The Rest Is Politics: Leading - 80. Bridget Phillipson: Can we save Britain's schools?

Episode Date: June 16, 2024

Is there a class system in the UK? What is the State's role in redistributing wealth in society? How did Jeremy Corbyn's leadership impact Red Wall voters? Shadow Secretary of State for Education Bridget Phillipson joins Rory and Alastair to answer all these questions and more. 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. TRIP FIRST 100 DAYS TOUR: To buy tickets for our October Election Tour, just head to www.therestispolitics.com Instagram: @restispolitics Twitter: @RestIsPolitics Email: [e-mail] Podcast Editor: Nathan Copelin Video Editor: Teo Ayodeji-Ansell Social Producer: Jess Kidson Assistant Producer: Fiona Douglas Producer: Nicole Maslen Senior Producer: Dom Johnson Head of Content: 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 restispoletics.com. Welcome to The Restless Politics leading with me, Rory Stewart. And me, Alistair Campbell, with the Shadow Secretary of State for Education,

Bridget Philipson. Now, Rory has this idea that in order to become a successful politician these days, you have to have an amazing backstory. And you've got quite a good backstory. We'll get on to that. Single mum. Dad left her when she was pregnant with you. Very smart at school.

Went to Oxford, became the boss of the Labour Club. And very, very quickly into politics. MP at 26. And pretty much 14 years later, on the brink of becoming education secretary, which would be quite a big deal. So welcome. Good to be with you.

Thanks for having me. Should we start with the backstory? Sure. Just give us a bit of your childhood. So, as you say, my mum brought me up on her own. My dad disappeared off the scene when she was pregnant, so I wasn't meant to be in the world. So it was a bit of a surprise all around. I grew up in a council street in Washington and the North East.

It wasn't a great time in the Northeast in the 80s and 90s. The street was very run down. Youth unemployment was high, crime was high. But I was from a really loving family. My mom is amazing. My grandparents were not far away and were a big health. and education was really, really important to me. And I was very fortunate to come from a family where that was supported and encouraged, especially my granddad, who was forever giving me books and doing times tables with me and really valued education and went to great schools and that set me up in the future.

We end up on this podcast quite often talking to our guests about relationships with their dad. And you never met your dad. No. And I just wondered what impact you think that had on your life. I've never missed what I've not had. So I always felt really lucky to have a wonderful and support of family. And the close relationship I do have was with my granddad, who was a really big influence on my life. His family came over from Ireland.

He then moved to Scotland. He served in the Second World War. So much of my upbringing was sat with him reading, hearing about his experiences. He then went on to train as a nurse just when the NHS was being set up. So he was a really important influence. on my life. Never the feeling of somebody bringing you into the world but then just buggering off.

As an adult, I can't conceptually get my head around how you could do that. I just can't understand how you would do that. But I don't feel any sense of bitterness. I feel like I've had a wonderful family and lots of support. And it would have been easier for my mum if there'd been two incomes. You know, we had it pretty tough because, you know, she was on her own, couldn't work when I was younger.

That made life tough for us. The one thing I do recall was when in the 90s, when the Conservatives were bringing in the child support agency, saying to my mum, how is it that he contributes nothing? I mean, I'm not exaggerating when I say he gave us not a single penny and thinking there was an unfairness there. But you could spend your life regretting the things that you didn't have. And I prefer to focus on the good fortune I've had in lots of ways.

I just want that for other people to. You came into Parliament with me in 2010. What was your first impression of it? What was your sense of it? I mean, I found it weird. How did you find it? It was a really funny time because obviously we in the Labour Party had just left government, but there wasn't a government in place. The coalition negotiations

was still happening. So it was really special and it was really special to have been elected to represent the community that I'm from. So I felt a real sense of responsibility. But it wasn't a great time for the Labour Party. I didn't think would be out for 14 years, but here we are. What did you think at the time? You thought you might be back in five? I mean, that was always going to be a stretch. But we've, you know, we take nothing for granted. We've still got an election to fight and win, but we've made it very, very hard on ourselves. And the consequence of that has been that many of the people that I represent have had a really hard time of it in recent years. And it breaks my heart to see so many people depending on food banks, the struggles that people

are facing day to day, and how life is a daily grind for too many people. Sounds a little bit of say you've gone on the election campaign already. I'd love you to talk about Parliament. How much power do you feel you have structurally, not Labour, conservative, that's getting quite political, but the structure of parliament, do you think it's well-designed? Do you think the idea of backbenchers work? Are the things you'd improve if you had a magic wand? Going back to 2010, what is it that struck you about that institution, that building, the way it works? I mean, the building itself is just incredible.

To be able to work in such an historic place is just special every day. Every day you walk in, it's just an amazing place to be. I think there is a lot you can do as a backbencher. I mean, admittedly, that's a bit easier from government rather than from opposition. But, you know, the first time I spoke in Parliament, was in David Cameron's first Prime Minister's questions as Prime Minister. So that was quite a big moment to speak for the first time in PMQs, even ahead of making a maiden speech.

But Parliament has changed in that time. It's changed from the place that I arrived in in 2010. It's become better for those of us who have children, have younger children. Both of my children have been born while I've been an MP. You know, the addition of on-site nursery. The culture has changed. I think it's a more diverse place overall.

It felt quite traditional and a bit, old-fashioned. I mean, I personally have always quite liked a lot of the tradition and the ways of doing things, but it felt like, you know, in terms of the people that worked there, for example, it didn't feel really representative of the city in which it was in, and that is starting to improve. And until now, as you say, you've only known opposition, 14 years of it. So first of all, what was your political experience during the area that we did have a Labour government? And just talk us through the various stages of labour. Because you didn't serve under Corbyn, did you? No. And you wouldn't have done.

I had no interest in serving under Corbyn, no. I mean, that was other people concluded differently. But for me, I was on the Public Accounts Committee. I really enjoyed that. That was a great place to be. I learnt a lot. And I was about Bencher. So your sense of the new Labor government

and then your sense of Labor's journey from where it was in 2010, losing that first election to the place where you are now? Well, I've just going back a step. I first joined the Labour Party when I was 15. So that was in 1998. So quite an exciting time to get involved. Yeah, absolutely. So you were 15? Yeah, I was 13 in 97 when, so I was at secondary school when

Labor would actually, my daughter will be 13 later this year. So hopefully there'll be a repeat there that we can, I can give her the Labor government that I also, you know, I was able to experience from the age of 13 onwards. We've had her ups and downs in the Labor Party in recent years. It's not been, it's not been wonderful. But I always believed, and the reason I got involved in the Labor Party and in politics is that politics should be a force for good in people's lives. And I'm glad that the Labour Party is now in a better position to actually advance the interests of working people across our country in a way that it just frankly wasn't under Jeremy Corby. So what was that period like as an MP? It was pretty miserable, both in terms of where the

Labour Party was, but it was also that period where there was everything going on with Brexit. It was a very volatile period for the country. Like a lot of female MPs, received a lot of abuse, unpleasantness, threats. I don't like to dwell on that too much because I think there is a risk that you make politics sound so unattractive that women in particular don't want to come forward and being an MP is an amazing job to do. Would you say that as a woman in modern politics you do have to have a pretty thick skin before you even think about doing it? You do and politicians should be subject to serious scrutiny. We should be asked tough questions. We should be prepared to defend our opinions.

But women MPs get an awful lot of nonsense whether it's how you look, how you speak, whether you smile enough, you name it. kind of women politicians get a degree of that, not just women. You know, some of my black and minority ethnic colleagues really get a hard time of it too. I know that. But I think it's incumbent on us to kind of stick it out and change the culture. Was there ever a point during that Jeremy Corbyn's period where you thought that the Labor Party was facing a kind of existential threat? Yes, but I was always convinced that we'd turn it around and I wanted to be a part of turning it around. Yeah, I'm interested in, I mean, obviously I had a much more negative experience of Parliament than you. you have a very positive vision of it.

I mean, the sort of things I guess that worry me, and I think worry a lot of people, are the first past the post electoral system, the party whips, the way people don't really vote independently, how rapidly ministers are reshuffled. I mean, a lot of it seem to be very, very broken. And honestly, I mean, leaving someone like you on the back benches for 14 years, I mean, you're putting a very positive spinner,

but from my point of view, it's not using you compared to what a normal job would do with someone like you over 14 years. You'd be managing things, you'd be running things, said of which Parliament is set up in a very odd way. I mean, you don't feel any of that? So I was in the Whips Office for three years under Ed Miliband's leadership, and I absolutely loved being in the Whips Office. And part of that was because you were part of a team. I think in Parliament you can sometimes just feel it can be quite a lonely place and that you're getting on and doing your own thing. But being in the Wips Office as part of a team, I really loved. And then after 2015 onwards, I was on the back benches. It's not without its frustrations, of course not. But so few people.

get the chance to be a member of Parliament. And I just felt it was really special. And I also feel having had more time to think about what I believe, why I believe it and how you can make change happen, I think has put me in a better position to hopefully become a part of a Labour government. I feel far more confident in my own views and far more clear about how you make change happen and how we would do that if we form the next government, which I don't think I would have had necessarily in quite the same way if I'd had had a shorter period of time in Parliament or had just jumped straight into

kind of high office. How tribal are you? How much do you see Tories as kind of the enemy? I mean, how would you pitch yourself to me as a kind of centrist Tory voter? So I'm Labour to my core. I'm from a Labour family. The Labour Party has been a part of my life. My whole life, you know, my

man was a Labour Party member because she was a single parent, she took me along to meetings when I was a kid. There was no compulsion to get involved, but I did because I felt it was part of how you served your community, how you made change happen, both locally and nationally. I was really interested in international politics as well, and that was important to me. But for all of that, I think if you're to be effective as a politician, you have to seek to understand other people's points of view. And I don't doubt that Conservative MPs come into politics for the right reasons.

I just happen to have a fundamental disagreement about how we use government as a force for good. For me, I think the differences, it's not about individuals. My view of politics is that it's about collective endeavour and how we use the state to give people more freedom and control over their lives. And that for me is what Labor is about giving people opportunity and freedom. So if you were pitching to me as somebody who's left the Conservative Party, I'm now a classic independent floating vater, putting yourself in my shoes, how would you provide an account to the Labour Party that would make someone like me feel welcome rather than feel judged and excluded? that we're a party that's focused on the national interest. As Keira said, lots and lots of times recently, it's about putting the country first. And I think putting a bit of hope and optimism into our country's future,

I'm really proud of what we have achieved as a country, but I believe our best days still lie ahead of us. And the Labour Party is focused on the changes that we need to make in order to do that, whether it's around education, which I'm sure we'll come on to, but also just giving people more choice and control in their lives. I think the right often make a really effective argument about freedom. For me, I think it's a left-wing argument that if we want people to have real and meaningful choice about how they live their lives,

then the rule for government is to open that up. And my politics are about how you make sure that people's background doesn't determine everything that they can go on to achieve. And right now in our country, we're still a long way away from that. And that's what brought me into politics. So would you say class is still a big thing in Britain? Class is a massive thing in Britain. Absolutely. And how do you define it and how do you define the effect that it has on us?

It holds people back. It holds our country back. We don't benefit from the full range of talent of everyone in our country. We're economically poorer. But I think as individuals and collectively as a society, we are poorer. You know, so many of the people that I grew up with work really hard are amazing, brilliant people. But they had to overcome often even more than I've had to in order to get on in life. And for me, that's why education is so important because for lots of the people that I grew up with,

It didn't work out first time around, but it was the chance later on when they were a bit older to go to university as a mature student or to go into training or to get involved in voluntary activity within their community that made such a big difference. But I think with the shadow cabinet that we have at the moment, I'd say it's probably one of the most class-conscious shadow cabinets that we've had for some time. And we partly reflect that change. Does that help, aren't you? Well, it's the change that we've seen across society that so many of us, you know, the vast majority of

went to comprehensive schools. And that reflects the wider shift that we've seen in society. And I think it's a good thing that we have more people from a range of different backgrounds in politics now. There are still challenges in whole host of professions. And I think increasingly arts and media is one area where we have far too few people from a range of backgrounds and it's moving in the wrong direction for, you know, for different reasons.

What do you mean when you say this is the most class-conscious cabinet that Labor's had? We're proud of where we're from. I'm very proud of my background and where I'm from. I'm not going to pretend. I'm going to be true to myself and true to the people that I represent. And I won't pretend to be someone I'm not in order to get on. So when you say the most class-conscious labour government sort of implies that previous labour governments haven't been like that? Well, they were generally more affluent from more privileged backgrounds.

That's not to say that if you are from a better off background, you shouldn't have a rule to play. Of course you should. but the difference now is that the majority of us in the shadow cabinet had the benefits of a state education, happened to think it was brilliant, and have gone on and been able to achieve. Now, for me, however, I think the slight danger around the kind of narrative which, you know, I'm setting out is that I believe in a concept of social justice rather than social mobility. So for me, it's not just lifting a lucky few out and saying we've solved the world's problems because a couple of people like me managed to go to Oxford and have gone into politics. it's about how right across society we make sure that everyone has opportunity, dignity and a good life where they can raise a family. They don't have to spend all their time struggling and they can enjoy the good things in life. You know, where parents can take their kids on holiday, go to the park, buy an ice cream, all of the things I think people should be able to enjoy.

And Bridget, listen to you, I'm surprised you weren't more comfortable with Jeremy Corbyn. I mean, a lot of the things you're saying he would say. And he might say that maybe from 97, 2010, New Labour didn't achieve the radical things he would have liked to achieve on class and social justice. I mean, this is an alien tribe to me, but why is it that you sound to me like somebody who would agree 100% with Jeremy Corbyn, but you don't? What am I missing? No one got working class aspiration more than that new Labour government. No one. And few got it less than Jeremy. Yeah, it was people want to put an extension on their house. They want to go on holiday. They want to live in a safe community. they don't want to be blighted by anti-social behaviour.

Those are the concerns that when Labour was in government, we responded to. We wanted people to be better off. We wanted them to have more, to have choice about how they lived their lives. And right across the country, that's what people tell me they want for their kids. They just want their kids to have a better life than they've enjoyed. Whereas there's another tradition on the left, which, although it sounds similar, because it also talks about social justice and poverty in class, has a slightly different take on that?

I think sometimes it can just end up a bit disconnected. from people's lives. And if you're not careful, I think you can sound like you're lecturing people on their lives or making judgment about how they live their lives. And you have to have a degree of empathy and understanding, but also acknowledge what it is that people want. And for people who've never really had to struggle, sometimes it can be hard to put yourself in those shoes. And yeah, I think on the left, we just have to be careful that we don't judge people and that we just provide the conditions whereby people commit the choices that work for them. It was interesting to me that you actually portrayed like a counterpoint. You can

be social justice or social mobility. And I think there's something in that. I think that Tony would definitely have projected himself as social mobility. But the goal was always about delivering social justice. But you are coming at it absolutely from that sense of saying there are massive social problems in this country and the state has a big role in fixing it. And you make no bones about that. Is that kind of where your politics lies? Absolutely. And I get that social mobility is a term that has currency and people understand or think they understand what you mean when you say that. But for me, it's a wider conception of the rule for government in providing freedom and enabling choice and opportunity. And British, given that we're in a very unequal society where class is very important, surely you must feel that one way of making Britain more equal would be to tax very rich people more and redistribute more of that money to the poor. make our tax burden feel more like Sweden?

I believe in a progressive taxation system and we do need to make changes many of which we've set out in the context of the election campaign but it has to be fair across the board absolutely and there are problems with the tax system at the moment but at the same time we have to tread with care

that we make sure that Britain remains a competitive place for businesses to operate and we make sure that it's where people can strive and can achieve and can make a contribution. But I guess presumably, I mean, maybe this being unfair, but if I was talking to your younger self, you presumably would have said to me, wait a sake, Sweden that's a place which thrives and does well and has a much higher income tax and has much more redistribution. I mean, your fiscal policies are not very social democratic. I mean, it looks like on income tax and corporation tax and national insurance and VAT, you're kind of tracking the Tories. Presumably, you would like, if you want to transform the country, to make us more social democratic there.

I mean, I'm not sure a younger me would have necessarily held that view. I very much came of age in an era where I saw the practical difference that government could make in people's lives. And that's always shaped my politics. We do need to get to a fairer society. That was what I feel we achieved last time around. And tackling child poverty in particular is a driving force for me. It's where we made major progress last time around and where, you know, whatever changes we might want to make in education, the single biggest way that we can provide more opportunities for children and actually could make the job of teachers and schools easier would be to bear down on the numbers of children living in poverty at the moment. So it seems to me that there are a lot of very, very wealthy people in Britain who could afford to pay a lot more money. And you're going to need a lot of money if you're going to do all the things that you dream of doing from child poverty through to proving the health service. And I guess if you were like a Swede looking at this, you'd say the answer is obvious. You need to be putting income tax up for rich people or you need to be hitting them harder on other forms of taxes. Why have you ruled that out? Why is that not something you want to do,

given all you believe? Well, as you know, we've set out the changes we make around non-doms, for example, making sure that the global super rich you make their home here, pay their taxes here. But the reason the last Labour government was able to invest in our schools and hospitals and was able to make that difference was through growing the economy. And if we had anywhere near the levels of growth now that we had then, then the choices would be different. One tax change that you are making, and one of the things Roy and I regularly disagree, agreeably about is private education. So you're going to put VAT on school fees, which we talked about a lot and never did. I just wonder what your overall attitude is to private education, whether like

me you actually feel that it is a big part of the class system that you were talking about earlier and that has held the country back and whether this is the limit of any change that you're going to make to the private education regime. So I think parents can make decisions about where they educate their children and that can include private schools. Personally, that's That's not a choice that I would ever make. I believe in state education. My children go to state schools. My focus, as shadow education secretary and going into government,

if we win the next election, would be on driving up standards in state schools. But we've got to raise some money to do that. And that's why I think it is the right decision to end the tax benefits that private schools enjoy. But parents can choose to send their children to private school as far as I'm concerned. I know parents want the best for their kids. And if that's what they choose, then that's absolutely a legitimate thing to do. So you're slightly different from Alice. One of the reasons amongst many that Alisa loves the VAT on private schools is he really would like all private schools to disappear.

I mean, he would prefer to be in a world in which there were no private schools. Are you like him on that? I wouldn't start, if we were to start from scratch, I don't think I'd start with either selection within schools or private schools overall. But I think it's hard to get away from the need for parents to have choice in where they educate their children. And I believe that parents should have choice in that. I just happen to believe that the taxpayer shouldn't be subsidizing that. choice. And I suppose the strongest argument, I guess, against what you're doing is the children themselves. We can talk about the numbers, how much you're raised and how many children, but some

children at least will find their education disrupted. Their parents will be unable to afford the money they're currently spending and they will have to take them out of a school that maybe they love and they're doing well in and put them into a new school. Are you thinking about how to support those children as they make that transition? So I've looked very carefully at the report that the Institute for Fiscal Studies has done on this policy. And they conclude that our policy would raise 1.3 to 1.5 billion pounds net, and that takes effect of any change, as you described, although they anticipate little effect from the policy,

mainly because private schools have whacked up their fees way beyond inflation year after year, and there hasn't been a shift in the numbers. And increasingly, they price themselves out of the middle-class market. Like, when I was growing up, even in the North East, I knew people that went to private school. I think in similar circumstances now, I would struggle to find similar numbers of people, partly because the fees are so much higher than they were.

And not discreet with anything you're saying, but for those children who will have their education disrupted, and what you're saying is you don't think it will be very many, but there will be some where parents will be unable to afford. What support will you be providing for those children as they leave one school and move into another? Access to a good state school. Two points.

Firstly, schools can seek to absorb that cost. So the schools have choices in terms of how they price their fees, what level of provision they offer. There has been, frankly, in arms race, where it comes to capital expenditure around many private schools. State schools in recent years have had some really tough choices to make, and I think private schools might like to consider how they cut their cloth. Secondly, we're actually in a situation right now

where we are seeing big falling rules right across the country because of the falling birth rate. I don't accept that there will be large numbers of children leaving, but we're already in a position where schools are merging and closing because of the falling numbers of children coming through the school system. So there is ample space. But I just don't accept the premise of it. I guess it's not a question.

space, it's a question of the children. It's a question of their lives, their education. It's disruptive to have to move school in the middle of your time. So there's a lot of the conversation seems to be around finances and numbers, but not very much around the actual children. I just gently observe that 93% of children in our country go to state schools. And I think this is the right thing to do. It sucks up an enormous amount of interest for what is a relatively small part of our school system. And I think it's absolutely right that I'm asked questions about the impact of policy, have we considered all the implications which absolutely we have done. But I want to make sure the 93% of children in our state schools have the teachers they need, the support that they

need, and the mental health provision that they need. And we would use that money to deliver more teachers, more mental health support, better training and development for teachers within the state system. I think that should be the priority of an education secretary to focus on the majority of children within our state sector. On education more generally, so famous Tony Blair Soundby, asked my three priorities for government, and I tell you, education, education, education. We interviewed David Blunkett on leading recently, and he said that he felt education had gone down the political agenda since those days. And also, I think getting an assessment of your priorities, it seems to me that childcare is as important to you as anything within the policy.

I'm not talking about you as an individual here, as a policymaker. So is childcare for fundamentally in education policy? Is it a social policy? It's an economic policy. And would you agree that education has come down the political agenda and we need to get it back up? It has and it's my job to get it back up the agenda. I think that's easier to do from government than from opposition. And when I've looked at the salience of education as an issue in the run into 97 and beyond, it was actually when Labor were in government where we were doing a lot around schools that the salience of education as an issue particularly started to increase. And there were kind of key moments where policy was announced, where changes happened, that really cut the

through with the public. And David Blanca is just an amazing man and it's been a real pleasure to spend so much time speaking to him about his experiences. I think there's an awful lot that I've taken from his approach from opposition and then into government and an awful lot that I've learned from him. But I do regard childcare and earlier's education as a central part of our education system. And it was clear to me from taking on this role back in November 2021 that it was the big unaddressed area of education policy in our country. If we can get it right when children are younger, if we can set them up to succeed, then so much more is unlocked. And what I hear right across the country from schools is that by the time children arrive in reception, they've already

started to slip behind. We see a widening attainment gap. The pandemic has accelerated that, admittedly. And the children that are starting to arrive at school now are of that COVID generation who experience the most serious impacts of isolation from family and friends. But for me, if we could really transform early years education and childcare, that would make the single biggest difference to children's life chances and the single biggest difference across our school system. And it wouldn't be simpler just to reinstate your start? Is that something you could consider? We do need to find a way of bringing together family services in terms of the wider support that families need, absolutely. But you'll recall that it was a policy that we announced from

government in 1998, not a policy that we've committed to ahead of an election. But I am really struck by the emerging evidence, including reports that have just been published this year from the IFS, for example, that show not only did Shoe Start cut hospital admissions and save money for the NHS, it also led to an improvement in terms of outcomes and grades for young people who were able to benefit from a Shoehastart Centre. One caveat, I would say, is that it does demonstrate, however, that the earlier part of the Shoe Start rollout was more effective than later stages. So whilst Shoe Start overall was an amazing and effective policy, think just to simply seek to recreate something that ended in 2010 in 2024 might not be the

right approach either. What's this earlier part? Which were the bits which worked better? So it changed in nature and scope over time. It had different purposes at different points. The initial phase, and this is the phase I remember well because I was in Sunderland at that point and was latterly involved in some of the work that the Shoe Start centres were doing. What made it really effective was that it engaged families and communities more actively in the delivery of services and in the shape and design of services. So just to give one very small example, but I think is instructive. Lots of dads wanted Saturday morning activities, for example. The professionals involved in delivering those services probably would have never thought, let's open up on a Saturday

morning. But the dads were saying, look, we're working during the week. We want to be able to access services on a Saturday. The other thing that families really wanted was a safe indoor play space. They wanted some kind of soft play because they often didn't have gardens, didn't have safe outdoor spaces. By listening to parents and families, responding to what they're telling us, and using that as the basis for shaping services so that you can engage people. If people are coming to use that soft play, then you can have a conversation about nutrition, about sleeping, about health visitors can do so in a way that isn't necessarily just the heavy hand of the state being intrusive in people's lives and it can feel sometimes intrusive to families.

And then the data suggests that some of the later stuff was less effective. What was the difference with the latest stuff and what's your theory on why it was maybe less effective? I'm not sure it engaged families and communities quite as effectively. And what was it? And why was it less engaging? The programme evolved over time and there did become more of focus on supporting people into work too, which I absolutely think is the right thing to do. And the part about show start I think gets that's often overlooked is the impact it had in terms of people's ability to get involved in volunteering, get back into training and education.

but it became a bigger programme with less of a focus on involving families. And the lesson I would take from... Became more sort of bureaucratic and NGO led with less family volunteer involvement over time? I think there was a bit less of the tailoring to local circumstance than had been the case in the earlier phases. So for me, the lesson from that is you have to strike the balance between the kind of core services you would want any show start centre to provide. Plus, where's the ability for communities to shape what goes on within the centre? So here's a really good example. This is a great policy from New Labour, Shawstart, which has now been completely validated by all this research and data to have been incredibly effective.

You've looked at it, you've analysed, you've even found which bit of it was the best bit and which bit worked less well. Why is it not in the manifesto? Because sadly, the economy is in a total mess and it will take us time to rebuild. And there'll be lots that's in the manifesto around education. But in this area, I only want to make commitments that I am absolutely confident that we can deliver on and deliver on quickly. and a program like Shua Start. How much did it cost? It was substantial.

It was a substantial investment. Like sort of billions, tens of minutes? Yeah, absolutely. Which was shown to be not just cost effective, but to save the NHS money, for example, and to lead to better outcomes. So you would have thought that you could sort of borrow against those savings, no? I would love to be able to commit to more.

Of course, I would. And there is so much. Rachel Reeves sitting on that shoulder as we speak. Well, I was Rachel's shadow chief secretary as well, so it was my job to go around telling people not that they weren't allowed to spend anything. So I've got to practice what I preach. Okay, let's take a quick break. Hi, everybody, it's Dominic Samarach 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 1970. disappeared 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 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. end of this episode. And if you want to hear more, just search for The Rest is History,

wherever you get your podcasts. What's your sense been of this campaign? I mean, it's a very, very, very, very strange campaign this to me. I've been involved in a lot of election campaigns. It feels like we're halfway through, and one team is going around basically looking like they've given up. And the other team is going around thinking, well, we'd take the ball into the corner flag anyway. Is that a fair assessment? I mean, it's, you know, this will be my fifth general election as a candidate the first time I've been in the shadow cabinet for a general election. So it's different on lots of levels for me personally. What I really love about it is just the chance to get out around the country.

It sounds like you're avoiding the question. No, no. You're going to give us a lovely portrait of how much you enjoy the campaign. But he asked you about the two teams and what they're up to. Because the greatest respect, I'm actually not that interested in that, which is why I'm just taking it to getting out around the country. because that's the bit I love. You know, we've been wanting this election for so long. Now we've got it.

I'm just enjoying the opportunity to actually persuade people to vote Labour. Bridget, elections aren't about the participants. They're about the public. Yeah. And you're talking to the different public, if you're not doing the public, I've been meeting a lot of who are kind of, oh, God, can't just get over with. That sort of sense of, you know, it just feels a very,

very strange atmosphere for an election to me. Look, it is, there's some different dynamics going on. you get a lot of people saying everything is so broken, how on earth are any of you going to fix that? That is a really big issue. And I think there is a fundamental question of demonstrating that politics can be a force for good and governments can actually change things when it just feels at the moment nothing works. And if you take just the personality, so there, Rishi Suna did his manifesto

and it was full of this and full of this and promise and tax cut and blah, blah, blah, and that's his approach. Is it Keir's personality in a way that is saying, you've already said, I'm only going to promise things that I know I can deliver? Is it a personality thing here that is sort of slightly worried about over-promising? No, I think it goes to that point about trust in politics. And I think people's trust in politics and politicians to actually get things done and make a difference isn't great at the moment. And I spend a lot of time just having to be quite upfront about both the scale of the challenge and how we will fix it and the time it will take if we form that next government.

And that's why I think here is right to talk about a decade of national renewal because the problems that have built up over the last. last 14 years will not be solved overnight. And I wish that I could kind of wave a magic wand and sort at all. But I do think we have to level with the public because I think were we to make kind of grandiose promises. I don't think, one, I don't think people would buy it and two, I think it would be fundamentally corrosive to trust in politics. I wonder whether you, this is going to sound something that I don't, I don't mean to say, but it slightly sounds as though your, your analysis is basically that the problem is a bunch of ignorant, uncaring Tories were in for the last 14 years and that's why we're all screwed. And when good people who care about social justice come in,

it's going to be great. My sense is there's a loss of things apart from the horrors of the Tory party which make governing Britain very difficult. And I had a lot of colleagues, and I was in cabinet myself, who I felt were incredibly hardworking, trying very hard and a loss of things don't work. And it wasn't simply that we were hopeless or cruel or uncaring. And I wanted to what extent you're able to step back and see some of the bigger structural problems that surround Britain, our economy, our demography, which are going to make it pretty tough for anybody who comes in and maybe have a little bit more sympathy for what's happened over the last 14 years. So, firstly, I think the problems have become particularly acute in the last three to five

years because we've had a party, I don't think, that's been actually focused on governing or making good decisions. That's not to say what I would regard what came before as being particularly wonderful, but it's been most acute in recent years. And I think it's left our country weakened. It's, you know, led to, frankly, you know, you travel internationally. You know, I've been able to travel a bit in terms of looking at other countries' education systems. People just say, what on earth are you lot doing and what on earth's been going on in Britain? And I'm proud of our country, but I want to be able to, you know, be proud of still. And it hasn't felt that way in recent years. But I think you do have to look back. If you've been in government for 14 years,

I would just think that's quite a long time to make your mark to set the country in the direction that you would wish. And if you look back after such a period of time and think, is the country in better shape than which we found it? I agree with you 100%. I agree. It's pathetic. Productivity hasn't shifted since 2008. The economy's contracted since 2019. We're performing very, very badly internationally. But if you were looking at it from the United States or Germany, you would probably say the big problems here are not that it would. was a bunch of Tories rather than labor, you would say the big problems are. Brexit. Demography, we're getting very old. We haven't sorted out our immigration policy.

The patterns of global trade are turning against us. We've never worked out how to do productivity and skills in this country. We don't know how to build infrastructure, et cetera, et cetera. So the reason why people are not hugely optimistic is because they can see that there are big kind of historical, structural issues here, which I agree with the other. Liz Trust and Boris Johnson just make the whole thing worse. But I think unless you're kind of facing those, it's going to be tough to be honest about what's likely to happen over the next 10 years. Look, I don't doubt for one second that there are big global challenges and that there are structural challenges that we face as a country.

I don't question that for one second. But I think that the risk with that argument is that you can get to a place where you almost deny kind of agency to your own government in shaping some of that. And I do think there is more that we could do to shape some of that, whether that's demography as you were talking about there or skills policy. How are you going to shape demography? Well, I think there is a, for example, I think there is a really big, and this is happening kind of across the Western world, it's happening here too, about the falling birth rate in our country. There are lots of reasons for that. I'm not suggesting it's straightforward. It's, I think it's a complex issue. Other countries, as I say, grappling with this. But because housing costs are so high, because the cost of childcare is so high, because work isn't as secure as it should be, I believe, because the safety net that a lot of people have depended upon around social security isn't there in the way that it was. I believe, that people are making decisions about family size driven by economic circumstance to a much greater degree than was the case previously. And that does have consequences in the long term for our country. Now, that's not for me about politicians saying to people you should have

a family of whatever size. I personally believe that family should be a broad concept in which we value a range of different kind of structures. I come from what people would have in the past called a non-traditional family. But for me, it's about the love that families give, not the size or shape. But at the same time, I speak to too many people across the country who tell me they would have love to have another child where they just couldn't afford it. And I think that's where government can come in in terms of responding to what is a trend. So might you also include a kind of a very straightforward, de Gaul type, breed for our future message? No, I think it's about the wider conditions that allow people to make choices. I think it's largely economic imperative that's

driving some of that decision making at the moment. And, you know, we need to take action, for example, on insecure housing, on the fact that lots of people can't afford to buy a home, other homes aren't there and the cost of childcare. All of these are drivers, I think, that are pushing people to make decisions about either deferring, having a family or limiting family size. And that's to the point about choice and the rule for government in giving people a greater degree of control over how they live their lives. It's very interesting. I mean, I'm not sure about the data because there are a lot of much more equal wealthy societies that aren't having kids. So I'm not sure that that's true. But maybe, maybe. I think it's complex. I think there are different drivers. And part of it is that

which is a good thing. People start work later in their lives and would have been the case a hundred years ago. People do live longer as well alongside that, which is wonderful, but brings with it challenges that we need to respond to as well. Two of the other kind of big factors, people look at, like COVID, Ukraine. Where are you on national security? Because it looks kind of scary to me. Alice is more cheered up by the European election results. But I look at Germany. I look at France. I look at Italy.

I look at Putin's up to it. There's a kind of 1930s feel that. Do you feel that there is a real looming crisis and emergency facing the world and that any government coming in is going to have to really step up in terms of addressing the global crisis? I think the trends that we see are allowed. and not least where it comes to Russia, Ukraine, and the impact that's had here. And the fact that we have been so exposed, I mean, that's had wider kind of domestic consequences arising out of international considerations.

But it's also why it's essential that we have a more stable government here in the UK. I think we can and should be a bigger player in some of this, even outside of the European Union. I think there is a rule for Britain in that. Well, you know, we're a NATO member. we have influence around the world. Our kind of soft power, as you will know, where it comes to the numbers of people

that will come and study here, for example, and then return home. I think we have a reach around the world that we need to understand, but that we need to be careful we don't limit. We're really talking about European Union, though. You take Macron, who is a formidable politician in many, many ways,

and yet has now has seen this sort of pretty remarkable rise of the far right there. Schultz in Germany who's come in, the country felt good about it, and very, very quickly, because they haven't really delivered, far right has been on the rise there as well. Do you feel that sense of responsibility that if a left-of-centre social democratic government comes in here and doesn't address a lot of these big systemic challenges that we face, then that threat exists here as well? I think there is a volatility and there's certainly a volatility in terms of people's voting behaviour. if Labour manages to win this general election, that will be a massive turnaround from 2019

that was in and of itself a big shift. So I think that shows that what can swing can swing against you. And I think people are less fixed in terms of how they will vote and party allegiance than would have been the case in the past. So if we form that next government, demonstrating very quickly that we have earned people's trust and are delivering will be absolutely crucial. You know the North East very well and you must have been horrified by what Boris Johnson did with this red wall stuff.

Can you explain that? How was he able to do that in 2019? Why did so many people that you know and in a constituency surrounding you vote Tory when those were traditional Labour seats? A combination of factors. I mean, Boris Johnson was an unusual politician in many ways and had a charismatic appeal. I think it would be undeniable to lose sight of that. Jeremy Corbyn was a big factor, really big factor. Brexit came into it but far less so than Jeremy. Corby Corby. I mean, some of it was a vote for Boris Johnson. Some of it was a vote against where the Labour Party had got to. And there was an awful lot of despair amongst traditional labour voters who felt that we'd turned our backs on them and it wasn't the Labour Party that they'd voted for in the past. But they were the people who, after Partygate in particular, who felt the most betrayed and most let down because they'd, for the first time in their lives, had put

their trust in the Conservative Party and just felt it was a slap in the face. And that was the moment. I think it happened more quickly than people noticed. And just going back to, you used this phrase before that they felt betrayed and let down. What is it that they felt betrayed? What sort of things were you hearing on doorsteps that made people in 2019 feel betrayed? They felt that the Labour Party was out of step with their priorities. It wasn't the party that had been the party their family had voted for traditionally. Sort of examples of that? Examples would be particularly around national security. They felt that we weren't, that they were concerned as to whether we would keep the country safe.

But was that already starting under us when Tony and Gordon were in charge? Was that already starting? I mean, there was some of it there, I would say, in 2015, but it massively accelerated. 2017 was a funny election in lots of different ways. It came up then, but not to the same degree. By 2019, people had made their minds up about where the Labour Party was and they didn't much like it. And it was, for a lot of people, that was a really upsetting experience. You know, I would speak to people on doors who would be really really.

really upset, genuinely upset about the fact they didn't feel they could support a party that they had supported all of their lives. Some of those people did vote conservative. Some people just stayed at home. So in your patch, how many of those have come back? Well, we'll find out soon enough, I guess, but I think there is a recognition that Kea has turned the Labour Party around and we're back to where we need to be in line with their priorities. But again, for people that have moved away from us and have then come back, we can't take that for granted. And we have to demonstrate that we're going to hold to

what we have promised. Coming towards Veriam, I've got hopefully a fun last question, but penultimate question before I go fun. What do you make about what was good and what was bad about what Michael Gove and is it Nick Gibb did with their education reforms? So what I would say about Michael Gove in particular was that he brought a real sense of drive and determination. He was clear about what he wanted to do right from the outset. He got on with it and he made it happen. And there is a lesson in that, I believe. They also took the evidence of what was working and developed it further. So the Conservatives will talk a lot about the roll out of phonics across schools. Absolutely. And I've had this conversation with Nick Gibb as well and gently pointed out that it was under Labor that we first

started that, they then continued it. I think that does show the benefit of continuity of policymaking in areas such as education. Another example I would give would be it was the Conservatives who brought in a national curriculum. That's, I think, was a fine development. I believe we need to reform the curriculum that we've got at the moment. But there are areas, I think, where continuity across education policy making is important. There are changes that I would want to make, however, if I were Education Secretary. But that sense of focus and drive, I think Michael brought education far more central to the work of the Conservative Government than would have been the case otherwise, and that's certainly a lesson I take away.

Give me a couple of changes you'd like to see in the curriculum. So we'll have an expert-led review of curriculum assessment overall. I think there is a real issue around creativity in our state schools and the lack of access that state school students have to music, sport, art and drama. I don't think that should be the preserve of just those whose parents can afford to pay for extras on a weekend or after school, and I want to make that a really important part of the curriculum in the future. Also, it feels for all we've had a focus on reading and on phonics,

and I support that. We've kind of forgotten about early maths in particular, so a real focus on early maths, on numeracy, and are making sure that our children have got a solid foundation there. We're slipping behind as a country on that. My final question, can you think of an intriguing question, that you've ever had in a political interview, which has allowed you to show a different side of yourself or go in a direction that interested you as opposed to being kind of hit in the normal way?

No is the answer. And I will try to address this. The question's actually that are toughest. I do a lot of school visits. Actually, the questions that kids will ask you are usually far more to the point. And there's a directness and a simplicity because they're not worrying about how does this sound or can I really ask that. And they're the hardest questions to answer. Just why is there poverty in the world?

Or, you know, why is it that you all shout at each other in Parliament, whatever it might be? And actually, you know, spending a lot of time around children and young people, as I do, genuinely, that is often a lot tougher than some of the more kind of traditional political questions that you would get. Well, you can kind of weave your way through it a bit if you want to. I was hoping you were going to provide me with a nice fun question for you, but I'm just going to have to finish with why is the poverty in the world. I think we go back to our kind of class-based discussion where we began, the structural inequality that people experience is what I would say. Well, thank you and enjoy the rest of the campaign. Thank you.

Thank you. So Rory, you asked directly to the Shadow Secretary of State for Education how to get a Tory like you over into the Labour camp. So how far into the Labour camp does you tempt you? Not very far, sadly. I mean, I was hoping that she would reach out in a way that Angela Rayner tried to and say, okay, I'm going to try to put myself in your shoes, I'm going to try to show some respect. Maybe just something like, listen, you could easily deal with me by saying, oh, well, you know, the Tory party's two things.

This is this kind of horrible, kind of far-right populist fellow brotherment thing. But then there's a good one-nation tradition and there were Tory MPs that I really liked and respected like you, Rory or Ken Clark. And, you know, we'd welcome you into the party. and, you know, and actually some of Kirstama's rhetoric, you know, as you've pointed out, is kind of appealing to people like me. But she doesn't want to go there or she doesn't, I mean, I don't know. I mean, I think she is very embedded in a worldview where somebody with my background, my privilege, my accent is not a friend. And she's not going to put much thought into working out how to persuade me to vote for her. Do you think so?

Well, I don't know. Is that not how she came across to you? I don't know. it's interesting. I think she's got a real warmth to her, but I think that there is, and maybe it's partly because we are in the middle of a campaign.

And, I mean, she didn't even, even those of us who watch this rather than listen to it, I think when I was putting the, the sense of the Tories have vacated the field, but even with the goal wide open, Labour are taking it to the corner flag, I sort of sensed cheek out of from the suburb of saying.

And likewise, when you were talking about a wealth tax, I think she'd love to be able to say, God, I wish we could do that. So I think there is something about a bit sort of restrained because of the campaign, because of collective responsibility and all of that. And I think she was. I mean, I felt that she's absolutely got no qualms about saying that as far as she's concerned, this policy on private school fees, she wasn't really listening.

She wasn't really, she's going to worry about the 93%, not the few that may have to leave to go into state schools. But I was trying to. And you see, again, I mean, it's absolutely nice. to do with me, but in communication terms, again, you could say, of course, I care about every child in the country. And, you know, we will, of course, be working with these schools to make sure that children who come in are properly cooperated, supported. You didn't know, how? What systems have you got in place? Yeah, but you don't need to say to my saying, how about the children, frankly, I care about

the 93% because that slightly sounds like you're saying. I care less. Well, I do think, though, if I had wrote a lot. my new European column about this last week. I think there is something a bit weird about the fact that we've had so many state schools have actually closed, had to close, and nobody bats an eyelid, so much sort of stuff going

wrong in schools and the media don't really care about it. And I think that's probably where she is. I think she probably doesn't care that much, whether some may have to leave a private school to go to a state school. Because I think she's coming from a place that says there's nothing wrong with state schools provided that the government, you know, supports and problem. But so, any child's

shifting education, you need a bit of support. I mean, you changed schools. I did, and I hated it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I did. And I think the other thing I was trying to, as we were talking, I was trying to have in my head, as I always do during campaigns, if I wasn't you and I wasn't me, but I was somebody who is sort of trying to decide

what to do in this election, trying to decide whether Labor would be a good government, I think she'd make a good impression on people who are just dipping in and out of this campaign. I think people would think she's nice, she's human, she's empathetic. I think what you were looking for, and I would like a bit more as well, was just a cent, and again, I think there's maybe the fact we're in a campaign mode. I felt, for example, with Wes streeting, I felt with Alex Chalk actually when we were talking to Alex Chalk the other day, that there was a part of the mind that was going beyond where they are in the campaign. Yeah, the couple of things. I mean, it's so difficult to know how much is personality, how much is

training how much is campaign. The things that were interesting to me is 99% of MPs, if you say, listen to House Cons, a bit crap and screwed up, will say, yeah, of course it is. A lot of it was infuriating. I found the whole thing absolutely mad. I was able to have very little impact. And she really didn't want to go there. She was just like, it's such a privilege. I got to ask, you know, PMQ. Ditto, when you were like, you know, this campaign's a bit weird. She was like, I love getting out on the thing. So here are my possible explanation. Number one, she's a very, very positive, optimistic human being. Yeah.

Who basically either doesn't see or doesn't want to dwell on any of the downsides or difficulties of life. And maybe that was implicit in her talking about her father. I just don't want to think about, you know, my father at all, and I'm fine. It's all great. Secondly, she is a professional politician beyond professional politician. She says she went to her first labor meetings at the age of two. She joined the party at 15. She was running the labor club at university.

She became an MP. I entered Parliament with me. I didn't realize that she was sort of 25? 26 when she came to Parliament with us. So maybe there's that. You know, you are the professional politician and this is the new style of political communication, which is all respect to. I'm going to win an election. We're going to do our business. I'm not interested in being charming. I'm not interested in being funny. I'm not interested in taking any risk to go off on some anecdote about the weirdness of Parliament or my life for the action campaign. I'm just going to land the blows. And I did feel that a bit with Rachel Reeves. And of course, that's, of course, why I'm warm to Angela Rainer because she's prepared to take more hectic directions.

Yeah. I was very interested that she talked about. She made a point of reminding me that Shawstart was not, as it were, a pledge. That it was, it followed. And I wonder, it made me think, oh, I wonder if she's got a few things up her sleeve. Could they not, maybe this doesn't make any sense. Would they get in trouble for this? But I would have thought there could be some things that you could say

when the fiscal situation allows, we will look very seriously at reintroducing some bits of to Shawstart. So you could signal to people. Well, they've done that on defence, haven't they? They've done it on defence spending. I think something like Shawstart, you probably have to do it or you don't. But if their basic argument is, we can't do it because we're bust, yeah, be nice to see them say, if we were less bust, in this particular economic conditions. What do they would like to do. Well, she did is say that she, and she's right about this, you can't just reinvent what you did then and bring it in. But I think the whole issue of trying to address child poverty. I'd be interesting to know what teachers,

And we have a lot of teachers and head teachers who listen to this podcast. I'd love to know what they thought. Because it isn't education, education, education in the way that David Blanket, Tony Blair. It is very much childcare, child poverty. They're the fundamentals. And I think it would have been a different interview with David Blanket or indeed Michael Gove. I think if Gove had been doing that interview, thinking back the interviews he gave in the run-up to 2010, you would have found 60, 70% of it was him talking about all these different changes he wanted to make the curriculum

and how he wanted to reorganize schools and teachers. That, again, isn't quite how it's being played. It's being played in terms of social justice. But it's not quite the kind of nerdy. Let me get my hands on a school. This is a headteacher I talk to. This is where we want to go. Good.

Well, I'll see you again soon. Thank you, Alastair. And that was really worthwhile. Thank you.