people who have come up to say, really like your podcast. I think that is hopeful, uh, because I think it says that people are engaged, want to be engaged, but don't quite know how to be engaged, which is why Alastair Campbell's book, But What Can I Do? May 11th Penguin Random House is so timely, Rory.

• 36:06Rory Stewart?

  Yep, Alastair Campbell's book, May 11th Penguin Random House. You heard about it first here. Right. Thank you all very much.

• 36:13Alastair Campbell?

  Thank you.

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