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This week Nish and Coco are joined by friend of the pod, Ash Sarkar from Novara Media to talk about political scandal, trust and compromise. Ash’s book, Minority Rule, has a new afterword which talks about two progressive movements which have tried to build different kinds of relationships with voters. Is that the way forward – or are we stuck in an endless cycle of broken promises from our leaders?

One of those leaders – Keir Starmer – seems to be lurching from crisis to nightmare, so can he rise above the latest headlines about Peter Mandelson’s arrest and the Labour Together scandal?

Plus Reform’s new immigration policies, the new proposals to change the SEND system – and some good news about two protest groups.

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GUESTS 

Ash Sarkar, Contributing Editor at Novara Media and author of Minority Rule: Adventures in the Culture War – out now in paperback.

USEFUL LINKS

Jumaane Williams’ thoughtful response following the outcry about the handling of a racial slur at the Baftas.

CREDITS

Daily Express – YouTube
Nigel Farage – YouTube
@sendra.uk – Instagram
Nida Jafri

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TRANSCRIPT

Nish Kumar Hi, this is Pod Save the UK, I’m Nish Kumar, and I am coming to you from a land down under. I’m in Australia on what was supposed to be a holiday, but the news never sleeps, and so I’m here, raring to go.

Coco Khan And I’m Coco Khan, I’m coming to you from my flat, which is not quite as glamorous. Maybe I should have gone first. I feel like that was a nice surprise that you were in Australia. Anyway, this week we are looking at Keir Starmer and wondering how many ways it can go wrong for him.

Nish Kumar The reason that I’m in Australia holidaying is because I was actually working last week in New Zealand. I was filming a small part in a sitcom that I am very excited about. I think it’s going to be a really funny show. And most crucially, my hair was blow-dried straight. We can all look forward.

Coco Khan Oh my god!

Nish Kumar To that visual later in the year. Between now and the hair straightening, we’ve got very exciting things coming up, most notably this week. We are joined once again by our great friend, Ash Sarkar from Novara Media, who is going to discuss with us the impact of Peter Mandelson’s arrest, the by-election, and a stream of endless bloody inquiries and investigations.

Coco Khan Also, we do want to mention that we actually have some good news to discuss. Do stick around right at the end.

Nish Kumar First up, Peter Mandelson was arrested on Monday on suspicion of misconduct in public office. Bizarrely, his lawyers then claimed that the arrest had only happened because the police wrongly believed that he was going to flee the country.

Coco Khan This all follows the release of emails from the Epstein files. They led to allegations that Mandelson forwarded market-sensitive government information to the convicted sex offender at a time when Mandelson was serving as a cabinet minister.

Nish Kumar Mandelson has always denied any wrongdoing. And we have to mention, because our lawyers have told us we have do, we have dimension that arrest is not a charge and we are still very far from any possible court case.

Coco Khan But the arrest alone puts the story back on the front pages, which is a headache for Keir Starmer. Joining us to discuss it all is Ash Sarkar, the contributing editor of Novara Media and author of Minority Rule, now out in paperback. Ash, welcome back to Pod Save the UK. So, let’s get into this. Starmer, I think he was hoping, you know, he had a parliamentary recess. I always find it funny when we say that. Who cares about your half terms? Anyway, Starmer might have hoped to ease back into things. Probably they wanted to talk a lot about send provisions. They’ve been sending the education minister out or at least talk about unaffordable student loans. I’m sure you’ve seen that has also been in the headlines. But instead, he’s back to talking about Peter Mandelson. I know it’s hard, Ash, but can you sympathize with him? We’ve all had a first bad week at Come with me.

Ash Sarkar Um, no, not really, because, because this is…

Nish Kumar Ash, let he who is without sin, let he who has not hired a man who many people warned him was a close affiliate of an international sex offender, cast the first stone.

Ash Sarkar And who had to resign in disgrace from government, not once, but twice already. Um, I mean, this is the thing.

Coco Khan I know, but look, he’s, you know, he has come back from his holly bobs.

Ash Sarkar Awww.

Coco Khan Always from his holly bobs!

Ash Sarkar I mean, in a way, I feel sorry for him in the sense that he knows that he’s only in the job right now because nobody else wants to take it on before the May elections. So a couple of weeks ago when he had that super overheated news day when Anas Sarwar said that Keir Starmer should resign and it was sort of expected that maybe there’d be some cabinet reservations or something, Keir starmer ultimately stayed in place. Now, the official line was that was because nobody wanted to destabilize the government. That’s just complete horse shit. That’s from bean to cop completely made up. The real reason is if you anticipate a completely humiliating election result, which Labour do in May, why would you want to be the leader for that? If you’re West Street, Angela Rayner or Ed Miliband or whoever else, why would want that to be your face in charge of the calamitous Fuck up.

Nish Kumar There’s also another problem because it’s not just the police investigation that’s going on, that could take several months. But Keir Starmer also has to release the number 10 files, which discuss the vetting process. I don’t know what you guys think. That feels like, I know this sounds like a strange thing to say, that could almost be more damaging because then we’ll have the internal machinations of what Keir starmer and the people around him knew about Mandelson. Like this is, no one wants their DMs released. No one wants that text messages made public.

Ash Sarkar It’s just going to be like a brown manila folder with Morgan McSweeney’s handwritten note being, Hire my daddy, please.

Coco Khan Do you think there is a kind of finishing date for this saga for the Labour Party? And then the other thing I wanted to just mention was that this whole thing about Madison potentially fleeing, and that’s why it led to an arrest. So Madison apparently told his friends that it was a complete fiction. He’s now saying someone was behind it, who was behind it. It’s all getting very inside baseball, but inside Westminster. I’m conflicted about whether this is good for our democracy or bad, you know, it’s good that we see the machinations. Of how it really works in some ways, but on the other hand, I don’t feel like we’re being free from this. We’re just sort of being sucked into it. I don’t know, Ash, what…

Ash Sarkar I mean, I think that’s a really interesting question. The first thing is, is there a finish line in sight for Labour? I think the answer is probably no. And that’s as much to do with what the story is as well as the sort of mood it taps into. So it’s difficult because there are so many facets to it, right? So yes, you’ve got Mandelson. And maybe that would be simple enough if you could just be like, okay, well, he’s a new Labour relic. This is a new, new Labour. Problem is, Starmer appointed him to be his American ambassador. A lot of this stuff, at least about him retaining a friendship with Epstein post-conviction, that was already in the public domain. So then that brings in the new generation of Labour Party apparatchiks, Keir Starmer, Morgan McSweeney, Labour Together, the organization which campaigned for Keir starmer to get the leadership. We’ve got this story with Josh Simons now, who was a director of Labour Together after Morgan Mcsweeney whether or not. He paid private investigators, basically, to smear working journalists who were looking into the operations of Labour Together. It just seems to keep growing and growing because it’s not just about Epstein being this uniquely horrendous, monstrous character. What it does is that it sheds light on the kind of networks and operations of people and power.

Coco Khan I suppose one way to look at it, if you were looking at it positively, is now that we can put to rest the conspiracy theories, because we know it is true, they are all reptiles, and now we can move on. Perhaps this is actually- The lizards were real. The lizard were real, maybe this is the palate cleanser we need to actually build something better, or there is this, the residual thought made that like, you know, there is a great sentiment of tear it all down that is brewing among the public. We’re only looking for bad actors to whip it up for their own agenda hence the kind of fascist march that we’re seeing across Europe and obviously here in the UK

Nish Kumar I’m in Australia currently and obviously the head of state here is still inexplicably the King of England for reasons that remain unclear, seemingly to most Australians. So there is a knowledge, a really good knowledge of the details of the case pertaining to the artist formerly known as Prince Andrew. But there was a bit more opacity around the Mandelson case. He’s not got quite the cut through here and it’s been really interesting, first of all, explaining who Peter Mandelson is. And just to bring it back to what you at this idea of Is the government acting in the interest of the people or acting in the interest capital is a really, really important question. That’s been exposed by all of this. And if we don’t pose that question, then we are doing a disservice to the real details of this story. Right.

Ash Sarkar So on this question of who do politicians work for, like is it the people, is it capital? I think the best way to understand politicians as a class is to think of them as being intermediaries between democracy and capital. And their job is to effectively manage democracy so it doesn’t become too difficult for capital. Because in a way, politicians aren’t that different from dogs, right? They respond to reward and punishment. And they’ve worked out that capital can punish them. More effectively than people ever can. There are lots of reasons for that, discusses in the book, there’s electoral geography, there’s the bond markets, there is the sort of overall depoliticization of society, the decline of trade unions, et cetera, et cetera. Over the years, politicians have increasingly become capital’s man. I think you see that with Palantir, it’s a huge government contract, 240 million, I think. Basically handed out without a full tender process. Now, the tender processes are already a crock of shit. They’re basically designed so that these huge corporations who are good at one thing, which is bidding and winning government contracts, not necessarily good at delivering the thing that they’re supposed to be doing. Not even that happened when it came to Palantir. So there are some questions of going, who set up the meetings? Who was in charge of making that decision, and why is it? That we have a political class which is so comfortable with giving hundreds of millions of taxpayers money to American corporations who, you know, I think Palantir’s got some pretty disgusting practices, particularly when it comes to surveillance and their role in the ongoing genocide in Gaza. But like, why is this the norm? And I think this is such an important thing because I don’t know if you feel this, but I just, I really fucking hate my own profession and I hate, I hate just how most people work in it. Because there is this herd mentality of, well, until it’s the story, we’re not gonna talk about it. So when it comes to Mandelson and Epstein, and again, what was already known, so it was out there, it was all there. And there were very few people who brought it up. There was the Financial Times, and then there were also a couple of my colleagues who were chasing Mandelson around Labour Party Conference being like, yo, what’s the deal with your relationship with Epstein? Everyone else, when he was appointed US ambassador, basically were like, Oh, what a cunning move by Keir Starmer. This is really going to boil the left’s piss. And it wasn’t until that buildup to September where Madison was forced out of the role that the lobby, who are the sort of elite, you know, death commandos of Westminster correspondence, that was only when they began to give a shit about it. And I’ve got an idea of why. And again. About this in the book, but the way in which the incentives align, you want access, so why would you prejudice or endanger the access that you could receive from important people by reporting on them well. And then there’s also just this group thing, and there’s a sort of negative polarization, which is you have journalists in the lobby who look at social media, because everyone’s a social media addict, and they go, people I don’t like are bringing this up. Know, someone with the username Jeremy Corbyn for life is saying this, therefore it must be completely ridiculous. And so they judge their own credibility on the basis of who they think are illegitimate actors in the political space. And that’s how you end up with this thing which a ton of just regular degular people could see coming, completely blindsiding the political media class.

Coco Khan I keep banging on about this, but it’s just been in my head, not least because I’ve been hanging out with some relatives recently and some of them have been saying some things. One relative in particular who does not listen to this podcast, so I’m safe, was like, This is the problem is that whoever goes into that parliamentary position They can go in with all their ideals, but fundamentally, this is the system. And they can tweak it a little bit, but this is this system. This is what I’m saying about like, even though I think this story getting out is so important for the victims, but also to reveal how power works, I worry about this tendency that is like, fundamentally, it’s so rotten, it can never be fixed. You can elect the Greens, it doesn’t matter. At some point, they will be compromised by this. They have to be. What do you say to that?

Ash Sarkar Think that’s completely true. And the answer is, well, what’s the nature of the compromise and why are they making it? And what determines that is to whom do they feel most accountable? Our current government feels primarily accountable to the bond markets. And I think that that explains a lot of the decisions that they’re making. Whereas different parties do it in different ways. So I write about this in the new afterwards, because one of the critiques which I thought was really legit that I got from the hardback edition was or you don’t. You don’t really talk about what anyone can do about this. And I was like, that’s because I’m a journalist. I just want to say what the problem is. I don’t want to see what the solution is. So instead I have a look at the Belgian Workers’ Party, which is a bit of an album track of European political parties, but they are polling second in Belgium. And I also look at Zoran Mamdani. And the Belgian Worker’s Party is really interesting because they started really, really small. So a small group of highly aligned people and they only really opened up their membership in 2008. And even then. There’s a sort of like tiered membership, depending on how long you’ve been in it, because the idea is like, okay, we’ve got a really clear strategy. It’s important we protect that strategy before we just let anyone in who can say, like, maybe you should change it. And the thing that they say is that people, quite rightly, have no trust in politicians, right? Why would you, right, if you are a reasonable thinking person, you would say, you know, these people are just in it for themselves. So what the work of the party is, is to demonstrate your usefulness to the community before you start asking for their votes. They do things like run health clinics. And that’s a model which you could pursue. Zoran Mamdani is very different because he’s a product of the Democratic Socialists of America, which is very much mass membership. It does have a bit more factionalism, whereas the Belgian Workers’ Party is like stamp out the factions. There will be one faction. The DSA is a… Know, there’s a bit more internal fighting, but it’s also got more of a strategy of like, hey, everyone get in the car. Everyone get in the car, like we don’t know where we’re going yet, but we’re going somewhere, get in the car get in.

Nish Kumar I really appreciate the afterword of the book. It’s a really interesting thing to read somebody reflecting on critiques of their own work and not necessarily responding to those critiques by saying, you can all go fuck yourself. As someone who has had his work critiqued, I can tell you the impulse is to tell somebody to go fuck themselves. Like that’s the impulse.

Ash Sarkar And I did, I did do that. There was a, there was a couple of like really kind of nasty journalists who worked for, you know, at the time, the Times and the Telegraph who were really sneery when the book came out. And then when it made the bestseller list, I was like, eat my ass, fuck you. And my husband was like why did you do that? And I was because I wanted to, because I fucking wanted to. So I don’t, I don’t want your listeners to come away. With the wrong impression that I’m an emotionally well-regulated person, because I’m not.

Coco Khan I’m just waiting for the third edition that afterward to just be like, it’s not my thought, you were too stupid to understand this.

Ash Sarkar Yeah, like every new afterwards, it’s like, I told you to read Lenin and you still haven’t done it. But like, but like some of the some of the critiques are good. And I think that a lot of the time, people identify gaps in your work that are the product of fear, rather than outright ignorance. And there’s like an area where you fear to tread because you go, am I well qualified enough for this or like, am i good enough to do this or, like, is my it’s not my wheelhouse or don’t feel fully comfortable and. The best kind of criticism sort of shows you where you have to like grow some muscle. So for me, it was thinking about strategy because I don’t, I’m not one of those people that instinctively has a really strategic mind. I’ve got more of like a narrative mind, but like lots of the feedback I was getting from people that I really care about was like, well, where’s the strategy? And I was like, guess I’ve gotta read some fucking strategy books. And so I think that there’s a helpful process, which is like, yes. You get bookmogged and the cortisol spike is just insane, but I’m sorry, I’ve been on the internet too long, that was a clavicular.

Coco Khan That was such an internet deep cut. I had to really… Okay. I’m so sorry. I haven’t been on an incel forum for some time. Please remind me of what a mog is again.

Ash Sarkar I was busy analyze, what was it? Analyze, maxing, and then I was brutally bookmogged, resulting in a cortisol spike. But there’s a useful thing that can come from that. No work exists outside of a dialog. And I think that we all have a choice about to what extent do we want to engage with it and lean into it rather than retreat into our bubble of self-loathing.

Nish Kumar Well, look, I think it’s very good that you two as journalists have reflected on the shortcomings of your profession. I, of course, as a comedian and podcaster, know that everyone in my profession has done a great job and done no cultural damage whatsoever.

Coco Khan Stay with us, we’ll have more from Ash after the break.

[AD]

Nish Kumar So on Thursday, the Gorton and Denchen by-election is taking place. Last week’s show had a fantastic interview and I can say that because I wasn’t involved in it. A fantastic interview with the Green candidate, Hannah Spencer, so do check out that episode. Now as things stand, she still tops the betting odds, but Starmer didn’t give the impression that he was worried about a Green win when speaking to the Daily Express.

Clip This by-election is about basic values, values of unity over division, of bringing people together, over tearing them apart. And it is a straight fight between Labour and recall.

Ash Sarkar Right. So I think that there is some tactics involved here. So everyone has to present a really bullish front because of the impact a viable reform candidate has. So normally what you’d see in an election is expectations management. Oh, it’s really tight. Don’t know if we can get this one over the line, but because the Labour Party is so hated at the moment because of Kirstama and the effect of tactical voting is a little bit different. They’ve got to go, we’re your best chance to win. We’re going to. Boss it, like we’re so confident in our chances of success. And there are advantages that Labour has. One is data, right? The Labour Party has electoral data going back to the doomsday book, right, and they’re able to draw on that really, really effectively. So they have a tried and tested operation when it comes to identifying their core vote, getting postal votes out early, that kind of thing. The Green Party, because It’s in this period. Of I suppose professionalization and growth, it’s unclear to me how good their operation is. What I know from seeing how they operate in different parts of London is that it’s patchy. So you’ve got some local green parties which have a really good data operation, some green parties which have really bad data operation. So that’s an advantage that Labour might have. Obviously the green party are confident, they’ve got a articulate candidate which really does matter. They’re hoping to get 2,000 volunteers out canvassing on election day itself, which is insane, right? I think that’s bigger than anything that you saw during the height of the Corbyn years when Momentum was organizing these get out the vote operations. So that’s absolutely massive. And they’ve also got the benefit of not being Labour. There are a lot of people who go… I’m not going to vote Labour while Keir Starmer is in power. I don’t want to vote Labour because they blocked Andy Burnham from even throwing his hat in the ring as a candidate. This all happening when the national conversation is dominated by Epstein. You can see how the Greens are the beneficiary of that. Now, on to Matt Goodwin and reform. The most reform sympathetic bit of the constituency is a smaller part of the constituency. So that’s a disadvantage that reform might be at, but you can’t forget the national picture. It’s such an interesting by-election because it’s a demonstration of the realities of multi-party politics, right? No more two-horse races, and it’s, it’s microcosm of what we might be seeing in 2029.

Coco Khan How do you think Starmer’s visit to the constituency will play out? Is he an asset or?

Ash Sarkar Or part of the problem. Normally, you only send your party leader or your prime minister in particular when you’re absolutely confident of success because you don’t want to have him associated with a loss. So it’s a way of trying to be like, we’re really bullish about this. And the other thing, don’t forget, is that Labour increasingly, in order to get enough canvases out, is relying on its councilors. So it has fewer volunteers who are stepping up for it because the membership is clinically depressed. So, they’re all at home like in the blanket, just like turbo-eating sitalopram. So they’re having to get the councilors out, having the prime minister go to the constituency is a way of doing that.

Coco Khan I guess I’m just coming back to this question of do they know something that we don’t know? Because I think it feels like the writing’s on the wall.

Ash Sarkar From having been a little bit up close to, and it was a council by-election in this because my housemate is a Green councilor, so declaring my biases, is that nobody really knows anything. Everybody has partial bits of information from which they’re trying to extrapolate a bigger picture, but everyone’s scared and nobody’s certain.

Nish Kumar Ash, let me put this quote to you. An unnamed advisor to Stama has been quoted as saying, a reform win would be terrible, but a green win would existential. Do you think that there is a part of the Labour leadership that is thinking, if we lose, then I hope reform win, because then that sets us on a course to 2029 of it’s Labour or reform, and the greens essentially ate our vote, and they’re gonna. Provide a pathway for Nigel Farage to come to 10 Downing Street? Is there an element tactically and looking at the Labour Party’s strategy for the period of time between now and the next election that a reform win is the second best outcome for them?

Ash Sarkar See, now you’re thinking like a spad. You’re absolutely right. That is absolutely what they’re thinking. So just to cast your mind back, um, a few months, the Cofilli by election, um in which it was a applied reform, uh, one, two, and the Labour vote completely collapsed. That was really bad for Labour. What they were hoping to do is say, look, it’s reform or us and applied were like horse shit, right? We can win this. And so thinking about the mayor elections, which, um for Wales is, is a Senate election. Um, that’s, that really, really bad for Labour, right? Well, it’s traditionally really, really strong, uh, voter turnout for Labour. Um, so they’re absolutely thinking, especially if Keir Starmer by some miracle hangs on into the next general election, his only real hope is saying it’s reformal me. So he needs a demonstration of that. And if Gorton and Denton is that demonstration, I would perhaps even suggest. That a reform win in Gorton is more useful narratively to a 2029 narrative than a Labour win.

Nish Kumar Because it essentially puts the shits up. People like me. Like a reform win, you know, I’ve said this a number of times on the podcast, I will vote for whoever I believe, at 2029, is the party most likely to keep out Nigel Farage. As much as I’m fed up with this country and this political system that has, you now, entrenched economic inequality in our society, I’m not willing to allow us to become a petri dish for Nigel farage’s St. George Cross masturbatorial wet dream. I know that the lesser two evil arguments is played out, but you know, there are Americans being killed in the street by ICE officers right now. I can see really from a Labour perspective the kind of political utility of that, but it’s also really fucking embarrassing for Keir Starmer. You’ve got the local issues, which is the sort of boxing out of Andy Burnham, who is a very, very significant figure in the Labour party in the area around Gorton and Denton. You’ve got the national picture which is economic stagnation, you’ve got the Mandelson effect, you got the wider Epstein scandal, and then you’ve this idea that there’s a kind of cabal of people that are essentially obsessed with controlling the Labour Party and not actually doing anything to run the country and are investigating journalists who are looking into this.

Ash Sarkar I always think about that, that meme where it’s like, you know, surely it can’t go on like this. And he’s like it can. If there’s one thing that Keir Starmer, you know, limping on like an un-euthanized old yeller has taught me is like, it can! And that’s, it’s got much more to do with internal Labour party factionalism. And I think for me, this is such a fascinating thing, which is so much of what we’ve talked about today. Whether it’s Mandelson or Morgan McSweeney or Labour Together or Josh Simons, it comes back to how the Labour Party is uniquely factionally divided and that the most vicious warfare in the Labour party is all internal. It’s something that they reserve only for card carrying members as opposed to their opponents, whether they’re in the Tory party or a former ever. Know, if anyone’s got a passing familiarity of what it’s like to be in a constituency Labour party, like if you just want to have like a treasurer role or like the local social media role, like you have to win a knife fight. It’s like that episode of The Simpsons with like the two monkeys in international waters. That’s what it is like at a constituency level. And I’m not just talking about, you know, Corbynites versus, you, know, the Labour right. That is what it was like in the Blair and Brown years as well. Right. This is what is like between people in the right. So, you know, going back to Labour together. It was an organization set up basically to navigate the factional waters, to get Keir Starmer into the top job as Labour leader, right? That’s what it was designed to do. And so much of this crisis that we’re in, whether it’s policy decision-making or whether it is about who’s being appointed and what the vetting process is, it’s coming out of this Labour together clique. And so… It’s just so fascinating to me to see this, to use a really pretentious word, this modality, this way of being, this way existing, this this modility of Labour Party factionalism playing itself out in the form of a government. And I think that you can trace so much of this particular government’s dysfunction back to that.

Coco Khan I have nowhere near as clever thoughts as Ash, but something I think about sometimes when I’m in the shower or just waiting for my coffee is, Keir Starmer was named after Keir Hardy, the founder of the Labour Party, and he will be the man to see the end of the Labour party. Is that not Shakespeare?

Nish Kumar Ash, as always, thank you so much for joining us. Minority Rule is out in paperback right now. It’s a strong recommend. It’s fantastic book. We loved it when we talked about it in February last year. And the afterword is really, really genuinely interesting. And, you know, as usual, thank-you so much coming to Potsdam UK. Now, Nigel Farage might be hopeful about winning in Gorton and Denton, but he’s still a long way from Downing Street, so one of the really disappointing things is the way that Keir Starmer has allowed Farage to lead the way on immigration.

Coco Khan So we take notice when Zia Yousuf rocks up in Dover to set out Reform’s policies. Standing in front of a lectern that says Shadow Home Secretary, which he definitely isn’t by the way, Yousaf seem to say it doesn’t matter how or why you come to the UK, unless you’ve got a fat wallet, Reform isn’t interested.

Nish Kumar First up, Yusuf pledged to deliver net negative migration by shipping out five deportation flights a day, escorted by the RAF. This would total about 600,000 people in five years.

Coco Khan There’s so much to unpack here. All of it. Horrifying. Would five deportation flights a day even do anything? Or is it just theater? What is the show saying? Look at our boys in blue, our armed forces, what, escorting brown faces out of the country? Is that to be a net benefit.

Nish Kumar It almost feels pointless to nitpick over the cost of this when nobody believes that this is a workable policy. It’s just dog whistle, xenophobic, anti-immigrant rhetoric. It’s also deeply strange as a policy, like this sort of psychotic obsession with immigrants. There’s more details that came out and sort of all of them are bad. So if return agreements aren’t agreed to, this is one of the policies that they’re suggesting, visas will stop being issued to that country. Part of the problem here in the kind of intervening two to three years, however long we are between now and a general election, is that Labour is allowing reform to set the agenda when it comes to immigration. So, Labour is already threatening to cut visas. Shabana Mahmood, the Home Secretary, said that cutting visas was on the table for countries that do not. So this is the concerning thing. Now, other reform policies are just purely, almost copy and pasted from previous Trump manifestos. So there are visa bans proposed for Pakistan, Somalia, Eritrea, Syria, Afghanistan, and Sudan. Most of those countries are majority Muslim. So it is establishing a very clear picture of who the reform party believes is deserving of coming to this country. Um, and it is once again, sort of a Trumpian playbook. And I, as we always say with these kinds of things, when center left or center right governments attempt to head this kind of rhetoric off by diluting it or imitating it in any way, it doesn’t actually solve the problem, it just confers legitimacy on anti-immigration as a policy platform and means that People will go, well. If we really hate immigrants, we’re going to vote for the party that’s really going to do something about this. The Conservative Party of Britain right now is a kind of shattered husk of its former self after having spent the best part of the 21st century attempting to head off Nigel Farage by imitating elements of his rhetoric and borrowing policies and referendum ideas from him. If the Labour Party is not willing to learn the mistakes of the Conservative Party, and it will consign itself to the same political dustbin. That the Conservative Party seems to be wedging its way into.

Coco Khan Well, crucially, as we’re talking about the details of reforms plans, Youssef made it clear that the spouses of UK citizens won’t be touched, which I suppose is some good news for Mrs. Farrar’s there, given that she’s German, although, you know, there’s something about her face and skin that makes me think that it’s not really 100% aimed at her.

Nish Kumar It’s good that you bring up Farage and immigration in this context, Coco, because Farage has actually been having some immigration problems of his aunt.

Clip I’m here in the Maldives, it’s Saturday, and 200 miles over there is Ildikwa, British territory. The British government are replying pressure on the president and the government of the Maldives to do everything within their power to stop me getting on that boat and going to the Chagos Islands.

Nish Kumar Okay, so for those people who are listening to the podcast and not able to see that video, Farage is just sort of dressed in a kind of, I don’t know, it’s sort of a holiday chic, striped polo, wraparound sunnies. You can’t see the bottom half, but you’ve got to assume there’s either a linen trouser or a cargo short in play. And I mean, Coco, this is, it is a pure publicity stunt, right?

Coco Khan Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s totally. So it’s to protest the deal for the British government to hand over ownership of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius. There’s a really significant military base there. The Mauritians will continue to lease the military base. For all intents and purposes, this is a done and dusted deal. The conservatives were into it and, you know, Labour’s kind of followed through on it, but it’s become this flashpoint because obviously Donald Trump is saying it is a flashpoint now. Donald Trump’s tearing up the rule books about like I don’t know, honoring deals and the idea that, you know, nations should be able to have a say in their own kind of sovereign legitimacy, unless you’re Greenland, obviously, of course. Nobody can just pop over to the Chagos Islands. As we said, it’s a military base. You need permits to visit. Farage didn’t have those permits. Obviously, he didn’t contact the government before flying on a private jet, we should add. Apparently, they’re saying that he was probably on holiday in the Maldives, which makes him relatable. And then he goes off to the Chagos Islands to say what? Say what, what is the government hiding or his free speech is being suppressed? You know, I don’t really understand it.

Nish Kumar So he’s basically spent his parliamentary recess taking a private jet to engage in a piece of political theater. Truly a man of the people. Who amongst us has not popped on a private yet to the Maldives to do something that we know we can’t do for the sake of advancing our own political career. He’s just salt of the earth. That’s the thing with Nigel. You just want to have a drink down the pub with him and compare notes on your private jet and which bit of the Maldives is best. For activities relating to political theater.

Coco Khan Well, he’s giving you some great ideas, Nish. I think what you could do is you could try and do your stand up in the British library and then when they throw you out saying that your free speech is being suppressed, I try to talk in the library, the government’s against me, just go to places where it’s very clear that you’re not meant to be doing that. Maybe I could try a funeral parlor. Maybe you could other places where would be deeply offensive to make it all about you and then say, I just, you know, there’s some inspiration there, I think.

Nish Kumar I was trying to take a dump in the vegetable aisle at Sainsbury’s and the woke left dragged me out and arrested me. Make me Prime Minister. By the way, I took a private jet there even though it was the Sainsburys in Derby and I was in London.

Coco Khan We do have to have a little bit of, you know, the kind of dark laugh that we have to adopt in times like this. So, you, know, he arrived on a small boat. He was refused entry. I’m just saying.

Nish Kumar Now that is one boat, I do one stop. Still to come, good news. We’ve actually got two bits of good news.

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Coco Khan Now, the BBC has been accused of making an unforgivable error after they failed to edit out a racial slur yelled by an audience member who suffers from Tourette’s syndrome during the BAFTAs.

Nish Kumar The comment was shouted whilst actors Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo were on stage, and it was shouted by John Davidson, MBE, who suffers from Tourette’s Syndrome. He was attending the award ceremony after inspiring the film, I swear, a film about his life growing up with the condition.

Coco Khan So the BBC apologized for the error and said that producers didn’t hear the slur as they were working in a truck, but many pointed out that the BBC aired the show hours after it was recorded and so they had time to bleep the remarks. The BBC of course did have time to edit out an acceptance speech which included the free Palestine.

Nish Kumar Speaking about the incident, Davidson has said that he was deeply mortified, explaining his tics were involuntary and did not carry any meaning. This has obviously been a story that’s been picked over and dissected. Um, I imagine most of you listening now will have seen the clip or heard a lot of conversation about it. I mean, the thing that I think it is important to sort of focus people’s frustration on is the institutional responsibility around this particular story. On the night, DelRoy Lindo said that no one at BAFTA had spoken to him afterwards, which is obviously a huge, huge fuck up on the part of BAFta. And then you also have to examine the BBC’s role in this. There is a two hour time delay on the BAFTAs. There is absolutely no excuse whatsoever, especially given that we’ve read several articles from people who were in the room at the time that knew that this had happened. There is absolute no reason. That that could not have been edited out of the broadcast. And there is certainly no reason that it could have been edited out the broadcast if the BBC was able to identify the phrase free Palestine and remove it from the broadcasts. There is a mistake here that is being made by a lot of us who’ve been culturally dissecting this. And that is the anger needs to be aimed at institutional failures here.

Coco Khan Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it has been very depressing, to be completely frank, seeing some of the online response to this. Who do culture wars serve? I mean they serve those who are in power. You know, I’ve seen some very, very harrowing comments directed at John Davison, you know, essentially saying that he should have been given a punch or should have be been physically harmed in some way, which is so mortifying. And equally the idea that these two. Men, these iconic stars of screen, I mean, it doesn’t matter that they’re iconic, but I mean I’m just saying I’m a fan, have to endure the ultimate humiliation to be have a racial slur flung at you when you’re in front of your entire industry, all of your peer group, looking around at all the white faces, some of them shuffling uncomfortably, not knowing what to do, beaming out to everyone. This is the stuff of nightmares and the idea that they should just be, oh, fine with it. The online conversation has not been healthy and I’m really glad you’ve pointed out that we should point all our energy at the institutional failures to not protect these two groups.

Nish Kumar No, look, I think there’s two issues here that are really important to highlight, and the first one is that this does not need to be an oppositional conversation about the rights of a person with Tourette’s versus the rights of black people. We often, when we get involved in the kind of oppositional back and forth over human rights, we make mistake, if for no other reason other than… There are black people with Tourette’s that I imagine have found the last 48 hours very profoundly upsetting, right? So it’s really important to keep that in mind. Empathy is not a finite resource. And so you should be able to have empathy for a man with Tourete’s who has a completely involuntary tick that he cannot control that has led him to shout this word. You should also be able to have empathy for two black men who were stood on a stage and had a racial slur that has its own appalling history and connection and connotations to slavery. I can’t speak directly to that experience. I’m not black. Also, I’ve not been in a situation as loaded as high profile as the one that the two of them were in when this happened. But I can speak to the feeling of racism being directed at you in the entertainment industry. And having to kind of hold yourself with a huge amount of dignity. And it can be a very, very lonely place when there is any kind of racism-based incident in the entertainment industry. There is this sort of assumption that the entertainment industry is in of itself full of progressive-minded people who are on the left of every political issue. And would always step into this kind of situation. That’s simply not true, right? The entertainment industry, like a lot of life, if you’re in a majority white country, is very uncomfortable when it comes to conversations around race. And I know from personal experience, the loneliness of feeling. You have to absorb the pain of being on the receiving end of a racial slur or any kind of racial hostility. Absorb that and process it and then in the moment conduct yourself with total dignity. That is a very, very familiar experience for a lot of us that work in the media or in the entertainment industries. It should be possible for us have empathy. Delroy Lindo, Michael B. Jordan, and John Davidson in this situation, and we should not be entering into a conversation about this being a question of oppositional rights. The second thing that I want to say about this is, have we fucking learned nothing from the last 10 years? Why do so many people that I know funnel their entire conversation about the subject on Twitter? We have learned that it is not a platform. For these kind of complex conversations. It is not a town square. It is a conversation that is being governed by algorithms that are designed to feed on hostility as a revenue generator. And thirdly, and most importantly, it is short form conversation. By definition, cannot engage with the complexity of the conversation that we should be having, that we shouldn’t be capable of having when something like this happens, right? We have to turn away. From exclusively funneling our conversations on this issue to social media. And I think that we keep on making the same mistake in thinking that these tech platforms are the right place for this conversation.

Coco Khan Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the kind of rage industry, the algorithms rewarding this stuff that is doing nothing for our democracy, nothing for compassion. I mean, Davidson actually did issue a statement after saying he was deeply mortified. Again, then there was like comment online saying, oh, we shouldn’t have to. There was a part of me that thought, well, actually, I think the fact that he wanted to make a statement shows that empathy. Kindness is is is achievable. Why do we all live in this world where we’re just being like well he shouldn’t have to no one should have to it’s like well actually no on a human to human level let’s and actually the people who are being the subjects here you know the actors and the activists are actually showing what it means to be a decent citizen you know conducting themselves with grace also trying to reach across and say look you know let me explain again. I do really feel for Davidson. Of course, you know, you’ve You try to campaign about this condition. You’re invited to this do because you campaign well on your condition. And then your condition gets you alienated and pilloried by the entire world. It’s absolutely horrifying. Of course, the Tourette’s is a very singular specific condition, but just in general, this idea that people who are disabled can control it or they’re putting it on, like we see this narrative playing out in so many conversations in the political space. When reform are talking about ADHD, or actually, is this child really in need of special needs provision? You see, ableism is real and it is alive, racism is real, and it’s alive, and also, apparently, we don’t need to get into the details too much, but, you know, apparently, some warnings that were probably not quite as fulsome as they should have been given that, you know, Davidson may have outbursts. Actually just think it through that what those outbursts might be. Do you know what I mean? It’s just like you have this foresight to bleep out free Palestine. I believe you have the intellectual ability to have done better here.

Nish Kumar I would really urge people to go and seek out a sort of YouTube video that’s been done by Jermaine Williams, who’s the first elected official in the States who actually has Tourette’s and is a black American man, and has spoken very, very eloquently in this video about his response to what happened at the BAFTAs, and it’s worth really engaging with some Longer form stuff than just a tweet on this, right? We also wanted to tell you about the long-awaited release of the Proposals to Reform the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities, or SEND, system in England.

Coco Khan Under the plans, by 2035, only children with the most complex needs will get an EHCP, that’s Education, Health and Care Plan. A few weeks back, I spoke to the brilliant campaigner, Rachel Filmer. Here’s her take on the announcement.

Clip I am very concerned about children with complex needs under these proposals. At the moment, arguably, they have their needs met best by the current system, and this change could fundamentally undermine the help that they need in order to access education.

Nish Kumar Yeah, look, that conversation with Rachel was brilliant and is really worth going back and checking out in full. It’s obviously some potentially concerning developments for us.

Coco Khan Yeah, absolutely. And I think it was John Harris writing in the Guardian saying that they should be watchful for parents with children for special educational needs because they are used to fighting and they are not going to go down quietly. So this is a story we will come back to. We’re certainly keeping an eye on how these proposals will play out.

Nish Kumar Now, as promised, we have some good news. First, six healthcare workers who were on trial for criminal damage following a protest linked to Extinction Rebellion have been cleared. The jury accepted their argument, which was that as healthcare professionals, they have a duty to protect life and that climate change is a health emergency.

Coco Khan Let me just give you a bit of a reminder of this case because it was a few years ago now. These healthcare workers broke eight glass panels at JP Morgan’s offices in London. They chose a Sunday. They tried to choose how to have the least amount of disruption. The bank, by the way, is one of the world’s biggest funders of fossil fuels. This took place during a heat wave. It was in July 2022. They carried signs which said, in case of emergency, break glass.

Nish Kumar It took the jury fewer than four hours to reach their verdict. It’s actually the second trial on these charges. The previous jury was actually unable to reach a verdict. But listen, it is a scientifically sound argument that medical healthcare professionals are concerned about the impact on human health of the climate crisis. And therefore I can see how a jury reached this conclusion that this was a legitimate expression of their concern about that.

Coco Khan Yeah, absolutely. I mean, if anyone is interested, the closing remarks of these healthcare workers ended up being made plays, very powerful stuff. And, you know, we talked about, it’s been really rattling around in my head, to be honest, when we had our interview last week with the lawyer for Amnesty, who talked about how judges have been trying to withdraw defenses saying that, well, certain defendants, particularly around the laws of protest. Aren’t allowed to say I did it for X, Y, Z reason. But nonetheless, the power of the juries are coming through. They just know in themselves, look, that clearly these people were not trying to commit criminal damage. They were trying to make a point, and that point is fair enough. We also have more from the Palestine Action Legal Cases. So 17 of their activists were released on bail earlier this week. They are facing charges including criminal damage and violent disorder over a break-in at the UK base of an Israeli defense firm.

Nish Kumar They appeared via video link at the Old Bailey, but a big group of supporters got together outside to celebrate the news outside the court. Now, regular listeners will know we’ve been getting updates on this from Nida. Here she is again.

Clip Hi Coco and Nish, I’m Nidha. My best friend Ammu is a Palestine Action Prisoner who underwent a hunger strike with other prisoners. And I’m really happy to say that some of the hunger strikers’ demands have been met over the last month. Number one, four out of the eight hunger striker have not been bailed. Number two, Palestine Action’s prescription is deemed unlawful since its enforcement in July last year. And number three, Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest weapons manufacturer, also lost a two billion pound contract with the UK’s Ministry of Defense. The Breisnaut and five, where four of the co-defendants were on a hunger strike, are still in prison. They still need bail for allegedly spray painting two warplanes. They are still on remand for almost two years before their trial on Jan 2027.

Nish Kumar Thanks, Nidha, once again for that update.

Coco Khan And that’s it! Thanks for listening to Pod Save the UK. Don’t forget to follow at Pod Save the UK on Instagram, TikTok, X and Blue Sky.

Nish Kumar Pod Save the UK is a Reduced Listing production for Crooked Media.

Coco Khan Thanks to producer John Rogers and digital producer Jacob Liebenberg.

Nish Kumar Our theme music is by Vasilis Fotopoulos

Coco Khan Our social media producer is Nada Smidinic.

Nish Kumar The executive producers are Kate Fitzsimmons and Katie Long with additional support from Ari Schwartz.

Coco Khan And remember to hit subscribe for new shows on Thursdays on Amazon, Spotify or Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts.