The Rest Is Politics: 122. Question Time: Leaking Liz Truss, the funniest person in politics, and ‘Killing Thatcher’

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So, welcome to another episode of The Restless Politics Question Time with me, Alistair Campbell.

And with me, Rory Stewart. And we're here in Belfast, but I wanted to start with one question.

So, what do you make of the current crisis befalling the CBI? What does it say about corporate Britain?

Is there a better way for the business community to be represented and have their voices heard and

Westminster Whitehall? Is that a question about Tony Danker's support of Labour or has he done something else?

Oh, this is just the classic Tory party, negative campaign, sort of sinister smeary that you build.

No, I think, I'm sure this is about the allegations against Tony Danker, the head of the CBI,

that have led to him departing his post. So, I'm guessing that's quite serious.

And then, whether there is something deeper about the culture there or not, I don't know.

I'm a very, very close friend of his predecessor, Carolyn Fairburn.

Oh, I think she's great. And she was one of the few people who was prepared to make really

constructive, detailed proposals on a soft Brexit, which I thought was absolutely vital.

And businesses failure to do that. And I really think business did fail to do that.

I kept saying, you guys have got so much riding on Brexit. You've got untold resources.

You could be spending millions funding think tanks and campaigns to come up with a really

constructive proposal on a good, compromised customs union Brexit.

And none of them did it. They either privately backed second referendum remain,

or they just kept quiet. And that was terrible, I felt, for someone like me trying to campaign

for something more like a customs union Brexit, that there were no voices out there really producing the papers.

Boy, the ERG had them. They had Brady arrangements and Malthouse compromises and Sangara agreements

and all these weird things that we've now fortunately forgotten being produced a lot of them by Tufton Street think tanks.

But Carolyn Fairburn was one of the few people prepared to engage in trying to produce concrete details

on what a better Brexit deal would look like. But even she didn't actually produce what we wanted,

which was the 500 page chapter and verse campaign, which would allow us to go to the Guardian

and the Times and others saying, this is what it looks like and get the MPs behind it.

I'm very pleased that you fell into my little jab there of turning a question that you were pushing to me,

trying to suggest that anybody who supported the Labour Party was involved in some sort of terrible sex scandal

into a discussion of how brilliant by very good friend Carolyn Fairburn is.

Thank you very much for that, Rory. Now moving on, Alison Golding.

Is Rishi Sunak really any better than Trussell Johnson?

The scale of government financial losses during his watch has transferred PM.

His failure to stop utility profits going abroad rather than to the UK infrastructure

and he's deliberately leaving the NHS to rot, all say not to me.

Tellinore, could Rory explain why he's a fan of Rishi Sunak?

I applaud his efforts on Northern Ireland EU relations but could never be a fan of anyone

who enables and reinforces Swallow Braverman on asylum seekers.

Brackets, Rory is correct on Labour's attack ads so we can park that.

We've talked a lot about that last week but fair question, isn't it?

I think the first question is a good question and obviously people who are strongly Labour

are going to be against Rishi Sunak and absolutely I do agree that I find Swallow Braverman's stuff

around boats and asylum and Rory and are deeply, deeply uncomfortable

and one of the things that has made me uncomfortable with Rishi Sunak

is the fact that Swallow Braverman is home secretary.

I hope he's now going to move to get rid of her as he becomes more confident in his position

and I think that's something that people should judge him on.

So you said on the main podcast that you think that might happen.

Is that wishful thinking?

Well, it's to do with and this is something we've talked about a lot

and we've talked particularly about here in Northern Ireland

which is how much you can say no to your party and confront your party

and that's the genius of politics, isn't it?

Because you can be like Boris Johnson just feeding the very worst instincts of your party all the time

or you can be, I'm afraid to be honest, like Theresa May,

ending up very isolated from your party not really bringing them with you

and it's very difficult to judge from the outside how tough you could be

but I think and this is something I can give you credit for

you've been pushing Rishi Sunak on being tough

for a more confrontational towards Boris Johnson on this trust

and I think we'd like to see it with Swallow Braverman.

On the plus side very quickly, I'm very struck by the fact that ministers I admire

and cabinet ministers too just say to me consistently

he is the first grown-up Prime Minister they've seen in a long time

and what they're talking about there is number 10 is run much, much more professionally and thoughtfully

he really masters his briefs but he's not strangely like Gordon Brown

and some people would have accused Theresa May of this

somebody who masters his briefs but doesn't delegate

he's somebody who masters briefs and seems to be able to allow people to get on with their job

first time we've had a Prime Minister I think that I've felt for a long time

where the people who work with him closely really admire him

but he is I guess in the end still quite private, quite introverted

and he's still very much a conservative

you know more on the right conservative party than I was

a Brexiteer, more comfortable leaning in on the immigration boats thing than I would have been doing

but I think a huge improvement on this trust and Boris Johnson

Now we've got a very good question here which I think could be an absolutely brilliant idea

from somebody with a brilliant name as well

Laurie the anti-growth collator

I think this is a point about Liz Truss

Could we get a one-off special podcast where Shashana and Fiona discuss Rory and Alistair

Do you think they want to do that?

I think Fiona would love it

Really?

And do you think anyone wants to listen to that?

I think they might

Fiona's had quite a few offers to write books about the hell of living with me

Okay, well we could picture that

I mean they're both definitely more interesting than us

I think we have to accept that probably the podcast in the future would be done by them

as soon as people hear them

He's a bad idea because he would put us out of a job

Okay, so Laurie, it's not happening

Go back to your little fantasies about Liz Truss and her anti-growth coalition

I think it's quite threatening

I think they're both considerably more appealing personalities than we are

but we could try it

Paddy, who would be the presumptive Democrat nominee if not Biden, comma Alistair?

I just don't know

I mean people talk about Gavin Euston but I just don't know

I think people got used to it, Biden's going to run for it

and I can see people, Rory is shaking his head and looking rather alarmed

I think he's going to go for it

and I don't think it's, as you said before

there are people in the Democrats who'd think, oh god, no, please, no, he's too old

but at the same time, I think if Trump does get the nomination

I think Biden might be the guy to beat him

It's a big decision, though

It's a huge decision

Can you imagine how stupid we'd feel if Trump defeated Biden

and how we'd all be beating ourselves up

Let's ask yourself this, when he was in Ireland

did he look like a guy who was on a victory lap of departure?

He didn't, to me, look like a guy who was starting a new campaign

so I think it's going to be Joe and I hope to God he wins

Now, Rory, I'm going to ask you this one

James Thomas, Rory, knowing what you know now

if you had your time again, would you vote for the chaos of Ed Miliband in 2015?

Ed Miliband, no, I would vote for David Miliband, possibly

I would not vote for Ed Miliband

Marty, who was the funniest person you met in politics?

I'll tell you what popped into my head straight away with that question

was Tony Banks, do you remember Tony Banks?

Two of the reason I love Tony Banks

he was a massive, massive Chelsea fan

that's not something I loved about him

but he was the MP for West Ham

and he never pretended to be Eddie

he used to walk around his West Ham constituency with a Chelsea scarf

some people get on their heads kicked in

and one of my favourite memories of Tony

and here's a shout out for Rory, by the way

at Tony Banks' funeral

David Meller made one of the best funeral rations I've ever heard

Made for a Chelsea sport but you're telling me did not wear a Chelsea strip in bed

I don't want to talk about conservative MPs in bed

but I think it's well recognised that that story about

David Meller wearing a Chelsea shirt in bed

while having sex with somebody called Antonia DeSanche

I think her name was

Who was who was the girlfriend of the England manager, no?

What are you talking about?

Is that not it?

Sven

It wasn't Sven's girlfriend, no

No, you're talking about Nancy Delolio

I don't understand at all

I mean, this is staying in

This is staying in

They're so...

So I have a vague memory of scandals about Sven in bed

I'm talking about Tony Banks

And scandals about David Meller in bed

but they weren't the same scandals at all

There were a lot about scandals involving Sven

in fact, here's a little confession for you Rory

his most famous scandal was an affair with Ulrika Johnson

Swede

Yes

Sven's a Swede and I introduced them

Oh my goodness

At, it gets worse, at a party for Richard Desmond's birthday

This is the sort of thing I had to go to in the olden days

and Fiona was giving me a very, very BDI

Can we just remind listeners, Richard Desmond

made his name as a publisher of porn, right?

He actually owns a copyright to some of my work

That's right

and then went on now owns the Dave Express

No, he sold them now I think

but he's basically a media guy

and he had this birthday party

and I was talking to Ulrika

and Fiona was giving me a bit of BDI

And also he bought down Robert Generic, didn't he?

He was the guy who sat next to Robert Generic

to get a planning permission for a building

He didn't bring it down, did he?

Generic, I think, in the end resigned because of the seat

Did he?

Yeah, Desmond had paid money, sat next to him at an event

This is getting so far from Tony Banks

Tony, RIP, we're going to come back to you eventually

What was it?

It was a joke, have you got a joke from Tony Banks?

Wait a minute

So, I said to Ulrika, I saw Sven arrive

and I said, have you met the other famous Swede in London?

And I introduced them and a few weeks later

it's all over the front pages of a bloody affair

Was that, that was the son again?

I think it might have been the mirror

And phone tapping?

No

Well, around that period, very good point

Very, very, very good point, very good point

Anyway, so David Mellor made this fantastic speech

about Tony Banks, which is interesting if you think about it

David Mellor was a Tory MP

and he was invited to do one of the main speeches

I think Margaret Beckett spoke and possibly said he can't

I can't remember, but anyway, but David Mellor made

an absolutely brilliant speech

But my favourite memory of Tony Banks

was at a Labour Party conference

where we were working on Tony Blair's speech

for the conference

and I got a message on, this was back in the days of Pages

I got a message saying that Tony Banks

had caused this terrible stir

because Tony Banks had done this speech

where he'd said Labour would definitely go to win the election

because William Hague was the Tory leader at the time

and he said, nobody's ever going to elect a foetus

Prime Minister

which was truly horrible on one level

but when we sort of told Tony, he said, Tony, what the hell is this?

and he said, ah, Guy, you know, I just got a bit carried away

am I going to get bollocks, am I going to get bollocks?

So the thing is, he just wanted those guys

you couldn't bollock him because he was so funny

So that's my, who's your funniest MP?

Actually, I thought Labour MPs were generally funny

Well, they're generally better people

Well, funny, I was on

Leak Politics, Alexander Kay

This week, again, has been all about a new wave of leaks

What do you make of Leak Politics

and how the unintentional, or apparently unintentional

leaks impact modern politics?

Well, this of course relates to this American stuff

which does seem amazing

that it's on, I think we're on Discord, aren't we?

You can get on to Discord to talk about the rest of his politics

So this guy has got access to stuff relating to some pretty sensitive material

and he's discussing it with his mates on Discord

and he's now being tamed

and so whether it's part of some sophisticated intelligence operation

against Americans or not, I don't know

So he's been described as a leak

but I think when people think of what we mean by leaks

I think the word gets used way too much

A leak to me is when you're in possession of usually a paper

or a piece of information

which you should not necessarily be going into the public domain

and you put it into the public domain for your own political purposes

Yeah, and often that was something that comes across in your diaries, isn't it?

Suspicions that Damien McBride and Gordon Brown were leaking things to the press

to try to bolster Gordon Brown's position against Tony Blair

Yeah, but sometimes what the press would sometimes do

is have a conversation with a guy in a pub

who sort of shrugs your shoulder or raises an eyebrow

in a different sort of way or says a few sort of choice words

and that becomes viewed as, you know, leaking, briefing against

when sometimes it's just journalists kind of hoovering up information

I think when...

Well, you also see, I mean, also I felt this with my colleagues

that it's clearly a basic bit of self-promotion

One of the reasons that Liz Truss made it to be very briefly Prime Minister

is she was very well known along with Gavin Williamson and others

for being one of the first to come out of cabinet

which is meant to be confidential internal conversations

I talk to the media

I hear from journalists that they used to get messages during the cabinet

of who was saying what

And it was a very odd practice

because it was something that somebody like me or David Gork

who were kind of more boring cabinet ministers didn't do

but it was clearly an absolute necessity

for the political career of certain kinds of people

I remember when journalists used to take me out as a young politician

how disappointed they'd get if I didn't say anything interesting

and how those people who did say interesting things pretty per tell

Liz Truss found their careers rocketing up

because the media developed them

and convinced the Prime Ministers the day

that these were the great media stars

So there's a sort of slightly strange relationship to it

Well, just related to that

I would say that one of the reasons that Michael Gove has been such a survivor

within Conservative Party politics

is he's very good at making sure the press reflects him in a reasonable light

I mean, Fiona, my Fiona has a sort of running joke about

you know, whenever she reads a story about Michael Gove

in The Times or The Sunday Times

he basically just puts his byline on it

You know, the Prime Ministers thinking of asking Michael Gove

to take over X problem, Y problem

or some amazing observation Michael Gove made

Did you have ministers who tried to do that to Tony Blair and Gordon Brown?

Oh, yeah

I don't think...

I think by and large we run a pretty tight ship

But if you read an article saying Prime Minister thinking of appointing X or Y

to run this, your suspicion would have been that that minister was briefing out

and trying to get their name in the press

Or somebody else was doing it so that they'd hope that you'd think that

So in the end it's best to just ignore it

Unless it becomes a problem

I mean, how does it work?

Can it sometimes help an MP to get stories out?

Does it backfire and just make everyone a number 10 think you're a dick?

I think if somebody over does it

One of Tony's strengths, I think, is the leader

He wanted other big figures around

He wanted people to kind of have a profile and get noticed for the right reasons

But I think if people start to do what I kind of...

The puff piece stuff

I think we'd find that pretty tiresome

Look, there's no doubt, particularly in the modern age

Getting noticed, having a profile

So you said recently, for example, we were asked at a show

Who do you think on the Labour side should be

If not Keir Starmer would be leader

And you said Peter Kyle, who's here at the moment

Because he's the Shadow Secretary of the State of Northern Ireland

Now I think Peter's terrific

Peter doesn't have a big profile

You need a big profile to be viewed as

And therefore to be one of the big beasts

And so interestingly, people like Jess Phillips

Or Stella Creasy, who've had more social media exposure

Can end up in a stronger position than Peter Kyle

Although Peter is in the Shadow Cabinet

So that says to me that, you know

So sometimes it can go either way

And ultimately, we still operate in a system

That's essentially the patronage of the leader

With David Gault, because I thought he would have made

A brilliant, brilliant Prime Minister

And yet the only response I got out of colleagues

When I was trying to canvas for him

When Theresa May was stepping down

Was he just doesn't have enough of a public profile

You know, nobody's heard of him

This goes back to our argument about the ads

Is that in our media world, I'm afraid

You either get noticed because you are

People recognise a sort of supreme talent

I would put Tony and Gordon in that category

Johnson got noticed because he'd built

Very carefully built his own profile

Under years of journalism

He was a celebrity politician

And then, obviously, Sunak now

Is incredibly high profile because he's become the Prime Minister

I would argue that it's possible to make the case

That Rishi Sunak's elevation to become Prime Minister

Actually goes against some of that stuff

And I think that's a good thing

But I think I can see why something like David Gault

Because he didn't cause scandals

He didn't say stupid things

They had people talking about him on the phones

He didn't polarise

He didn't go out there and try to

Say look at me

He tried to be a serious bloke doing a serious job

And I think that there is a part of our politics

That doesn't take those people seriously enough

There are loads more questions to come

Take a quick break

Australian referendum

Here in Australia are Labour Prime Ministers

Planning to hold a referendum to change the Constitution

To admit, acknowledge Aboriginal

And Torres Strait Islander people

Conservative Party back the no vote

And as such I can't see it

Getting up as a double majority is required

What will be the damage to our reputation

If the no gets up

So I think Frank is more on the Labour side on this

And then Helen would be interested to hear your view

On the upcoming referendum in Australia

To amend our Constitution to give First Nations people

And Torres Strait Islanders a formal voice to Parliament

There's a vigorous debate in Australia

About this proposed change to our Constitution

Among both Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians

Any thoughts?

Well I, as you know

I'm a regular subscriber to the conversation

And because of that

I've always been sent

Even though I've never asked for it

But I really enjoy it

I get sent the conversation Australian version

And this week

I didn't know this was coming up

This week I listened

As I was walking here yesterday

To a podcast on the conversation

With somebody called Michel Grattan

G-R-A-W-T-A-N

Who was interviewing a well known

Indigenous campaigner

And writer about this issue

And I found it

I think I sent you a message saying that

You know, this might be an interesting one for discussion

But it's a very difficult debate to get your head around

Because it strikes me

All that it seems to be

Is that Albanese is trying to say

We need to put into our Constitution

Something that gives proper recognition

In the voice of the Indigenous population

Which seems so blindingly obvious

What's wrong with that?

But as often happens in referendums

People are sort of taking it to other places

And developing arguments that look

Kind of slightly off to one side

On the question about what damage it does

I think it would be quite damaging to their reputation

But presumably constitutionally

Or I suppose philosophically

The challenge is that generally

Liberal democracies are very, very blind

Their fundamental

History is total equality

One person, one vote

No special treatment

And so we're always dealing with this

Tension between majority representation

And protection of minority rights

And the question of how much

You can lean into minority rights

And in this case on the basis of ethnicity

And history

And to what extent special treatment

Is the correct way to think about discrimination

And injustice or not

Well, I think it's something we should

Come back to because I was fascinated

Listening to the conversation

But at the end of it, I was slightly left thinking

I can't understand why this is

Proving to be such a contentious issue

So it's one that maybe

We should come back to

When I do a bit more research

What small wins have you had recently?

This is from Dom Fertado

Life these days says

Dom is made up of small wins

For me, a small win

Is covering the daily hate mail

With other newspapers doing convenience

The little Englanders desperate for their daily

Hit of small boatry

What small wins have you had recently?

I used to do that at airports all the time

You just hide the daily mail?

I used to really know them about British Airways

The only paper that they have

They're sometimes at the F.T.

But basically, you've gone to the British Airways

And they just have stacks of the daily mail

So I used to go to

I'll go to the Luftwaffe

I'll find a load of Develte

And carry them off down

And cover the daily mail

Is that childish?

You've actually made me think

I've made me think about an answer to a previous question

Funniest MP

Paddy Ashton, I thought was pretty funny

His one to me

Which exposed my vanity and ludicrousness

He gave me a copy of his book

And I looked it up

And there was no inscription on the front

I thought it was a bit odd

And then I got to the index

Paddy

What's the

The other great index story, of course

He puts somebody in the index

But then he wasn't in the book

I think it was Govindar

Mark Grubowski

If you both had to sing karaoke

What song would you choose?

Have you been watching Succession and Sonny?

I realised IOU and Apology

I was a bit snooty about Brian Cox

He was quite nice about me

So I was feeling a bit guilty about that

It is an extraordinary performance

In Succession

Completely blows me away

There's a question we had this week

On who our favourite actor is

The stage of Stockwell asks this

My favourite actor

I guess is Mark Rylance

Who I think is extraordinary

From Wolf Hall and Incredible Hamlet

But my goodness Brian Cox

That is quite a performance

By mentioning the conversation

Somebody wrote a piece

I'm not angry, I'm a bit angry

But somebody wrote a piece

The headline of which gave the ending away

Oh, of Succession

With Mark Grubowski

If you both had to sing karaoke

What song would you choose?

It would either be

When it's ace in all in three languages

Simultaneously

Which I can do

I can do the French and the German

Very, very, very, very, very close

Are you alone tonight?

And I do the Elvis version

Where he laughs

Which one are you going to do

For us to close the question time?

Which one of the two?

My thing has got to be how you learn

We need the laugh

I can't do Elvis's laugh

Although I will say, Elvis's laugh

People can check this out

Elvis's laugh is almost identical to Bill Clinton's

And to your impression of Bill Clinton

I can do quite good Clinton

I'm not doing it

I can sing quite well Elvis

The other one I think is Johnny Cash's

I'll keep a close watch

And this Howard Amman

I like that one as well

You've got to sing something

Well, Johnny Cash has performed some Falsum Prison

If we're looking for a cultural reference to drive people out

Absolutely extraordinary

You can hear the prisoners in the background

And that's a great movie actually

We've recommended the Elvis movie

Joachim Phoenix

Really a pretty cool Johnny Cash impression

You can actually get a tape

Of him singing Johnny Cash's songs

The guy doing Elvis as well

The film is Walk the Line

With the prisoners

Raging as he sings

What book are you reading at the moment?

Ireland, I read in a single day

Rory Carroll

The island correspondent of The Guardian

He's written a book called Killing Thatcher

I actually think they could have done with a better title

That's a pretty good title isn't it?

Well, the only thing is that Thatcher wasn't killed

That is true

But it makes you wake up

It's very very rare that I read

A 300 page book in a day

Because I just don't have the concentration

To keep going but I was lucky

Because I was on a train, I was on a plane

I was travelling about the place

But it was gripping

It was quite fitting in a way

Because I was picked up at Dublin Airport

To come here and I read the last 80

To get it finished by the time we got here

So I read the last pages coming into Belfast

To celebrate the 25th anniversary

Of the Good Friday Agreement

And it's basically the story of the

Brighton Bomb

Which I covered as a journalist

And then the police hunt for the bomber

And then we'll have to measure it

Remind non-specialist listeners

Brighton Bomb, IRA Attacks, Conservative Party Conference

Date

What almost kills Mrs Thatcher

Date

It was 2.5401

I've never forgotten that

2.5401

And he's got some incredible accounts

Of the police investigation

What is 2.5401 made?

54 minutes past 2 in the morning

And that was Norman Tebbett's wife was killed?

No, John Wacom's wife was killed

And four other people

And Norman Tebbett's wife Margaret was paralyzed

It's extraordinary

But it's the story of the bomber

And his life and his background

What about Jerry Adams in it

Who doesn't give an interview

And then there's the story of Thatcher's rise

And why Thatcher took the approach to the IRA

That she did, that's got the hunger strike story

But he writes it like a thriller

Look, I know the ending

I knew the ending of the book

But it's literally you're turning the pages

To see where it goes next

That's a great recommendation

Well, I've been reading Making Sense the Troubles

A History of the Northern Ireland Conflict

David McItrick and David McVeigh

I mean, to manage to write a book

That produces something pretty close

To a balanced account, given how raw

And passionate the views of both sides are

In Northern Ireland

A hell of an achievement

They were also two of the authors on this extraordinary book

I think in nearly a million, million words

On the dead of the troubles

Following the story of every single story

Of everybody who was killed

We talked a little bit about the victims

So I'd recommend anyone who wants to understand

The troubles, Making Sense the Troubles

A History of the Northern Ireland Conflict

Good. Final things to put in the newsletter

I think it would be lovely for people

If they hadn't seen it to see the picture

Of Joe Biden in the office

Of the Irish president, Michael D. Higgins

It's one of the greatest photographs

I've seen for a long time

What sort of desk policy do you operate?

Are you a tidy desk person?

I go for tidy, yeah

I'm moderately tidy and where I'm not tidy

Everything's in quite neat piles

Some distance probably

This has got an enormous desk

That is just absolutely

Covered

And obviously made no effort whatsoever

To tidy it up before the president came in

It's a beautiful picture

Very good. Well, thank you all very much

Thank you. See you soon

Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.