The Rest Is Politics: Leading - 63. Sajid Javid: Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, and Shamima Begum (Part 2)

Episode Date: March 8, 2024

What is Sajid's biggest regret from his time in politics? What barriers did he come up against in the Shamima Begum case during his time as Home Secretary? Will the NHS survive? Rory and Alastair are joined by Sajid Javid, former Home Secretary, Chancellor of the Exchequer, Secretary of State for Health, and many more cabinet positions, to answer all these questions and more in part two of this two part interview. TRIP Plus:  Become a member of The Rest Is Politics Plus to support the podcast, receive our exclusive newsletter, enjoy ad-free listening to both TRIP and Leading, benefit from discount book prices on titles mentioned on the pod, join our Discord chatroom, and receive early access to live show tickets and Question Time episodes.  Just head to therestispolitics.com to sign up, or start a free trial today on Apple Podcasts: apple.co/therestispolitics. Instagram: @restispolitics Twitter: @RestIsPolitics Email: [e-mail] Producers: Dom Johnson + Nicole Maslen 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 restispolities.com. Welcome to the Restis Policy leading with me, Alistair Campbell. And with me, Rory Stewart. Now, when we sat down to interview Sajad Javid, the former insert six former cabinet jobs, I did not think we'd end up giving him the Theresa May, John Major two-parter treatment, but one, he was incredibly generous with his time, too, but I also

think it was really interesting, and he seemed sort of unbuttoned and really talking in a way about all sorts of things that I had not really heard him talk like that when he was a minister. So if you've listened to Part 1, I hope you enjoyed it, and this is Part 2. If you haven't yet listened to Part 1, probably good to go back and hear about him talking about his background and his upbringing and all sorts of political issues that drove him to be the politician that he became. But this is part two, much more, as it were, about more recent times. He gives a very interesting assessment of some of his prime ministerial colleagues, Listrust Listen Away Now, but also some very interesting stuff about his time as Home Secretary. We had discussion about,

for example, Shemima Begum, which is in the news again recently. But anyway, lots and lots and lots of stuff we talk about. I hope you enjoy part one and I hope you enjoy part two. Here it is. What's your assessment of the last five prime ministers? Cameron May... Broad question. It's a broad question, but I'm sure you've thought about it. Cameron May Johnson

trusts, who you voted for and soon. Yeah, with great regret. Big mistake. Don't ask you about my big mistakes from politics. Would that be number one? Yeah, it would say the top of the right there, towards the top of the list. It was a huge mistake to the sportless trust. Why did you do that?

I did it because I thought, and on this bit I was right, I think everyone was right, said it, is that I thought she's going to win anyway. And I thought naively that I would be able to help sort of moderate her because I was worried about what she might do. And obviously it turned out that first she did win, but she wasn't going to be listening to anyone. And then she was the author of all her own mistakes, the disaster that she was. So when you say she was going to win anyway, is that where, politicians make a judgment, well, if they're going to win, I need to be a part of that team rather than the losing team. Well, it wasn't so much, I wasn't, I didn't want another job. So, you know, by then I'd had, you know, I've done what I've done, what we talked about. I was already thinking, you know, it's pretty certain in my mind and sort of made my final decision. I was going to not stand in the next election. So I was just thinking about what's going to be the direction of the country now. So Boris obviously had gone. I think that was the right decision. He goes. Obviously, obviously someone had to follow. I tried. I couldn't get anywhere. really. There wasn't enough interest amongst my colleagues. And so I concluded that she was going

to win and I don't want a job, but she's going to win. And what influence could I have on whoever, on the individual that becomes our next leader? And if she's going to be it, then I have backed it, maybe she'd be more willing to listen to me. But she wasn't. And it was a mistake. I should have backed Rishi Sunak. It was a mistake. And, but it is what it is. And what about her predecessor, Johnson? I mean, you had some very colorful times with him. You had Dominic Cummings getting the cops in... I resign twice for his administration. I know you did. I know he did.

So we often have discussions about who's the worst prime minister of all time. And I think it's between those two. I think it's between those two. Trust and Johnson. And I think that trust has left this awful economic legacy from which I don't think your party is going to recover. But Johnson has had a different sort of legacy, which is about lying, about standards in public life.

And I just wondered what your take now on what it was like working alongside him. Well, look, I refer to my resignations, and I think, I mean, I've talked a lot about the reasons why I left, and I think people know the circumstances. But the first time when I left as Chancellor, I mean, I was really excited to be Chancellor and having the party won the 2019 election the way it did I. I know a lot of it was about Brexit, but what I was most excited about was what Boris called sort of leveling up and bringing growth throughout the UK opportunity.

And I really, you know, I took it really seriously. I thought this was a great position to be in in the government where you're the chancellor. I've already runs four spending departments for that. I had a good understanding government. And I was really interested in things like skills and infrastructure and job growth, the enterprise zone, all this. I had a, you know, remember a few weeks before I resign, I think at Christmas time, just before Christmas, I sent Boris a 20-page personal minute on how I would deliver levering up. I went through every government department, what you would do. I said I could court it.

I was so excited about it. And then about a month later, so I resigned. And the reason I resigned, well, documented was that, you know, he asked me to do something with my team that I found totally unacceptable. He was under the influence of Mr. Cummings. I had been telling him that Mr. Cummings was only in it for Mr. Cummings and didn't care a damn about what the prime minister actually thought all the rest of the government for that matter. Boris didn't listen to it. And I thought there was no way forward. So I let it.

Do you think you read you a minute? Yeah, because after Christmas, when he came back in the new year, he gave me a copyback of the minute where he had written a lot of it. Actually, he did read it. To his credit, he did read it. And he had commented on a lot of the things that I said. And that's what I found with Boris is that when sort of I would get him to talk with him one on one and go through things in detail and how it really works and things, he would listen. And you'd sort of get him to the right place. And you think, right, we can do something with this. I can actually. I'd go off and then probably it's Cummings. Someone's got to him. It's all changed. But it was very weird. I mean, so he was the Foreign Secretary when I was the Minister of State and a foreign office.

And I remember going in to present the Africa strategy to him. And I did a sort of whiteboard presentation through all this stuff. And he said, absolutely terrific. Saint-Posant, 100%. We're going for this. Then he left the room. And I turned to the permanent secretary in the head of the Civil Service Department and said, well, foreign secretary signed off.

We're good to go. And he went, well, Minister, you know, if Boris had said he didn't like it, that would be a problem. But it's not a huge help that he said he liked it. And I was like, what do you mean? He was like, well, unfortunately, if I go in tomorrow and say Rory's Africa strategy is bullshit, he'll go 100%. So I think he was a very, very odd man. The big question I've got in my mind is what in the end has gone wrong? I joined with you in 2010.

I am full of admiration for you and for others of our colleagues. I mean, you know, I'm on record. He's going to mention David Gork again. I worship David Gork. So he's the most wonderful boss, and I really enjoyed. He's a great minister. Enjoyed working with him. And I think listeners listening to this will think here is this thoughtful, competent, serious person

who took his job seriously, he's got a good brain on him, and he tried to do the right thing. And yet, they will also think, we're now in 2020. form, the Conservatives are going to almost certainly lose this election by a large margin. And the economy looks like it's going to barely grow in an entire parliament. The NHS is creaking, people are unhappy with schools, growth is anemic, productivity is rubbish. So how does one reconcile kind of hardworking, serious, thoughtful people in senior government departments over 14 years?

And the fact that many voters will go to the next election thinking these guys were hopeless. I think you ask me what's gone wrong if we look off the eye at our own country, but I think what I'm about to say is true of many other countries, you know, leading democracies, whether it's in Europe, where it's France, it's Germany, it's Italy, US, of course. And that is, in a nutshell, so it's the rise of populism being populist. There's lots of causes of that. And it's the political, it's not like the political system isn't without fault. There have been some big divisive issues over the last couple of decades. Iraq, the expensive, scandal, Brexit, we've talked about, and that in itself leads to obviously big differences

of opinion, but then you get the politicians who can then just exploit that for the sake of their populism, obviously social media, it was paid a big part, continues to play. I think that to me, that sort of polarisation that's being created in politics, again, not just in the UK, through populism, is, I think that's our number one defining issues of country going forward. And it exists not just in the Conservative Party. I mean, look at Gary Corbyn and his legacy. I mean, Alistair can even get himself to vote, you know, Labor in one of the elections, right? And that, you know, how powerful that's been.

Very specific reasons, actually. But yes, it's true. It's true. But just on that, so populism, Brexit driven by populism, Johnson driven by populism, list trust driven by God knows what, but it's... Conspiracy theories. Now it is, yeah, but that's all part of populism as well. Yeah.

So all that being said, you've been a conservative minister, you've been in six government departments. And as Rory said, you know, you'd be seen as one of the kind of sane, sensible guys. Can you honestly look people in the eye today and say, after 14 years of this government, we should give them another go? Yes. And I'll tell you why. Because despite all of that that we just discussed, so I look back, last 14 years

where you had constant government under conservative leadership, if you think about three or four, I can think it's sort of three or four things that really sort of are better of improved. We talked about the economy. Of course, the economy is in a difficult position today. but you find me a country in Europe where it's not. But since 2010, the UK in real terms has grown faster than any other major European country. France, Germany, Italy, Spain's grown faster than in real terms. And that means real jobs and opportunity.

If you think about education, I think our schools, our university, colleges are much better. And that's not my view. If you look at any international measure of educational performance on maths or... Please don't know. Well, look, you might not like them, but it's better than the great inflation under the labour years. And so I'd rather take an international measure than a domestic measure, which is much easier to make. And then last one, it's another really important area. We never get to agree on this one, which is the environment, right?

Now, I know obviously there's a constant debate where I care deeply about the environment, what we give to our children and grandchildren. I believe passionately in the damage of climate change, declining biodiversity. But if you look, as a country, you know, we've cut our emissions faster than any other G20 country, in terms of renewable energy, it's growing faster than any other comparable country in Europe. So don't get me wrong. I'm not saying all these areas we've done enough, but they've done a lot. Equality.

I was proud to vote for same-sex marriage. I was proud that it was a conservative prime minister that bought it to parliament. Modern slavery. We don't get to, sometimes these things can part of people don't, for lots of reasons, they're not the most sort of exciting topics and stuff, but we have done a lot on modern slavery, right? Because of Theresa May's leadership on that, on domestic abuse. We've done a lot. on taking mental health more seriously.

I don't something you care about, I care about taking it more seriously. I'm not saying again, it's enough, but there's been chosen. There are things where there have been huge improvements. Can I pause a second and bring you in on this, Alistair? So, I mean, I think we're looking at a situation where Labour will win the next election.

When you hear him, and I understand, you'll disagree with 90% of what he says, and we know that because you tell us again and again. But do you ever sort of recognise what it must have been like for Gordon Brown in 2008, 2009, when he must also have felt, wait a sec, we've done all these things over 13 years, we're proud of our record,

and yet I'm staring defeat in the face, and it's unfair. No, honestly, even though I think it's had you did a perfectly fine job of trying to present a positive gaze, if you remember a speech that Gordon made in, I think it was Manchester, before the election that he lost to David Cameron,

where he did, I don't know if you remember the speech, but he just read out a list that went on and on and on of real progress and real change. And I think when we had Julian Keegan on, I think it's very hard for conservatives to genuinely to stand there and say this is a better, stronger, richer country than it was or that you're going to leave it in a better state.

But listen, there's no point. But also, let's not forget that when when Labour came to office in 97, they all had a big economic bonus to spend as well, right? We started a different 2010. Exactly. You had a big, because the conservative government,

because John Major had made the right economic decisions finally after the ERM. On health. You had a huge bonus. On health and education, just look at the graph that goes like that, then that, and it's now done that again. So, listen, it's not all about spending, but I just think as a country, I think you agree with me, the country doesn't feel good about itself. We are more divided. We are poor.

And I agree there are challenges in all these other countries. But I think, I'm afraid, particularly since Brexit and Johnson, this country has taken a very, very bad time. Can I bring in our health, which is a huge thing. And then back to, I promise not to do much more of this. But health is one of the really big things. because although honest is right, Gordon Brown spent a lot on health. Actually, Theresa May spent a lot on health. Boris Johnson spent a lot on health.

I mean, we are pouring billions into the health service, and yet doesn't seem to be very much coming out the other end. I mean, it seems like an absolute nightmare. Let's imagine, I mean, no, you don't want to say this is going to happen, but just imagine, for the sake of argument, where Streeting became the health secretary and Labour was trying to run the NHS over next five years. What's anyone supposed to do about the health system?

Well, first, we need to be honest, whether it's Labor, whether it's considered about the challenge of the health system, is the biggest public policy challenges country faces is the health system by far and away, right? Because it's so important, health, who isn't it important too? And just to put the challenging perspective is that, you know, when Labor came to office in 97, it spent 27% of total day-to-day government spending went to the NHS. Now it's 44% is soon about to be 50% in the next five years. Of total government spending?

Total government spending. total. A lot of it, the expense of defence, which is going to have to go up. Defence is going to go up, have to go up for obvious reasons. Spending on interest and the government debt is going to have to go up. And there will be other areas that probably have to go up as well. But take that into account and where's the NHS going to get the money from? Today we are spending more as a proportion, more in real terms than ever before. Right.

So one budget that just kept going up and up and up in real terms, even before COVID. And why is that happening is because we're living longer. NHS was created, there were something like half a million people over the age of 18. Now there's over 3 million people. There's new medicines and treatments that people rightly want. We're taking mental health more seriously than when the NHS was created. And all of that, the burden of disease has changed. And I am clear, especially having worked up close now with the NHS, having run that department,

there is no way that it can continue to be funded with what it really needs and resources directly only from Texas. It's not going to happen. It doesn't happen in any other country in Europe. It doesn't happen in Canada or Australia or in Japan. I'm deliberately picking countries that have universal healthcare systems. None of them do it this way. And that is why I've called for a Royal Commission on it.

I think politicians just need to say, look, we know this is a massive problem. We need a consensus on it. We're not going to agree it through Parliament and media. So let's get the great and the good politicians of all side around the table and do this. So what should West Streeting do in your scenario? Let's say Labor do win the next election. They're going to have the same problem. if conservatives win the next section, they need to deal with this. We need a Royal Commission

to sort of this out. Otherwise, our children, grandchildren are going to pay for it? You essentially saying there has to be a sort of hybrid system, whereas the principle that people who require healthcare should have access to that health care, but that the funding model is going to have to change. Yes. Yes. And I can tell you today exactly what that funding model should be, but I can point to countries that I think we can all look at and say, I don't think anyone looks at Australia or Canada to take to sort of English-speaking countries or even France or Germany and says they've got, they don't look after they're sick, right? And but they do it in an entirely different way.

And of course, the government's involved and things. And also, by the way, these countries also take protection, prevention much more seriously. We need to be much more serious about prevention, whether that's a mental health or obesity or cancer. And that will pay for itself in the future as well. I completely agree with you about prevention. Just on mental health, you know, you had a brother who took his own life. And I just want you to tell listeners who he was, why in your view he did what he did, and what sort of effect that's had on you and the rest of your family.

Yes, my eldest brother, Tarrick, and he took his own life in July 2018. It was a long time ago. But I think I probably think about it every day still. We were very close. He's one of, you know, we were five brothers. We were all very close. And the truth is I didn't see it coming. at all. And I remember when my other brother, Bass, who called me up and turning his death.

He's now in the home office. He's director general of immigration enforcement. Oh my God. So we'll see him as a select duty too. But he was police officer for 30 years. And he called me up and said, you know, you're okay. I've got some serious news. And I was actually my, I just visited my mother. I was in a car being driven by my protection officer. I was home secretary at the time, back to London. And he told me the news. And I mean, I was, I was, I was, I, I was totally even shock and devastated sounds is an understatement because we just didn't see it coming. And I wish I'd now, and obviously I've learned more. I wish I'd done more to try and prevent it in the way that just talk to my brother more.

I'd seen him before, I think two weeks before that at a family wedding. And everything, you know, to me seemed normal. But I only learned afterwards. He had some serious health issues, including some mental health issues. And I didn't talk to him enough. And I should have. Is there a Pakistan-Panjabi cultural thing about not talking about mental health as part of that, do you think? There is. It's not just Pakistan. I think there's a sort of Asian, if I can call it that, Asian sort of subcontinent sort of issue here.

I've talked to people, not just since then. I've campaigned a lot on sort of prevention. I will continue to do so. I've talked to a lot before all communities, but including from the Sikh community, you know, Pakistani community and others. And there is a bit of, there's actually not a bit, there's a serious taboo about not talking. Still? Still. Yeah. Yeah. There is. So when you say you wish you could have done more, what do you actually think you could have done? I think I, if I just, of course I was busy, I was the Home Secretary. I was busy. But I shouldn't have been so busy that I couldn't sort of sit down with my brother one on one, go out for lunch, something, say, what's on your mind? What are the issue? You know, what's going on and just probed it. I think if I had done that, I would have learned more.

I think my other brothers would say the same thing as well. And since then, I've learned more about suicide prevention, some great charities that do the amazing work in this space, but through them, I've learned more. I think probably the number one thing I've learned is just to talk more, get people to open up more, especially men. 75% of suicides in this country are men. And obviously, there are other risk factors, there's regional differences, suicide rates are twice as high in the North East, for example, in other parts of the UK, deprivation areas compared to affluent areas ten times higher. So there are risk factors, and that's why ever since,

by my brother's death from this. I thought I need to do more. When I became health secretary, it meant I was in a position to try and do more. And that's why I set off work on doing a national government-wide suicide prevention strategy, which eventually has been published. I asked the Treasury for more money and support, which they've done. I hope there'll be even more when the budget was coming up. And also, like so many things in government, I think you can do more if you do cross-government work. And it's not just the health department, but the education department, of DWP and stuff, trying to get more joined up policies on this. But as I say, it's an area that, obviously, I'll be leaving sometime this year in politics

in terms of parliament. But this is one thing. I'm just going to keep trying to do what I can. So, I run against you on the leadership. And of the final group of us that were at that BBC stage, you were the one that I would have been most happy to see as prime minister. But it didn't happen. Why didn't it happen?

And I think you had three leadership runs. Why did you not become prime minister? Well, ultimately, I didn't get the support, but why did that happen? And what lessons did you? I think in each one of those, there's different fact. I mean, it's not, I only tried twice myself. And one was the occasion that you mentioned where it did make some progress, but clearly not enough.

I think in that particular lecture, I think actually it was for Boris Johnson to lose right from the start. I think you probably agree with that. It was for whatever reason and the whole momentum was on his side. And for me to win or you to win, I think, something would have had to go wrong with his campaign. Otherwise, no one else was going to win. And then in a year later, when I tried after Boris Johnson himself would quit, the support wasn't there. I've tried to sort of think back and one of the reasons.

I think one major reason was just actually a really practical thing in my case. Obviously, I was health secretary. There's a massive job to be done. I came in during the lockdown and I took my job like very, very, very seriously. I thought, I mean, I had to end up the Omicron crisis. And I, the job was rightly, understandably, rightly all consuming. I didn't have any time at all, even if I wanted to to sort of campaign a bit behind the scenes.

And I think that the reality is whenever you have leadership elections, the eventual winners or the serious contenders have been doing a lot of work before the leadership. election actually starts. So what do we, what do we learn from the fact that Liz Truss became Prime Minister and you and I didn't? What is it about her personality, her style? Well, I think you could add Boris Johnson to that. I mean, anybody who knows Boris Johnson as long as, certainly as long as I have, knows that he would have been a complete disaster. I think the one, at least in Boris's, who, I think most people would agree, whatever you might think, you might think, you are a self as politics, he's a, is a great campaigner. He was

very good with people in terms of, you know, make them feel good, get support. He's a very good campaigner. I sort of understand us being beaten by Boris Johnson, but being beaten by LIS trust. It's tough. And I think that the particular, I think what had a big role to play in that was the particular circumstances of Boris Johnson's departure. So, you know, I'm not giving anything away that Boris and Rishi weren't the best of friends when Boris left government.

I think the team around him were determined that is anyone but Rishi. And they had to find someone to focus on rather than to spread that support too thinly. And they, for whatever reason, they chose Liz Trust. And I think that was probably the number one reason why she won because of that support. But the reason I guess this is important is that we desperately need good leadership. And one of the reasons I think why the Conservatives will lose in a selection is that 44 days with Liz Trust totally destroyed our major calling card, which was supposed to be economic credibility. Yeah, a big damage to our reputations. No question about that.

And as soon as that happened, it becomes very, very difficult because we're supposed to be the party of prudence and thoughtfulness. You know, the political parties have a brand. Yeah. As well as, you know, they have lots things, but they have a brand. And the brand was trashed. So what could you change structurally in the system to make it more likely that... That Rory became prime minister? No, that you became prime minister.

Oh, David Gork became prime. I don't know, but not let's trust. I mean, what structurally needs to be changed? I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure what structural changes can be made because ultimately it's... It's the MPs that make the sort of short list. It's the members that vote.

Members that join any political party by definition. Obviously, they're more interested in the average person in politics. They've got pretty defined views. And it's the members that led to Liz Truss. It's the members that experimented with Jeremy Corbyn and things. So, I mean, this is not just a unique sort of conservative party challenge. Okay, Sajid, Roy, let's have a quick break. And back in a minute.

Hi, everybody. It's Dominic Saurak here from The Rest is History. some of you may have heard me on your show, The Restis 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 Restis 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 Alastair 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 grimmest 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.

Do you agree with Rory that the Tories have lost the next election? No, not completely. I think that it's going to be incredibly difficult. And for the reasons we've discussed with this branding stuff and the COVID and war in Ukraine and inflation that's come about because of that, it's going to be very tough. But I think this is that when the election comes sometime this year, the choice in front of people is either going to be Kirstarmer

as your prime minister or Rishi. And I think that's a pretty stark choice. And I think a lot of people yet still haven't made it their mind. Why is it a stark choice? Because from a distance, most of the public would be like, they seem completely identical. It's like a slightly boring. It's a boring. And also, and the Kierstama, of course, he's not Jeremy Corbyn, right?

He's not Jeremy Corbyn, nothing like him. I happen to Kuwait Stammer is a decent guy. If I woke up the day after the election, Keir Stam will standing outside 10 Downing Street, I'm not going to, you know, I'm not going to be frightened, right? would have been if Jeremy Corbyn had. But he's also not

Tony Blair. You're on the doorstep. Rishi Sunnah is not Margaret Thatcher, isn't. I'm not saying he is, but I'm saying Keith Stama is not Tony Blair. There's no love for him

on the doorstep, and he's got his work cut out for him. There's Sajid, I've got you told that you have to go because you'd be unbelievably generous with your time, but just a couple of things. First is Roy and I were an event yesterday

with what, thousand people there, business people, and we asked them the same question and I'm a bit with you I think it's never over until it's over but to a man and woman every single one of them said it's all over anyway can I just ask one final question relating to your time as as home secretary we talked about this on the podcast last week I do find the shemima bigum thing I know it's really complicated and difficult and you know it's it's unfair

in a way to say finally yeah but I do have difficulty to do the idea that she is now literally stateless and what that means for her and what it says about our justice system as well. So just like your reflections on that. Well, I'm not going to talk about that particular case. And then there's a reason I can't talk about her or her particular case. But I will address what I think is the point that you've raised because there's still a legal case going on. But the general point where, you know, whether it was that individual or others, there are many people that left the UK to fight against the UK as and others as terrorists. And the question is then how do you sort of deal with that, particularly when they are planning to or want to come back to the UK.

And I first, you want to reflect on that, I wish there were more tools in the box. If you're home secretary, I wish there was more I could do. But in terms of the legal tools are what they are, right? They weren't designed for the situation, I think, that we faced as a country. And by the way, I did, people then asked why don't you try to change your tools. I did bring a counterterrorism act to parliament. I put created more tools like the designated areas initiative and stuff like that. But they, there's not, I couldn't use them retrospectively. So you'll find as home secretary, you only have a limited set of tools and some of them can be quite blunt.

And where you have an individual that has gone abroad, worked with terrorists. And again, I can't talk about the particular case, but where then on that and you receive advice, you're the home secretary. And you receive advice from your counterterrorism officials, from counterterrorism policing, and from MI5. And it's absolutely, you know, for all through that, absolutely clear that a particular individual, if you let them back into the UK, A, you won't be able to prosecute them. You know, you can't, even in the evidence that you have, you can't present in front of a court. Because it variety of reasons, but mainly it would compromise your sources, put them in danger.

You have evidence, but you can't use it in court. It won't hold up. And so you can't prosecute them, but they're a serious danger to British people. Serious, serious danger. And they're all in agreement. Now, you're the Home Secretary. I think, I'll be very confident saying this. I think if you think of all recent Home Secretary's conservative and labor,

I think they would all make exactly the same decision that I made, especially to finish that off, especially when you're being told, obviously because you need to make sure every decision you make, especially a tough one like this, is lawful. And you're being told by your lawyers that this is a lawful decision you're perfectly within your rights to make it, but you mentioned the stateless point. And as we've seen with the case that you've mentioned

without going to detail of it, that it's been through courts many times, and the recent judgment was on all five counts that my decision was challenged. In all five, the judges were unanimous that it was a correct procedural decision, and it was lawful. And have they seen the advice that you were going to talk?

and that's a thing the judges have seen and on the court before them as well which is a closed special immigration court they get to see the advice that I saw the public will never see that why couldn't a court why couldn't you have a there are courts that can deal with that sort of thing there are and these courts did

right so in which case why couldn't you be brought back to face justice because again I don't want to get to that particular case but it wouldn't have worked final one for me This is a show about politics and people who listen to it, a passionately interested in the mechanisms of politics and how it works. You came in from the outside, having had a big professional career elsewhere, including in other countries. What does the public not see about the reality of being a politician?

And in particular, to finish on a bit of a downer, what are the negative aspects of being a politician? What are the things that the public doesn't quite understand, which makes it perhaps a strange job? a difficult job when you look back on these 14 years. Well, I'll say two things. One is that no matter how, when you look for the outside in, no matter how obvious the problem seems, you know, we've talked about so many challenges today, health service and protecting our country and all this.

Once you're in government, and obviously you may be the minister, but obviously you've got lots of other checks and balances and people with important views and power, whether the non-public bodies, Parliament itself, of course, and others, things are a lot more sort of nuance and complex than they might look at the outside to actually get stuff done. It's just not that straightforward. And so one might say, why don't you just knock it through, get it done?

For example, you want to change something significant. You've got to consult on it. It can be really annoying. You've got to consult. It can be a year. It can be two years or whatever. You consult and you just want to get it done. But the logical in a democracy, you want to consult,

but there might be people on the other side and you've got to hear their view. So it can get annoying, but there are sort of barriers in the way to making quick progress. The second thing your question makes me think of is the personal toll that politics takes on individuals, particularly if you're, I think, if you're actually not actually, look at just this last few days. There's more support for protecting MPs. In all parties, MPs are coming under unprecedented levels of unacceptable abuse, physical abuse, people turning up at home. We've had two MPs, sadly murdered in the last few years.

And so there's a personal tone on all politicians, whether you're a minister or not. But obviously, when you're a minister and now you're making decisions, your politics is all about making decisions. And when you make a decision, there will be someone always, always on the other side that doesn't agree with you. Now, I happen to think like 95% of the cases, 99% of the cases, people so accept that, you know, they're not going to come and attack you for it, either verbally or physically. But there are also a small group of people that can still add up to tens of thousands of people that don't accept that.

And at best they are verbally abusive to you. I still do. I get abuse. You look at my social media time. I get abuse all the time. Racist abuse, all thoughts. But also, they want to really hurt you. I have death threats all the time.

I was a protected person for years and things and still have level of protection because people really want to hurt you. Because you have to make decisions. and that is, I'd say that anyone that ever thinks about getting into politics is be prepared to make decisions and don't think it's all like you just get the benefit of that. There will always be people that disagree with you and you have to be ready for that. Yeah, but that's a more hopeful message than the one in your book, Rory, which, because you're still saying you should go and do it. Oh yeah. Yeah, I don't look back and have any regrets at all, despite everything I've said on your program today, what I've just finished with in that I would do it all over again because it takes good people. and good people exist in all political, all the major political parties.

And you want them to come forward to make their case and do the best for the country. You need more of those people. Otherwise, you will get, if those people pull out, you get more of the divisive thought, and we don't want that. Well, thank you for your time. Thank you for your candor. Thank you very much. Good luck and whatever you're going to do afterwards.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for coming. Thank you. So one of my other kind of minor political heroes, Sartar Javid. David Gork, Gort, major political hero? I mean, obviously, no. Theresa May. Major politics. Nobody ranks alongside David Gork. But Sartid is somebody who I really liked and admired, and I think on a live show once you asked who I would hope would be the next Prime Minister after Rishy before he announced his stepping down. And I mentioned Sajid. So anyway, that's just to say, what did you think? What do you think for him? Well, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I felt really bad because I knew he had to get away, but I just kept having more things I wanted to talk about. It's different. It's your point that you made a lot about somebody having a different moment.

to Soparandi in these sorts of interviews if they're in government or if they're not. And I just honestly think if more politicians in government talk like they think they can't talk when they are in government. I mean, you know, okay, he's obviously angry about the Lee Anderson thing, but he could have just said that. But the fact that he then leapt on your point about Anas, about Sadiq, about Hamza Yusuf, and said these have become friends of his. I think that's what politicians should be saying about each other when it's true,

as opposed to I'm Labor, he's Tory, therefore he's bad and I'm good. I think you've put your finger on my big takeaway. I think that was Sajit communicating really well. Many people listening will sympathise, will take him seriously. I'm afraid it's much better than he often did in his early political career doing communications. He was incredibly much a party line man. He never faded against government. I was sad when we ran in leadership that having been,

you know on my side on things like being against progging parliament being against boris he then decided to endorse boris support and said he's supported no deal breaks it as well yes support no deal but so and i think it's very difficult judging a colleague on this stuff because there will be many many things in his life which will have made him feel that he he couldn't afford to rebel and that he really those jobs meant a lot to him but i just feel if he'd somehow let the real sergeant out earlier it would have been phenomenal if you'd been able to hear what he sort of really is when he's no longer trying to become a minister. I know that some people just listen to us and some people watch on YouTube and why. I think that one is definitely worth watching because his facial reactions, for example, whenever I mentioned Johnson,

as soon as I mentioned, revived him that he voted for Les Trust, there was sort of, you know, sort of leant back in his chair. Oh, God. No, but it's also, I mean, a very unusual politician to say I was completely wrong. She was a total disaster. And that's one of my worst ever mistakes. And owning that, owning the fact, because the fact is, if people hadn't voted for it, you wouldn't have become leader. No, no, so thank you for that.

And I'd be interesting to see what he does next. And in a sense, a lost parliament. I mean, that's the other thing we didn't really get into because he finished with an optimistic story. But obviously, it's not like it used to be in politics where somebody like that would spend 30, 40 years. he's obviously done his, you know, whatever, 14 years and then he's going to leave and do something else. Maybe no bad thing. I thought his defense of 14 years was not the strongest. No, but he's, but to be fair to him, he's, he needs to defend. He's a conservative MP. He's not someone like me who left the party and became an independent. And I think it's, it's,

it's good for listeners to hear him defend. And I think he's sincere. I think he genuinely does think that Labour would not have done a better job over the last 14 years in the Conservatives. And I think he, those things that he talks about, I think he feels sincerely the problem is that the big picture is all wrong. I mean, it's absolutely right. Of course, they brought in gay marriage. Of course, they did the first commitment to net zero. Of course, they did a huge amount of transitions on energy. But the big picture is, we're going to get to the end of this parliament and people in real terms will be poorer than they were at the beginning of the parliament. And I didn't want to get into a kind of he said, she said,

but I think you could match all sorts of statistics against those. And on net zero, I mean, you know, we're talking about a prime minister who's deliberately reversed his strategy. So no, I wasn't. But at least he tried. Yeah. And it's not that he's trying to campaign or particularly when people over. He's just trying to make the case.

And I think it's worth making the case. I really feel this, that the idea that all conservative ministers were a bunch of sort of evil incompetence who did nothing other than screw up the country isn't fair. I genuinely think he and many of them working hard and trying hard. It's just the end total result is that Labor is going to be the next government. No, but the other thing where the other place where this is important, and this is a lesson that Labor should learn if they do get into government and then hopefully a long time in the future get out of government, having politicians that are prepared to defend your historical record

is actually more important than people realise. And it's one of the reasons I think why we've not been in power for such a long time. Just quickly to finish on that, because one of the issues was that actually Labor after 2010 were not as activists. They should have been defending. not at all. New Labourer, defending Tony Blair. And so that when austerity happened, yes, they pushed against austerity up to a point,

but actually there was a little bit of, well, yeah, maybe we did leave a mess, maybe we didn't regulate the banks enough, as a post, and then, of course, once Corbyn came, well, you know, the Blair, Brown ear was like an aberration. So you have to defend it. So it would be very, very dangerous if the Conservatives lose the selection

to then spend the next five, ten years crapping on their record in office. I think you have to alight on those things that you think you did well, as he was trying to do. But don't allow yourself to be defined utterly negatively, because if you do, you'll pay a price, a historical price into the future.

Well, thank you very much, Havaston. It's good.