The Rest Is Politics: Leading - 156. Defence Secretary, John Healey: Is Britain Ready For War?

Episode Date: October 5, 2025

What tactic did Donald Trump steal from Gordon Brown? What can we learn from when Labour beat UKIP in the 2012 Rotherham by-election when it comes to taking on Farage? As a New Labour alumnus, why does John Healey think there was more patience for change in 1997 compared to 2024?  Rory and Alastair are joined by John Healey, The Secretary of State for Defence, to discuss all this and more.  For Leading listeners, there’s free access to the Wordsmith Academy - plus their report on the future of legal skills. Visit ⁠https://www.wordsmith.ai/politics⁠ To save your company time and money, open a Revolut Business account today via https://get.revolut.com/z4lF/leading, and add money to your account by 31st of December 2025 to get a £200 welcome bonus or equivalent in your local currency. Feature availability varies by plan. This offer’s available for New Business customers in the UK, US, Australia and Ireland. Fees and Terms & Conditions apply. For US customers, Revolut is not a bank. Banking services and card issuance are provided by Lead Bank, Member FDIC. Visa® and Mastercard® cards issued under license. Funds are FDIC insured up to $250,000 through Lead Bank, in the event Lead Bank fails. Fees may apply. See full terms in description. For Irish customers, Revolut Bank UAB is authorised and regulated by the Bank of Lithuania in the Republic of Lithuania and by the European Central Bank and is regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland for conduct of business rules. For AU customers, consider PDS & TMD at revolut.com/en-AU. Revolut Payments Australia Pty Ltd (AFSL 517589). Join The Rest Is Politics Plus: Start your free trial at therestispolitics.com to unlock exclusive bonus content – including Rory and Alastair’s miniseries – plus ad-free listening, early access to episodes and live show tickets, an exclusive members’ newsletter, discounted book prices, and a private chatroom on Discord. Instagram: @restispolitics  Twitter: @RestIsPolitics  Email: [e-mail] Social Producer: Celine Charles Producer: Alice Horrell Senior Producer: Nicole Maslen Head of Politics: Tom Whiter Exec Producers: Tony Pastor + Jack Davenport Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Thanks for listening to The Restis Politics. Sign up to the Restis Politics Plus. To enjoy ad-free listening, receive a weekly newsletter, join our members chat room and gain early access to live show tickets. Just go to therestispolities.com. That's the rest is politics.com. This episode is brought to you by Wordsmith. A.I. And increasingly, of course, in all the organizations we work in, we can get massively slowed up by the paperwork, the processes, the forms, the legal advice. And that's why, in business today, it's all of us, legal teams, companies are facing a choice, lead the AI shift or risk being left behind. And companies like TrustPilot, Deliveroo, SkyScanor are already leading the way,

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Shifts already happening. Wordsmith is helping legal teams around the world with clarity and confidence. There's free access to the Wordsmith Academy, plus their report on the future of legal skills. visit wordsmith.a.ai slash politics. Welcome to the rest of politics leading with me, Rory Stewart. And me, Alistair Campbell. And we have a member of His Majesty's Cabinet, John Healy, Defence Secretary. John is one of a very small number, fewer than 40, who were there from 1997 or before.

I first knew John Healy when he was actually working for the TUC, Trade Union Congress. He was going to John Monk's right-hand man. is how I saw him. And also, I remember campaigns he used to run on mental health when he was also working in the charity sector. But then he elected in 1997, part of the new Labour, possibly the best government of our lifetime, who knows, for historians to judge. And then, as been there ever since, went through a series of junior ministerial positions. Didn't get in the cabinet under Tony or Gordon, but was very close to Gordon.

when he was his PPS, private parliamentary secretary. And then loyal there through the wilderness years under Ed Miliband and Jeremy Corbyn, and then when Kierstlamer took over, made shadow defence secretary and has been defence secretary since the election. So we're lots and lots and lots to talk about past, present and future. Thank you for being here. Thank you both for having me. Well, John, thank you for coming on.

Well, let me begin just with the sense that. that you've been in the House of Commons a long time, and that that's more and more unusual. I mean, I guess you go back to the 19th century, you often had people who Gladstone famously spent, you know, whatever it was, a decade upon decade. What's your sense of how it's changed? I mean, what's your memory of that House of Commons you saw in 97?

And are you able to keep it clear enough in your mind to explain how the 2025 world is different from the 97 world? You're making me sound very old. You're not that old. It doesn't feel like 28 years and counting. It really doesn't. I think partly because I always live and work in the present. But yes, Alisa, you and I've met in those days

when we were in the run up to that 97 election when I had the extraordinary fortune of being elected then. And I remember, as was typical, Tony was coming. down for a general dinner at the TUC Congress. And there'd been some very strong, challenging new labour lines against the unions. And you and I missed the dinner. We were locked in a room together. We missed the dinner as we were working out how on earth we sort of pulled the two

sides of the labour movement together again, which we did. And then we had a drink together with John Monks and Tony after the dinner. I had finished, but we didn't get anything to eat. In terms of the 97, it was an extraordinary mood in the country. That's first and foremost. There was that real appetite for change. 18 years had taken its toll. It was a time when, to be fair, to the previous government,

and I think Ken Clark had been the chancellor in the run up to 97, the economy was in half good shape. Public services were a bit ropy. But there was a really big, really big rebuild challenge to do. But a sense of change and a real sense of hope and a, what in political terms we'd call now a honeymoon period that we led and we sustained. But John, also looking back, that 97 parliament seems quite old-fashioned compared to what we'd expect today. I guess if you were Harriet Harmon talking about how women were treated then, there were fewer people from minority backgrounds, presumably some of the old. old Tory MPs that you saw in 97 must have been figures who'd been first elected in the 50s or even the late 40s.

I mean, have you got a sense of it as having been a more old-fashioned place then in 97? It was different, certainly, but that 97 election was a sea change. That iconic picture of Tony with all the elected Labour women MPs. And Harriet was a big part of that. It changed Parliament for good and for, in both senses of the words. but it took a while. So we still sat. I remember having campaigned in the TUC and the trade unions before the election,

I sat on the national minimum wage legislation, fought tooth and nail by the Tories, and we sat through the night three times in order to get that bill through committee. I was on the committee twice in one week, at a time when you lost all the business of the next day, if that happened. So the sitting hours were different.

The sense of central importance of the chamber was more important. So speeches in the chamber, people paid more attention to what happened in the chamber? The speeches in the presence in the chamber. And because we were in the commons for longer hours, there was certainly a greater sense of being part of the whole for the MPs. And is that partly, I mean, some of my colleagues in the party who were back in 97 would have said that it was partly that because you were sitting through the night, you were together. I mean, you were sitting, having meals together. And this was something that certainly by the time I arrived, people were beginning to worry that often evening discussion groups, dining clubs and things are getting much less membership because young people like me were getting back to their families running away from the House of Commons at six or seven in the evening to get home. I think the hours and the culture and the traditions certainly put a lot of young people. It put a lot of women off.

It made it very hard for anyone with a young family. It was particularly hard if you wanted to and felt your roots were in your constituency and you wanted to raise your kids in the constituency rather than in London. My wife Jackie was a single parent for half the week while I was in London because we or our home's always been in Rotherham. So those changes are good. The all-party nature of the Commons has certainly continued and some of the best unsung, unseen work in the House of Commons

goes on between parties through select committees, all-party groups, through some extraordinary schemes like the All-Party Parliamentary Armed Forces scheme where we've got MPs from all parties, in uniform and joining the forces over a period of a whole year, real commitment. So that's there. The other thing that was stronger because the presence was required was the connection between and the availability of ministers to MPs. And I'm talking cross-party.

And I remember that actually it was when your government was first elected in 2010, Rory. Well, I remember for nine years as a minister in our Labor government, and you're right, Alistair, I wasn't in the cabinet, but I was at cabinet by the end for the last year or so as housing and planning minister. So how that worked, but whenever an MP of any party wanted to see me, I would always see them. And that dropped away in those first five years as an MP, the ministers in that coalition, particularly the Conservatives, ministers became almost impossible with some honourable exceptions for backbench MPs. And that's for me, that's a disrespect to the democratic mandate that each and everyone has and they should have a right on half of their constituents to get to me now as a minister, as they did before, and I will always see them if they want to see me, or I will ensure that

one of the ministerial team in the defence see them. You sound quite wistful about that period in some ways. can see why the mood in the country, that was something that both of us, I think, can recall with a lot of kind of pleasure and fondness, but also the way that Parliament has changed. I'm sensing that you think it maybe hasn't always changed for the better. I think that's true, and I think the administration of the place now has become an end in itself. It's lost sight of the purpose of the House of Commons, which is to be the forum to represent people and MPs have lost that central place.

But in many ways it is a better place. It's much more mixed. It's much more representative of the country. You can see that in the mix of gender, of race, and indeed, actually, of political parties and independence now. I think it's more representative of the country. But at times, I think that sense of clear, crystallized purpose that I remember almost 30 years ago when I was elected is sometimes dissipated. So you talked there about these two very different moods around two very different elections.

You had 1997, as you say, this sense of kind of hope and change and what have you. And then 2024 felt different. you know, it's pretty remarkable that just over a year in, you now have this seeming sort of shaking of the fundament going on. Whether you look at the polls, whether you look at Kirstama's ratings, whether you look at Farage and the way they're rising. I mean, what's your take on the change in mood? Why is it different? What is different about the country that has made this, that change feels so huge? I think of both 97 and

24 big sense of mood and appetite for change 2024 less patience for it and more amplified grievance that's driven a lot by social media but an amplified grievance that it doesn't just draw

in the same way from the immediate personal and local experience that people tended to bring to their perception of how life was for them and their family and their town 30 years ago. And I think so that makes the challenge the challenge of government much harder. It makes the challenge of leadership in other walks of life, be it media or business harder. People are more impatient. The sense of being failed by the system is more, I think, crystallized in the social media conversations that were clearly not around before. Very quickly.

Sure. Farage, what's going on? How on earth did this guy manage to get himself into this position where he looks like he's swallowing the Tory party? He's got enormous number of, at least in the polls, an enormous number of votes. How has he done this? What does it tell us about the moment? I think what surprises me is that people are seeing this as a new moment. I remember running the 2012 by-election in Rotherham with John Speller.

And Farage came once, and from nowhere, UKIP pulled 24%. It was a very clear sign that in areas like industrial South Yorkshire, that had seen long-term change and some really significant changes after 97, for instance, I remember the huge impact that our new deal for young people had, where we took a windfall tax on the privatised utilities. We put almost £4 billion into that programme. And in areas like Rotherham and parts of South Yorkshire, we brought the youth unemployment rate down from plus 20%

to low middle single figures. So it's been there for a while. I mean, I think now what Reform and Nigel Farage is doing is capturing a sense of grievance. But I would say, look, it's all anger, it's not answers. And I've watched reform in its previous incarnations of Brexit, UKIP, very closely. You can't live in an area like South Yorkshire and serve it without being close to that sentiment. And Kit Asthma's right.

You know, the left has denied some of the senses of... concern, deep concern that people have had and dismissed them in the past. He's determined that we don't do that now. But with Nigel Farage, we absolutely will challenge him. We must challenge him. But I've always felt there was something suspect about Nigel Farage. You know, this is a man who regards Putin as the best leader that tries to blame NATO for Ukraine, his invasion of Ukraine, who wants to have private insurance in the NHS, who's called on Trump to levy tariffs against our country. And when he's challenged by that, he either denies it or changes his position. And, you know, he just doesn't have the answers. And he will have to sustain this claim

to be a credible potential leader of a country for the next four years up to the election. And my concern is that we concentrate on doing our job, which is to deliver the change and what people elected us to do last year and that's what I'm doing in defence. Because in the end, I think that's the way that we meet the challenge that we all face. And this isn't just a labour challenge and that is to restore people's confidence in government and trust in politics. What's the mood like in Rotherham at the moment? I was actually up in a Burnley game last weekend and there was somebody who'd come from Rotherham and said he'd been driving through Rotherham and said that he'd never seen so many flags in his life. And the roundabout,

that have the St George's flags painted on and what have you. And of course, in London, the flags thing has, hasn't, I haven't seen it taking off anywhere. You probably still see more Ukrainian and Palestinian flags than you do the flag of St George. So what is the mood like in Rotherham right now? I mean, that's, that tells you,

you've got an area and a community with a deep pride in the country. If your friend had driven through Rotherham at a time when England were in the, in the euros you'd have seen a lot of flags then. So there's a sense of pride that isn't always a sense of complaint.

But you don't think the flags at the moment are there to spread fear and division? For some, they cause anxiety. They do cause fear. They do cause division. But I think we've, for me, we've moved away a large, a long way

from the fact that, you know, that the hard right or the populist right can claim ownership of the of the English or the British flag. And what that tells me is part of the, part for me the challenge now of being in government is we rebuild a confidence and trust in our country and our government by delivering what people want and doing what we say we will do. We rebuild a pride in the country as we see Britain again becoming democracy's most reliable ally and leading the changes and reassertion of European security, which Kier Stama is doing.

And then in the end, then, we try and rebuild the trust that people can have in their country by making sure that we deliver for them. And look, for me, there is a, if I may, there's a different story to the last few weeks from Angela Rainer, the reshuffle, Peter Mandelson, Andy Burnham. And that is, in that same period, you've had a government that has introduced free preschool childcare, which is going to be worth over £7,000 a year to working parents, a government that's tightened the rules on refugee families being able to come to Britain, that's won the biggest British warship contract ever with a £10 billion injection of money into the British economy,

which will secure over 4,000 jobs of 15 years with the Norwegian deal. got a defence industrial strategy, it will take growth to all parts of the country. And you've got, you've got, you know, the confirmation that we haven't just in the first year of a Labour government delivered an extra 2 million NHS appointments, but nearly 5 million. And that's even before you get to demonstrating with the Trump state visit that we, uniquely, can bring 150 billion of new tech investment into this country directly from the states. So two things. Are you highlighting there, something that quite a lot of people say, is that, you know,

the government's doing lots of good things, but frankly, the public don't seem to be that aware of them. Even to our listeners, we've got a lot of them political geeks, probably two or three of those things said, oh, didn't know that. And my second point, I slightly worry that the way that you're talking was exactly how the Biden-Harris people were talking before Trump came back in one. In other words, they were saying, well, when it comes, push comes to shove, we'll be able to show we said we'd do this and we did it. We said this would be the economy and it is. And in the modern age, and this seems to me is what Farage is able to tap into, it's not just about delivery.

It's about human connection and it's about emotion and all that stuff. So is there not a danger that that sense of a government that's technically, technocratically competent and doing the things it said it would in this age is not going to be enough? It's certainly part of the first. It's only a slice of the second. What I mean by that is this certainly demonstrates the challenge that we've still got. So people aren't seeing what we do. They're not recognizing what we're doing. These, after all, in the end, are things that you would not have a Tory government doing.

And if we are not talking about those, if we're not talking about what we're doing, what we're delivering and why no one else will. So for me, it's time to put an end to talking about ourselves and talking to ourselves because our job is to do the job we were elected to. Do. And if we're not demonstrating and talking about that, as I say, nobody else is going to do that for us. On the Biden question, I think the weakness of the Biden Harris, it's all about delivery, was that it failed to capture the sentiment of a lot of America. And I don't think you can level that accusation against Kirstearner and this government. And I think you've seen particularly how seriously he's bending the efforts of all parts of government, not just the home office,

to deal with illegal immigration and small boats now as a reflection of that. And I think you will see in the run up to the budget a similar whole government now bending its efforts to get economic growth going in this country after 15 years where we've frankly had sluggish and flat growth. And it isn't just the mission of the Treasury. It isn't just the business of the business and trade department. All government and departments need to do that. And you've seen in defense very clearly me setting out to say, look, we're a government making a record investment in defence investment, in defence spending. We have to demonstrate a dividend to the country

and we have to demonstrate that this defence can be an engine for growth in all parts and that's what I'm doing. My last, I'm pushing you back onto the personal. You are very, very unusual. I mean, 14 out of 15 MPs who were around since 97 left. So a vast number of your colleagues will have gone through that first new Labour government

made it as you did to a senior junior minister's position, attended the cabinet, and then thought, okay, enough, we're off. And others will have fallen by the wayside year after year after year. Without sort of blowing your own trumpet, I mean, obviously there's one politician's answer to give us, which is that you believe in public service. But tell us a little bit about your personality. What is it you think that means that you sort of stuck with it

when other people would have thought, well, I sort of had my career. I've had a good time with Gordon Brown and Tony Blair, and I'm moving on to other things. I believe in Labor. I believe in good government. I'm the only one who's served in every shadow cabinet through the 14 years of opposition.

And my single purpose was to help get a Labour government elected. And were the moments when you were tempted to leave? Were the moments where you thought, oh, for goodness sake, this is pretty grim? No, never. No time when your wife said, come on, John, this is a bit much. She's as critical as he is. That's a different question.

And actually in my early years, I mean, when I was a trade unionist before I was a Labour Party sort of acted. And when I first met Jackie, she was responsible for the Labour Party's conference organising, the introduction of commercial exhibitions, which was the first party ever to do it. And for a number of years, I mean I was known in Labour circles, John Smith's Kinnock's office and the early days of Tony's office, Alistair, as Mr. Jackie Be. Right. But no, and the reason is that your focus is solely on the national. For me, the heart of the job I do and the reason that I have this extraordinarily privileged being in Parliament is I'm elected by nearly 80,000 people in a part of Rotherman and a bit of Doncaster. And as long as I feel I can do a job for them, then I will continue. And look, I'm talking with you today. I don't normally. talk about myself like this. But yesterday I spent over three hours doing my advice surgery at home. I do it every couple of weeks. And when you're dealing with the problems that we're discussing at the top level, and you're also able to deal with a retired teacher that is struggling to get her full pension paid, or a retired taxi driver that desperately wants to see the regulation tighter so that we can

guard against any passenger safety or worse still potential CSE problems or a grandfather who lost his daughter 10 years ago and his wife last year and is struggling with looking after and caring full-time for two grandkids. You know, that is a, that's a very powerful motivation to continue to serve, wherever people want me to do that and wherever I can do that sort of job. And I can make a contribution at national level. I'll do it. Rory sometimes thinks that I don't, I'm not fully frank about

some of the events of the new Labour years and in particular what became known as the TBGBs. And of course, you were very much part of the GB operation because you became his PPS. But I just want to, looking back,

what is your take on that period, on that relationship? And whether There are actually, there are things that you learn from it that are, that we would say that's a good way to do government and politics and whether there were other things that you think, maybe we hadn't have operated like that. Things could have been better. And I'm sorry, just for listeners, obviously, just for internationalists, this is Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and the fact that along with all the many other extraordinary things about New Labor, that clearly was a tension between those camps. At times. At times. But what a powerful, creative. tension that was. And what a extraordinary combination of two really able intellects and able

politicians that captured a mood of the time and were at the heart of a government for 14 years. Tell us a bit about Gordon Brown. I mean, what was he like? What did you admire in him? What was frustrating about him? What I admired about him was absolute. And I, and I, and I, And I've tried to borrow from this in a sense a very clear sense of direction, a focus that borders on the obsessive. Some people think that Donald Trump has invented the caps in his tweets, but actually it was Gordon Brown in his 5am emails. All caps. Two fingers at the keyboard, all caps. Many mistakes.

Well, that's one thing I don't have from Kirstama, the 5am emails in block caps. But an extraordinary sense of focus and determination. I remember being with him as his PPS when Michael Portillo was appointed by William Hager's shadow chancellor. And Gordon was up at four in the morning. And by 5.30, we'd all got an email, three pages, of an outline political critique that by mid-morning, the government had put out and it branded Portillo as part of the problem

not the solution and by the following day when there was treasury questions Gordon was branding Portillo was responsible and piloting 22 tax

rises and Portillo never recovered and very soon after he gave up the ghost and went off to do TV yeah he never recovered so anyway so focus

direction, great, great sense of mission. When you look back and the fact that it was Britain that led the way to the write-off of debt for the most impoverished countries, when you look at that national minimum wage that in that 97 election, the conservatives, the business were all threatening a million job losses as a result of this. It's become a part of the labour market now. and it's absolutely the flaw that we promised as a Labour Party 90 years before we actually legislated for it. But they were different characters, for the most part, complementary. But when you've got forceful characters like that, of course there were tensions at times. And I think that was a strength of the government by and large rather than the weakness.

And what about the critique that when Gordon finally became Prime Minister, that there wasn't the same clarity, the same plan, and that therefore that that's very quickly started to feel like it was just kind of the end of an era as opposed to the start of a new era. Were you conscious of that? I was conscious almost immediately of government being hit by some really big things.

So the Floods Recovery Ministry asked me to do that. So we're hit by immediately the 2007 floods. soon after that we had the cues outside Northern Rock and actually what Gordon was dealing with there was less domestic and demonstrating what actually even Obama said at the time needed Gordon to do which was to coordinate an international response to the global financial collapse

and recession that many of the Western countries were driven into so I think I think Alistair to some extent And that dominated the large part of the two, two, three years that was Gordon's premiership up to 2010. And we ran out of time to get to demonstrate to the people how we had helped pull the country through. We'd helped pull the international intervention in place so that what could have been an even worse recession, I think we lost 4% of our productive capacity. It was the deepest, quickest recession for a couple of centuries. But by early 2010, the economy was growing strongly. The fundamentals were there for your government to take over. OK, Sexture State, Alistair, quick break, and then back for more. This episode is brought to you by Revoluted Business, the all-in-one account, to manage your finances.

Now, politics has its share of bad deals, trade summits, late-night negotiations. Often, somebody walks away with the short straw. And we've seen enough botched negotiations in Westminster to know what happens when numbers don't add up. Business is no different. Nothing empties your pockets faster than hidden exchange rates. Revoluted business changes that. Over 25 currencies exchanged at the same interbank rates that banks use during market hours within plan allowance. With automatic orders and price alerts, the guesswork disappears. Breaking into new markets feels possible, not perilous. Whether you're paying salaries in Dublin or supplies in Sydney, your money reaches. over 150 global destinations fast without the fine print hangover.

Business across borders kept simple. Exchange like an expert. Open a Revoluted business account today by scanning the QR code on screen or via the link in description. And add money by the 31st of December 2025 to get a £200, welcome bonus or equivalent in your local currency. Feature availability varies by plan. This office available for new business customers in the UK, US, Australia and Ireland. and terms and conditions apply. Hi, everybody, it's Dominic Zavrick here from The Rest is History.

Now, some of you may have heard me on your show, The Rest is Politics, when Rory was away, and I was filling in and enjoying Alistair Campbell's tremendous banter. And I'm back to tell you about our new series on The Rest is History, which is all about Britain in the 1970s, a period with a lot of uncanny resemblances to our own. So right now we're living through a moment when oil shocks, generated by war in the Middle East

are rippling through the world economy when Britain feels like it's sunk in a bit of a malaise people are arguing about Europe the government has got a few issues with the trade unions and we have a kind of I suppose you'd say governing elite a kind of political class that is really struggling to come to terms with all of these issues

and people are asking if Britain is governable at all so there are a lot of parallels between that Britain that I'm describing which is our Britain and the Britain of the mid-1970s. So in this series that's coming out on the rest is history, we'll be looking at these and other issues. We'll be talking about the rise of Margaret Thatcher, obviously a colossal figure in our political life even now,

whether you love her or loathe her. We'll be talking about the very first Brexit referendum of 1975, a subject that I'm sure Rory and Alistair will have strong opinions about. We'll be talking about the fall of the Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson, and we'll be talking about one of the grimest moments in Britain's economic history, the moment in 1976 when we had to go cap in hand, as people said at the time, to the International Monetary Fund, the IMF, for a then record bailout. Now, if that sounds good to you, how could it not sound good to you?

Of course it sounds good to you. We have a clip for you to listen to at the end of this episode. And if you want to hear more, just search for The Rest is History, wherever you get your podcasts. John, fast forward now to your current job. We interviewed Ben Wallace, that are two-hour thing, and the theme he kept returning to is the trickiness of dealing with the Treasury. I mean, in the end, a loss of defence is about money.

And I know you will say, because I've heard you say it in public, you've got a lot of money, you've got a lot of programs, a lot of spending going on. But it's still presumably true that money is an issue. And if this is really a 1938 moment, if you really needed to go to war tomorrow, you know, some of these submarine programs are sort of 2045, our surface to air missiles aren't still in place. I mean, tell us a little bit about this story about how defence works with the Treasury. And what, in an ideal world, could work better about that. Of course, money is an issue, but the Treasury isn't.

So Rachel and I, in opposition, worked very closely on developing a defence industrial strategy, on the recognition and case for investment in defence, driving economic growth, recognising, for instance, that 70% of defence jobs are outside London and the South East, recognising that defence jobs are on average paid at least. 10 to 15,000 pounds a year more than the average manufacturing jobs, and that defence with the military offers over 20,000 apprenticeships, new apprenticeships every year. So a recognition from the Treasury which we didn't have before about the importance of place around the UK, and you'll see that as a not just as a characteristic of how I approach defence, but Rachel approaches and this government

approaches the economic investment. The second thing was that we worked really closely on the strategic defense review that Keir Starm had launched within three weeks of the election back in July, not keeping the Treasury at arm's length, but hardwiring a senior treasury person right at the heart of that review. We worked closely together on being able to prepare the ground for Keir in February to make that historic commitment in many ways, the commitment to the largest increase in defense spending since the end of the Cold War, very soon after Trump was elected, an act that

his defense secretary, Pete Higseff, said to me when I phoned him to let him know we were doing it as a great act of leadership. It was the first European country at that time demonstrating that we were ready to meet the U.S. challenge to step up on European security, step up on defence spending. And so we will hit 2.5, 2.6% of GDP on defence by 2027. That's three years earlier than anyone expected. And certainly the Tory plans will, we've got an ambition of 3% in the next Parliament. And we've been central to that NATO commitment in June at the Hague summit of 5% on national security as a whole by 2035, recognizing quite simply, We are in a new era of threat.

There has to be a new era for defence. And politically, and for the sense of fairness for the country, we have to demonstrate that we can spend not just more, but we can spend better, that it will be good value for money. And not just give people a sense that this is going to make the country more secure, but it can bring a dividend and it will bring a dividend in the jobs, the support for business, the rebuilding of our British industry and innovation base right across the UK. Do you feel that the United States is as reliable an ally as it was during Thatcher Reagan, Blair Clinton? I do. Kirstama does. Certainly reliable, perhaps less predictable. But when Kirstama first went to the White House, President Trump said to him very clearly, my commitment to NATO is total.

And certainly in the many discussions and meetings I've had with my opposite number, Pete Hexeth, you know, I know the value that he places in the intelligence, the defense, the cyber, the special forces operations that our two countries do together in a way that no other countries do. and but the Americans are right. They're right to challenge the UK, the right to challenge the European nations to step up, to fund more, to do more within NATO. And look, I've been arguing for nearly five years

that the European countries in NATO have to do more of the heavy lifting. And that's why we have a NATO first policy now at the heart of our defence plans. That and the fact that in this era of increasing threats, our strategic strength and security lies with closer allies. When you did make the move in terms of increasing the share of GDP on defence, it was part paid for by cutting back on share of GDP on international aid and development,

which was a breach of the manifesto. Was that not a time actually where you could have broken a different line in the manifesto, which is taxed, basically to say we are in a completely different era, Putin, Ukraine, Trump's re-election, the need for a greater defence spending, we're actually going to raise tax. Was that even a discussion at the time? Well, there were always options in government. They're never easy choices and decisions. And that, particularly for a Labour Party in government with a sort of record of the previous Labour government on Millennium Development Goals,

on writing off the debt of most impoverished countries, on the setting of the aid target and raising it really hard to do. But that was a switch that recognised essentially that hard power is more important than soft power, that you can't deal with Putin's drones, with international aid projects. And in order to make that commitment of increasing funding by 2027, we had to make that decision.

And that's what we've chosen to do. One big choice that you have to make with all this extra money is in blunt terms how much that money you give to the US buying their defence equipment and how much of it is focused on European cooperation. It's a tough one, right? I mean, Trump makes no secret of the fact that one of the reasons he wants you spending 5% of GDP on defence is he thinks you're going to be buying more and more American equipment. And there is a sense that quite a lot of the money is going to the US.

Now, of course, they'll always say you can have a little bit of it. You know, we'll make the Chinooks, but you can repaint them instead of you having the medium lift capacity here in the UK. Or we've got a fancy American firm that can do data and cyber and all this kind of stuff and go with us rather than with the European equipment. When are we going to begin seeing a bit of balancing away from the US, more money going into European manufacturers, UK manufacturers, so that we don't end up, God forbid, in four years time, eight years time, too dependent on a US that may not. be as reliable in the future as you think they are today? We're already seeing that. There's been an increase in our first year of defense contracts into the UK as opposed to the US.

And I've been arguing that for four or five years now that we should direct and look to direct British taxpayers' money, first to British jobs, British businesses and British innovation. And that's what we're doing. So there's a, because of the commitment that not just we're making to increasing defence spending, but other European countries are. There's a desire in the US, of course there is, to see their industry and their firms do well. But there's also a recognition, and you will hear Pete Hegseff arguing this. You will actually hear the senior military, and you'll hear Trump say this as well, is that we have to build up the European industry base, not just the strength of our forces.

There are things that we can do. So the link up, we talked about the 10 billion pound deal that we've struck with Norway to build five new warships for them. Part of that will be stepping up the Norwegian contribution to that. We'll build together and we'll build better. We're doing the same with the next generation of new combat aircraft with Italy and with Japan. We're doing some really important work on submarines with the US, Australia. So with the really big projects you have to collaborate. But gone are the days when

you'll have a British government signing contracts with American firms and not concerned to make sure that the jobs, the economic benefit and some of the innovation and the intellectual property is here in the UK because one lesson that we have to take from Ukraine is that when a country is under threat or forced to fight, then its forces are only as strong as the industry that stands behind them. You mentioned Australia there, and we've got a lot of listeners to Australia, and obviously, Orcus, this three-country, this huge defence deal

between the US, the UK and Australia, very, very important to the Australians. And we spoke, Rory and I spoke recently to a couple of Australian politicians who were very clear that they think Orcus is on track and it's kind of it's a strong agreement and it's not going to be broken. But I don't quite understand why the Americans are still kind of having this review and they've got this guy in charge of it, Colby, who strikes me as being right out there on the kind of mager end of the Department of War, as it now is.

Do you have any worries about the way that the Americans are handling walkers? Albanesey thus far, apart from a selfie where they look like they're in mud and two swords, he's yet to have a proper meeting with Trump. Yeah, I don't. The discussions I've had, the knowledge of the program, the work that we're doing on elements of August directly with the US as well as with Australia, give me the confidence of this is hardwired and recognised, not just as a program to develop some world beating leading military capabilities. It's a big strategic link up between three natural allies. The other reason I'm not really concerned is that we came into government, and we did a review of Orcus. I commissioned that. The Prime Minister reported to me and the Prime Minister. New government in the US, of course they want to take stock of it. And I'm looking to report the confirmation of that as a way of rebooting Orcus for the future. And then you'll have essentially three recently elected new governments looking for a fresh commitment to that

Orcas program, perhaps developing it in areas where it isn't being developed and driven at the moment. And it will reinforce that three-nation commitment that straddles the security of the Euro-Atlantic and the Indo-Pacific and demonstrates exactly why you can't divide the security of one from the other. Ukraine and Gaza. Yep. So Ukraine, Trump has kind of been.

blowing hot and cold and he changes line from time to time. The latest line is that Ukraine can get the whole territory back. First of all, do you agree with that? And secondly, on Gaza, how does it end? Two massive questions. So on Ukraine, it's too easy to say, look, Putin's winning. Yes, he's making some, gaining some ground. But at the rate that he's been winning Ukraine territory this year,

it would take him another four years to take. the whole of the Dombas. And this is a war in the end, which he thought he'd win in a week. Three and a half years on, he's lost more than a million men. He's lost more than 10,000 tanks and armored vehicles. He has produced a NATO, which is now bigger. It's now more unified. And it's got a big commitment to being better resourced over the next 10 years.

So this is, Putin likes to talk as if he's strong, but he's actually in weak. than he was before, NATO stronger than it was before, and Ukraine, having been out there two or three weeks ago, is just as determined and defiant as it was three and a half years ago. And that isn't just the huge courage of their military, it's the determination of their civilian population. I visited a drone factory, which had been bombed five times this year. And those workers still come to work every because they know the drones they're making are what their fathers, their sons, their uncles need on the front line to fight back Putin. So I think Trump is recognizing that.

I think he's recognizing the, really the determination of the Ukrainians and the relative weakness of Putin. You look at the fact that 40% of his government spending now is going on the military. What's needed now is to turn the screw on Putin economically, to continue to make sure that Ukraine has the military support to keep fighting, which is why that we've stepped in as the UK and I convene and chair, co-chair with the Germans, the Ukraine contact group, which is 50 nations supporting with Ukraine, standing with Ukraine. But we've also got to prepare for that point of peace because peace is possible. And that's why we've also stepped in and Keir's been an important force in this alongside the French to prepare for the coalition of the winning so that we can help secure that piece for the long term when we can get an end to the fighting. Just hypothetically, tell us a bit about what it's like being a government, what the problems are, what the public doesn't see, right? So let's say hypothetically you got out of bed in the morning and thought, actually we're in a bit of trouble.

Our type 23 fleet is knackered. We don't have any surface-to-air missiles. We can barely deploy a battle group, let alone a brigade. And if we needed to go to war in 12 months' time, we'd be truly royally screwed. And you wanted to really push ahead with it. You really wanted to say to your department, where the hell are these surface-to-air missiles, where are the artillery? What are the things that get in the way of it happening as quickly as the public would like? We have a defence system that has been used to working too slowly, that has overcompetent,

every decision, that has not had people who are clearly identified as responsible, ready to get a grip, and answering for whether or not things are done. That isn't just a defence problem, it's a government problem as well, but part of the purpose of the reform that I'm driving, that's the deepest reform of defence for over 50 years that nobody sees or reads about. It doesn't get in only front pages, no photo opportunities. But unless we do this, we won't be able to, put the most innovative new tech in the hands of our frontline war fighters. We won't be able to get on contract with new ships or planes within two years instead of six. We won't be able to harness an upgrade, the new radar systems or weapon systems as we need to. So that's why I've set target times for getting on contract. It's why I've done a deep reform of defence. So we had now, for instance, we've got 17 organisations down to four lead areas.

We've got 11 finance teams down to four. We've got a single invest budget now instead of multiple areas in defence making their own investment decisions. And you've got a military strategic headquarters for the first time with the chief of the defence staff commanding the service chiefs. So you get a stronger strategic centre. You're able to make the decisions. quicker. And look, we can do it. We proved that we can do it to support Ukraine. We've got this

extraordinary task force that has demonstrate its capacity, not just at scale to procure and develop what Ukraine needs, but can do it quickly. John, I was watching a documentary on German telly the other day, which was about Finland and the role of reservists and the extent to which you get the sense of a kind of societal understanding of the threat. Strikes me that despite all the things that you and Keir say about the threat that Putin poses and to our way of life, to our stability, that we're still nowhere near that sense in the UK that he really is a threat. Even though we see what happens in Ukraine, people don't necessarily feel it here.

Do you think we need to step up on that front as well? Yes, we do. And what does that involve? And part of the big strategic. Defense Review that we published in June set that out. It's also an observation from Ukraine. It isn't just a country is stronger, it forces a better, better ready to sustain a fight if the industry and the innovation base in the country can support them, but it's also that you require that, as they do in Ukraine, requires the whole society to do that. Finland's on the Russian border. We're somewhat remote. We've been used to years in which we've been able to help ourselves to the post-Cold War peace dividend to be able to sort of outsource any sense of defending the country to the armed forces. But we have to take our homeland defense more seriously. And this is part of the NATO plans. We have to make our forces more ready. to fight because that's the way that you deter aggression in the future.

And we have to be ready to call out and explain to people just what a threat and just what Russia is doing. That's why, for instance, recently when we had one of their spy ships in our waters, I made sure that we didn't just keep that quiet and did what we needed to shadow them, make sure they got up to no harm while they were in our waters. But actually, we exposed it so people can see some of what they're doing. But, I mean, I was shocked when I became the defense minister by the scale at just how many, for instance, cyber attacks that we can trace to states, including from Russia, that we face day in, day out. We often see the Scandinavians, the Baltic states, the Poles, the Germans really seem to be pushing forward.

They're really impressive. What can we learn when you go to visit those countries, see the culture there? What could Britain learn from what is going well in defence in Scandinavia, the Baltics, Poland? I think we can learn from Sweden as well as Finland, that sense that society is stronger and more secure if it's resilient in basic ways, that we're all more attuned to cyber threats, that we recognize and support more strongly the role that the forces play. For those countries on that eastern flank,

they have an acute and immediate and understandable sense of threat, but they are also, and I think we learn from this as well, that they want to work with allies like us. We've made a big commitment to Estonia, for instance, So we have hardwired our, about a thousand of our UK troops into that Estonian defence and planning. We're part of developing some extraordinary new technology that we're putting in the hands of the Estonia and the UK fighters.

That, for instance, to come back to your previous discussion, we've developed and put on contract and delivered into the hands of our forces there within six months. and it is already allowing the sort of black rats, the fourth light infantry brigade that's out there, to be able to see 10 times further into Russia and to be able to react 10 times faster. So we can work the Estonians together. And I think we learn that. We learn that we're stronger together. We stand together. And that's the philosophy of NATO.

One thing that can be a bit of a risk in Britain is that we can get a little bit complacent. we can be very good at taking quite limited resources and then spinning and saying we're doing all these amazing things. And so let's say, again, hypothetically, I'm not saying this is the case, but let's say the Estonians said to you informally, listen, it's great what you're doing. But the truth of the matter is, there's problems here. You don't always have the missiles when we're expecting them to. We can't really rely on you for the artillery.

The Germans are spending hundreds of millions building barracks. you're saying you're going to deploy from Britain when you turn up. And you begin to sense, I don't know, that might not be that. It might be some other part of the world where you begin to sense actually we're a little bit complacent. People, civil servants, military are spinning that we're doing all these great things. And you sense actually the substance isn't quite there. How do you, as a secretary's sake, grip that?

How do you drive it through? How do you challenge this? Look, it is a big challenge. You had Ben Wallace on your program a few months ago. I've got a lot of time for him and a lot of respect. and the strength of the UK response and leadership on Ukraine. In large part was down to Ben Wallace. The cross-party support was absolute from Kirstama and me from day one,

and we have that from the Conservatives now, and it's a really important part of it. But he also said, look, in 14 years, we hollered out and underfunded the forces. There is a huge challenge now to make our forces, more fit for war fighting because that's the way that we turn the increasing Russian aggression and other adversaries, but we don't do it alone. And so it doesn't require every country to be within NATO to be able to do all things. And that's for me the real importance.

What's the special contribution and leadership that Britain can bring? So part of that is about how well equipped and what our forces can do. But it's also that recovering that sense of leadership that Britain can offer. So, for instance, on Ukraine, we are leading the coalition of the willing preparation for the point at which the fighting stops. We are leading the contact group of nations that is stepping up support for Ukraine. But we've also behind the scenes. We've also been setting up and leading funds, the international fund for Ukraine. It's just top two billion pounds, ten countries.

And the UK is procuring and delivering through what we call Task Force Kindred for the contributions for other countries. So we've been responsible for coordinating the biggest movement of munitions across Europe since the end of this Cold War. We've been responsible for procuring for Ukraine the contribution from other countries because we can do it better and because other countries will look to us to lead. My final contribution on the handing everyone to conclude, but just to return to my question, In those moments, that's good news, but in those moments where you sense we're being a bit complacent and you're getting a bit of spin that, well, yes, Minister, we may not have many troops on the ground and we may not have much kit, but the fact is we're providing thought leadership, which some of our European allies might occasionally think, hmm, how do you challenge it? How do you challenge complacency? You can't just do it by what you say and what you thought leadership. No, that's why we're increasing defence spending by a record amount since the end of the Cold War.

That's why we're putting in place some very profound reforms within defence. And it's why we're stepping up the alliances that we're rebuilding our alliances in a way that we've lost sight of in Britain until 15 months ago. And that was what we said we would do. We said that Britain would again play a leading role in NATO. We said we were reset relations with key European allies, relations that were broken and some times willfully, willfully tested during that Brexit period. Gaza.

The IDF. Do you look at what they're doing and think, that is not good. We should not fire war like this. 100%. The new offensive in Guy. utterly, utterly out of order, harsh agonizing to see its impact. And we've condemned that.

We've not just called it out in public, but I've had the hard conversations in private with the Israeli defense ministers, Keir has, with the president of Israel. So we've been working to try and say, this is got to stop. Tell them stuff though. Well, we've suspended the export licenses on 30 items, which the IDF, there was a risk the IDF might use to breach international humanitarian law in Gaza. We've refused since then another 46 licenses. We've paused the military training places for IDF personnel in the UK. We didn't issue any invitations to the Israeli government, to the big London International Defense Trade Fair that was the O2 earlier this month.

So we've taken steps not just to say to the Israelis, but to demonstrate to the Israelis that there are consequences. And part of – and of course we've taken the step now to say that we will recognize Palestine, and that has brought other consequences. countries along with us. It has helped to shift an Arab opinion. So you've got Arab countries now like us condemning Hamas and confirming that Hamas can have no role in any future for Palestine. So we're doing what we can and what we can do is much stronger if we do it alongside allies. And so that's why you've seen Keir the whole time working with other European countries with Macron with Mertz. You've seen him working. You've seen him working. with Albanese. You've seen him working also with Carney from Canada in recent weeks.

Our final question, it is startling to see, you look at the polls and you look at Keir's ratings in particular. Make the case for Keir as Prime Minister and as Prime Minister for the long term to lead Labour into the next election and how you win it. This is a man who's Prime Minister at a time of unprecedented threat who recognises just how deep the problems in this country are and how tough the job to fix them is. He is someone who has never done things the easy way. He won't walk around problems. And he knows that his task now is to lead a government that can restore that sense of confidence. and trust in government that can restore that sense of pride in the country. And if you want the

biggest picture, I think this is at a period where he recognises as I do that the future of Britain, the future of European security will be determined over the next three to four years. And that's why what's so important about the leadership he's offered on the international side, with the coalition of the willing, the new agreements that we've struck with the European Union, the trade deals that we've been able to land. This is, once again, Britain becoming democracy's most reliable ally. This is once again Britain being able to play a leading role in Europe because make no mistake, we have to settle the land war in Ukraine, we have to be able to deter increasing Russian aggression, and we have to be able to strengthen that,

collective NATO-led deterrence in order to keep Britain safe. Very good. I heard a story about you. As you said earlier, you're not one of those politicians who likes wearing your heart in your sleeve. You don't like talking about yourself. You like to just get on to do the job. But digging around a bit before doing this interview, somebody told me a story that was so ridiculous. I don't know if I can believe it.

But it was when you were, I think, working for the mental health campaigns and you got a sort of parliamentary success, you've got the law changed. And you celebrated by sailing across the Atlantic. Is that true? Yes. And then what happened, John? Hold on. Are you a sailor?

No. Never sailed them alive. So what you do? You're sailing across the Atlantic? I helped, I drafted and I organised the campaign to win a piece of legislation that included rights for people being discharging. from the big mental hospitals we had in the 80s. Because you'd worked in a psychiatric hospital.

Because I'd worked with those people that were being turfed out under the Thatcher government into care in the community, so-called, and there was not even an assessment of their needs before they were discharged. That legislation changed that. So, look, job done. Perhaps it was 30 years before its time,

you know, career break. I thought I want to sail the Atlantic The problem was I didn't really I'd never sailed I didn't research it properly I got one-way ticket to the Canary Islands and found I was there two months before

any of the boats arrived To make the crossing What sort of boat was it? Well it was a sailing boat I managed to talk my way onto a sailing boat That was 47 foot How many people? There were four others

How did it work out? How did your trip go? We got a cross It was an absolute trip of a lifetime. It was coming back that was worse. That was on a 30-foot boat with one other, no engine. What happened on the way back? And that was, we had very bad weather.

We got driven off course. We were 43 days at sea. We were reported missing to the Lloyds. And we ran out of gas. We ran out of fresh food. Yeah, we were in pretty bad shape when we got to the Azores. But we got there. You got as far as the Azores?

Yeah. And then got flown back. And then I left the boat. there and he got it repaired. But, I mean, you know, what does that, what does that tell you? Well, in the end, you know, when you're, when you're in the middle of the Atlantic and you're hit by a force nine storm and you're, the waves, you're being driven off course by waves that are bigger than the boat, you survive that.

You sort of think, well, I'm going to survive anything. Yeah, backbench rebellion. Who needs to have that. 14 years of opposition. Yeah. I saw, I saw this guy was winding up, but there you go. Yeah. I never talk about that.

It's just something in the past. Well, John, thank you for your time. Thank you. Have a great day. Thanks very much. Thanks again. So, Alison, what did you think? Well, I like John.

He's a, I mean, he's a serious guy. And I had a sense of somebody who's really on top of his job, which is unusual. I think it's unusual. I think it's really good for a capital, but it's on top of their job. You used to say that's the bare minimum we can expect. Yeah. So no, what do you? you think? No, I think he's, I think he's incredibly charming. He's very interesting. I mean, he was

basically, uh, from the early 80s to 97, a communications and campaigns professional, advocacy professional. But his style is, is quite sort of gentle, measured, measured, understated. Um, you did very well to winkle out that amazing story. I mean, lessons will have picked up on the undercurrents of that, but that is complete terrifying. I mean, 43 days stuck in the Atlantic before the days of GPS, driven four days by the wind. Having never sailed before. Yeah. And absolutely certain they're going to die,

trying to take sextant readings in a ship that's crashing around in waves, largely a ship. I mean, he doesn't strike you as that sort of big adventurer. He's steady as you go. He's like, you know, it was interesting, for example, when we had Keir-star was reshoffler. He was moving every left, right and center. I don't think he gave any thought moving John Healy,

because he just feels like he's around pegging around. Oh, look, you talk to military people and I talk to military people. You get the sense that even though they're maybe frustrated about the state of British defences and the role of defence within the political debate, most of the people you talk to will say he's doing a good job. Absolutely. And there's something quite interesting about both him

and actually Ben Wallace, who we interviewed on leading, which is both of them had relatively slow careers they weren't the kind of high-flying fast people. I mean, in the first 13 years of Labor government, as you say, didn't get into the cabinet, whereas we've interviewed people on this show who were in the cabinet within two, three years, right? And a bit like Ben, there is a real sense that he's sort of,

I don't know, there's wine in the cellar, he's developed capital over time. And incredibly impressive that he's managed to live through so unusually. I mean, 90% of MPs left. He just has stayed. And I think we could do with more of that, actually. It must be odd around that cabinet table because so many of them actually entered politics after me.

And I came in 13 years after him. Including Kirstama. Including Kirstama. Yeah. No, he's, I thought it was interesting. It'd be really interesting here what I listen to this thing. Because, I mean, the thing is he doesn't like, he's not one of those politicians who likes to tell his life story and talk about himself. He wants to focus on kind of policy and detail.

And even the TBGB thing. He was a bit evasive. He was kind of portraying a nice picture. The creative tension. Well, there was creative tension. That is true. There came a point where the tension drove out the creativity at times. But no, I think he's a really good solid citizen.

Now, on the Cirrus sort of bigger picture, I guess if one was going to put the other side, because he's obviously very proud of his job and he's he's a government minister defending. If we did end up in a war in the next 12 to 24 months, we're not ready, not remotely ready. And all this stuff about, you know, we're going to get up to 2.7% by such and such a date and we're going to have submarines by 2045. It's going to look mad. So the big question is the question you posed. What is the threat? because if it's real, my goodness, to be honest,

the Nordics, the Baltics, the Poles are streets ahead of us. We are still very much gradual, gradual, business as usual, a bit more expenditure, but boy, are we not ready for the big stuff. And of course, he had to say what he said about the United States, but I sense part of what's happening with the European defence debate is there's sort of everybody is trying to kind of keep the Americans broadly on board, re-NATO, re-Artical 5, re-Ukraine. But at the same time, understanding that that relationship is not as strong, maybe, as it was,

and therefore we have to do more of our own. And part of the story of the Trump visit, which wasn't reported enough, is there were a loss of commitments around buying US defence equipment. And the problem is that we now have a presidency that, to quote, Osula Vandalion, weaponises dependency. the more dependent we are on US kit, the more we have a president who's prepared to use that. And I'm afraid the thing that I would have wanted to get onto is AI if the future of war fighting is artificial intelligence. And the only countries with the large language models are the US and China.

Then Britain and Europe are in a very, very vulnerable situation with our defense and security because we have to depend then on them not. exploiting the fact that we rely on them. And of course, Trump loves exploiting anyone who relies on it. What do you think of his take on how to tackle reform? Yeah, well, I think he's really interesting on that, isn't he? Because he's a Rotherham MP. And it was interesting when you raised the flags. He said, isn't it great? It shows the patriotic pride of people. I think his line on Farage was very strong. I think it would be nice to see other people say, this is what he said about Putin's. Interesting, he didn't land break.

Brexit on him. I mean, that's the obvious attack line that you keep pointing out, which is 60% of the... I can't know what he's going to say, though, so I just... But 60% of the British public now think Brexit was a mistake. Fras delivered it for us, and yet he doesn't get any of the blame. Yeah, well, I was trying to see whether he might sort of weave that into his attack line, but... Don't worry, Roy, I'll keep going on about that until the day I die, which will probably about the same time we get these nuclear submarines. Exactly. Can I finish with a final cheeky question? Do you regret the fact that you didn't put him in the cabinet?

I mean, look, here's an immense talent. He sat around for 13 years in junior ministerial positions. Why was he not right up at the top team with you guys? It's very good question. I wonder, I mean, listen, he got some serious jobs and did them well. I think it's partly because of this thing about maybe he doesn't push himself, doesn't do the list trust thing of, you know, look at me, here I am, just going to get some of the job.

And I wonder whether unfairly sometimes he got, because he was very much part of Gordon's, you know, in terms of the jobs that he did, he was very much part of that, whether at the time when he might have been thought to be going into the cabinet, Gordon would have been pressing for some people to be in the cabinet, just as John Prescott was, and whether we thought that, you know, John Healy was very much part of that GB thing. And I don't know. I think the other thing to say, I would say about him,

I would actually say about Andy Burnham, even though that's quite controversial at the moment. I'd say about Ed Miliband. I think it's interesting to say, how people develop. I can look at John today and see a much more, you talk about, you know, wine in the cellar, I can see a much more solid, complete politician that maybe was that how it went back then? I can't remember to be honest. Great. Well, thank you. See you soon. See you soon. Bye-bye.