The Duran Podcast - Rayner RESIGNS. Starmer decline accelerates

Episode Date: September 5, 2025

Rayner RESIGNS. Starmer decline accelerates

All right, Alexander, let's talk about the situation in the UK and the UK economy. How are things looking with the economy in the United Kingdom? Is it true that Stomers' approval rating is at around 11% or 12%? Is that true? Is it really that low? Yeah, I've seen some... Or is it really that high? Actually, is a better question to ask.

Is it really that high? I've seen some opinion polls that say that. There are other opinion polls that put his... approval rating higher, but to be honest, I prefer to believe the ones that put them as low, as you said. I cannot, I haven't met anybody who likes him. Not not, not for a very, very long time. And I mean, I've known people who voted for him, I mean, who voted for him as prime minister and who for a brief moment in time did work up some slight enthusiasm for him. But, I mean, all of that is melting away.

I mean, I just, I think that he is widely disliked. And I think most people would want to see him go, frankly. I mean, I don't get the sense that the people in Britain would miss him very much if he would to quit the scene tomorrow. The economy is in a very bad way. Bond yields have been rising again. There is great uncertainty about the budget. Because, well, we've discussed it in previous programs,

but Britain now has a very high debt-to-GDP ratio. The economy is stagnant. There's a sense that spending is gradually becoming out of control. There was all the talk from the economists a few weeks ago, two weeks ago, about Britain might eventually have to apply for a bailout. Eventually, very belatedly, the Chancellor said that would not ever happen. Rachel Reeves. But the point is that as the economic economy flounders, the political ship is looking increasingly unstable. So a couple of days ago, Starmer carried out what was presented as a reshuffle of the government.

It wasn't really a reshuffle of the government. It was an attempt to set out a second finance ministry within his own office. He brought in various economists, all economists who are loyal to him or have been loyal to him and who are connected to the Labour Party. So he brought a whole group of economists and people of that kind. into his personal office in Downing Street. And he also took from Rachel Reeves, who is his finance minister, her most senior official

and brought him to Downing Street as well. Now, it is very, very difficult to see that move, that rearrangement as anything other than an indication that Stama is losing confidence in Rachel Reeves and is trying to build an alternative finance ministry, if you like, within his office, preparatory presumably to sacking Rachel Reeves and putting somebody from this group in her place. So we could see the tensions starting to grow between Stama

and his finance minister. You remember a couple of weeks ago when the government lost a vote in the House of Commons on welfare spend, Stama refused to give her support in Parliament and she burst into tears. And it looks like that scenario is now beginning to play out that he's now moving towards eventually getting rid of her.

So that creates instability, it creates nervousness, it creates nervousness in the markets, when there is a sense that the Prime Minister and the finance minister are at odds with each other in any government, anywhere in the world that is going to create instabilities and uncertainties and fears. And of course, it is doing that in Britain. But on top of all of that, Starma now has to face the possible loss of his housing minister. Now, housing doesn't sound like a very senior position, but in Britain, housing is very, very much issue that concerns people a lot because the cost of housing is so high.

So he looks like he could lose his housing minister. She, Angela Rainer, who is also, by the way, hello? Yes, Alexander. Before you proceed, news just came in. Angela Rainer has resigned. Well, there you go. Continue. Sorry, just came in right now.

Exactly. Boom. Angela Rainer has resigned according to Sky News. continue your thoughts and continue. Now with that news, yeah. Well, now with that news and it's very important because, I mean, she was, she has been the deputy leader of the Labour Party. I wonder whether she will continue to be.

But he's now lost her. She was an important member of Starmes' cabinet. She was in theory. He's number two. It's fairly well known that they didn't terribly like each other or particularly get on. But the point was that she was loyal to him and to Stama and to the government and because almost uniquely she has a working class background within the government. I mean, there are one or two other people with working class backgrounds, but they're

relatively few. But because she came, she has a working class background and came up through the trade unions, She was the contact point between the government and organised labour. The unions, which have always historically played a very important role in British labour politics. The unions don't particularly like Starman. They don't particularly get on with anybody else in his government as well. And now, as it turns out, he's lost the one person in the government who the union, unions did like and who they did like to work with. So that's going to fracture. And remember,

it's called the Labour Party because it was originally created by the unions as their political arm. So without the support of organised labour, the Labour Party is very much adrift. So that weakens him. And it weakens him in another respect as well, because it means that he's not just lost this loyal person who was a prominent person in his government and he's lost her in connection with a very ugly and sordid scandal about tax avoidance on houses. Remember, she's the housing minister and the government has been trying to talk about increasing taxes. So it's going to play badly with a lot of the, this whole,

affair would play badly anyway with the British electorate. So Stama's not only lost this person, but he's now got to find somebody else to take her place if she's going to stand down as deputy leader of the Labour Party. There has to be an election of the Labour Party membership. They don't like Stama at the moment. They're pivoting more to the left, maybe. They might throw up somebody who Stama absolutely doesn't like. And if that person is elected by the membership, that person, whoever it is, could argue that they have a more recent mandate from the membership than Stama does himself. And that makes that person a more plausible rifle for Stammer's position as Prime Minister and as leader of the party. So everything is looking increasingly shaky.

One gets a sense of a government. I mean, this news that you've just provided, it increases, it reinforces the sense that this is a government that's starting to fall apart. Angela Rainer is one of the very, very few politicians in Britain, certainly within the Labour Party and one of the very few ministers within the Labour government, of whom most people knew about her and knew her name and had some sense of who she was. Most of the others really never cut through. And now she's gone, and she's gone in the worst circumstances for Kirstom. Do you know if Starmert showed up in person to the coalition of the willing meeting in Paris or not? Oh, he did. He was looking at it right now.

He was there pretty chariot, but was he there in person? Yeah, I believe he was. I believe he was too, yeah. I know he was a co-chair. Yes. I've no doubt that he was. I haven't heard that he wasn't. if he wasn't, he didn't go, I am sure that it would have been commented about in Britain.

But just to say something, of course he should not have gone. He should have stayed in London. I mean, he's got a government that's starting to fall apart. He's lost his deputy leader and his housing minister. Very soon it looks like he's going to lose his finance minister. there is a developing economic crisis in Britain. Of course he should be in London, not wasting his time going to coalition of the willing meetings in Paris, which are going nowhere.

And if they did ever lead somewhere, it would only lead to far greater further trouble. Yeah, I'm trying to see if he was there in person. Maybe he was there, maybe he was not. But it doesn't matter. He was focusing on this coalition of the willing meeting yesterday. He promised long-range missiles to Ukraine so that they could strike into Russia. Healy was in Kiev a couple of days ago, the defense minister, he brought with him another billion pounds to give to Zelensky. All of this activity with Ukraine and his government is collapsing.

I mean, can we categorize his government, his labor government as collapsing? It's in collapse. Yes, I would say so. I mean, it's in slow motion collapse. Okay, slow motion collapse. I mean, it's still got a huge majority, which, of course, protects it and him to some degree. But the things cannot continue like this for much longer.

And reform, we should come to, by the way. And they're holding their conference, their annual conference now. This is Farage's party. I mean, they have been saying for some time that they're preparing for an early election. And they're not just preparing for an early election, they are preparing for government. In other words, Farage is now positioning himself as Britain's future prime minister. What about the conservatives before we get to Farage and reform?

What are the conservatives doing about all of this? I'm looking right now and it says that Kirstamertended the coalition, this is Grock. Grock is saying Kirstammer attended the Coalition of a Willing Meeting in Paris, September 4th in person. Co-sharing the discussions alongside Makonanate de Elise Palace. Okay, this is what Gronk is saying. Anyway, so he's wasting his time on this stuff as his freaking country is collapsing. And he's not only wasting his time, he's giving money. He continues to give money to Ukraine as his government is freaking collapsing.

His country is collapsing. Yes. There is an obsessive sign to this. I mean, but it is, it is clearly, I don't have any words. Well, I don't either, but it is clearly his priority to give as much money and as much help to Zelensky as he possibly can before everything in Britain falls apart. You know, then he's no different. Macron is the same. Mertz is the same too.

I mean, in Germany, apparently there's increasing criticism even within the coalition government. But Mertz is exclusively focused on Ukraine. and isn't paying any attention to Germany's problems. So there you go. Now, let's just now talk about... On the parties, yeah. Let's focus on the... Okay, just talk about conservatives and then reform, like what's happening there.

So conservatives are absolutely nowhere. I mean, they have a person, Kimmy Badenock, who's, you know, in some ways, I suppose, an amiable person. But everybody agrees that she's a complete dud as a leader. She's not entirely failed to cut through. yesterday it was questions in parliament everybody was expecting that she would make a huge issue of Angela Rainer and all of this would be able to walk over Starmer over it she managed to bungal it I mean she made it I mean she made no impression at all she doesn't seem to have any

ideas and the conservatives are still continuing to lose support despite the fact that the Labour Party continues to lose support usually Britain. I mean, the historic norm since the 1920s is that it oscillates between conservatives and labor. If conservatives are down, labor is up. If labor is up, if labor is down, the conservatives are up. More often it's the conservatives up than labor, but that's always been the pendulum swing in Britain. Now, the conservatives are not benefiting as the opposition, to what is in effect a collapsing government. And this is unique.

I mean, this has never happened before, to my knowledge, in British parliamentary history. Even when you're talking about the crisis, for example, of the 1920s, when the Labour Party replaced the Liberal Party as the main party of the left, it wasn't because the, you know, it didn't play out in that way. the Conservative government throughout the 1920s was popular. The liberals weren't able to rebuild because the conservatives were succeeding, and that opened the door for Labor to go up. I've never known a time in British history where the government is not unpopular,

but beyond unpopular, and despite that, the conservatives managed to poll below it. I mean, this is unique. And this is now opening the field for Nigel Farage. And increasingly, I mean, you're starting to see more and more articles, more and more commentaries appear in which it's becoming now almost the received wisdom, the conventional wisdom, that Farage is going to be the next British Prime Minister and that reform is heading for a Now, I find myself almost gasping when I say that because it's difficult to convey to people outside Britain what an extraordinary moment that is. If Brexit, the Brexit referendum felt like a revolutionary moment, this will be much bigger than that. Anyway, they are, they have,

they're going through their conference. They put together a very, very tough, immigration policy modeled on Donald Trump's in the United States. They're coming up with some ideas, like pulling out of the European Convention for Human Rights, which would mean that the European Court of Human Rights no longer has binding authority on British courts and British law. They seem to be taking some ideas from what Donald Trump has been doing. They're speaking of forming a government, which will include an awful lot of people outside the House of Commons, including people in the House of Lords, interestingly. And we are still...

Well, it is interesting because up to now, British governments since the late 19th century have always been anchored in the House of Commons. It's very much part of parliamentary government in Britain, that the ministers are there in the House of Commons and they're because they're there they are subject to questions from MPs if they are not in the House of Commons if they're in the House of Lords or outside Parliament altogether then that actually makes it more a presidential system like the one in the United States it changes the character of British government so just to say so anyway

We still don't have very much clarity on the kind of economic policy that they would follow. But there is talk that the focus will be on policies that are patriotic, that are about Britain and about addressing its problems, and that that will be the focus. not foreign policy anymore. So by extension, that would presumably be the end of Project Ukraine, the end of Britain's involvement in Project Ukraine, the end of ideas of sending British warships to the Far East to the South China Sea, the end of Britain becoming or trying to become involved in various adventures in the Middle East, all of which by the way if it actually does happen is an excellent reason for voting for Nigel Farage, because we absolutely need to do that in Britain.

And it's long overdue that we did that. But anyway, so they are now starting to ask themselves what sort of a government are we going to be and what is our approach going to be and what are we going to do? they are clearly, I mean, they're clearly a right of centre party. I mean, I'd say that. Actually, I would say they're a right wing party. So one would expect that whatever program, economic program, that they will put together

will reflect that. But there is still a huge amount of work to do. And they need to work hard and they need to work fast and they need to start getting some outside advice. because given the speed with which events are shaping, with, as I said, the government crumbling, the Starma government crumbling. It's unlikely that we're going to get an election

within the next few months, but the possibility cannot be excluded. Yeah, he's going to inherit quite a mess of Araf if he does end up in government. So is that, just to wrap up the video, So is that the correct first move to make if you were consulting Farage, the correct first move? Like the easiest thing to do right away, right off the bat, in order to start to get things

on track because you are inheriting just a complete freaking mess of a situation would be to just get out of all of these entanglements and the money that's flowing to Zelensky, all these things? I mean, would that be the correct first step to make? And maybe another first step would be to start to actually engage in diplomacy and trade deals and stuff like that, something also that Stommer does not do because Stommer is also focused on getting the UK back into the EU. So he hasn't really done much outside of maybe the trade deal with the United States. He hasn't really done much to put the UK back on the map in that regard. Absolutely. Can I just say a few things here? I mean, Britain's current trajectory under the current government and with the current political class in control is unsustainable and very, very bleak. I still believe that if we have a government that really gets itself organized and is purposeful and dynamic and starts addressing the problems of the country and starts drawing on its real strengths, the situation can be taken.

turned round. But a number of things need to be done and they need to be done very fast. First of all, this endless drain of funds to Ukraine needs to stop. I mean, it's something that needs to be stopped totally and completely. And that will already buy some fiscal space because not a huge amount, but we're talking about five to six billion pounds a year being shipped to Ukraine. well, of course, it disappears. I also think that the government needs to, a future government, and maybe Donald Trump won't like this, but a future government needs to drop this pretense

that is going to start increased defense spending to 5% of GDP, whatever it was, 5% of GDP. I mean, it's not going to happen. And setting that target is distorting, is distorting priorities. The other thing the government does need to do, however, is look at the conditions of the domestic economy, above all, and look at how growth they're going to bring some kind of growth back. Because this is going to be a right-wing government, and, you know, there are left-wing options, they're right-wing options. But let's focus on the right-wing options because this is going to be a right-wing government.

I think inevitably that means that they're going to have to cut taxes. I mean, impossible to see how the economy can grow successfully without a significant cut in taxes. And that means corporate taxes, those kind of taxes. the kind of taxes that work against investment and at the same time taxes, you need to work the tax system, which we don't do in Britain, in order to encourage business to invest in productive capital, as opposed to having investment constantly flow, as it has been doing in Britain, for 30 years, to fixed assets, property, certain times of shares, that kind of thing. Property, property, most of all. Now, you can actually, there are interesting ways of doing this through the

tax system, which I'm not going to explore in this program. This is not letting billionaires off the hook or anything of that kind, if that's what some people are worrying. But it means creating tax incentives for people to set up businesses to start. doing things, to start taking on workers. Maybe you want to look at the national insurance contributions, for example, which is basically a tax on employing people. If you want to grow your business, it becomes very expensive to do that because you pay tax on every employer, employee that you have and the tax levels in Britain are very, very high. So, now, in order to do that, in order to square that circle, obviously you'll have to engage in some spending cuts.

And that is very, very difficult to do. But you're going to need some fiscal space. You have to, not just reassure the markets, but you're going to have to find some sources of income to come into the economy to help you through that transition. And that means that you have to start making, at least establishing contacts with the people around the world who do have money that they can invest in Britain, in the Middle East, in China, in Russia, elsewhere in the Far East as well. And you must do that much more purposefully than has been done up to now. And in order to do that successfully, you tell them there is absolutely no possibility or prospect of us imposing upon ourselves this massive regulatory superstructure that the European Union has created and which we continue largely to operate in Britain today. And you've got to start to work to dismantle it because I know that it is this regulatory. superstructure that does deter a lot of investment. And then you've got to start making the best

uses that you can of what Britain can do as a trading, business-minded, entrepreneurial nation, which, in my opinion, we still are. Now, that is a right-wing program. I could equally well create a left-wing program. I'm not going to do so in this program because I don't believe the left has any way in whatsoever, just to say, not, I mean, they might become, they might become a option, an alternative in the future, but they are absolutely not one now. All right. We will end the video there, the durand.com. We are on X, we are on Rumble, and we are on Telegram as well.

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