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  • We've all had enough of this.

  • Getting the Brexit election done.

  • Argh!

  • Too much?

  • No?

  • I'm losing my voice.

  • Right, so Robert, you've got a festive frog in your throat.

  • So I'm going to let you offload the talking.

  • And you can have light felt pen duties today

  • because you're unwell.

  • But anyway, here we are, results day.

  • And a new blue dawn has broken, has it not?

  • It has.

  • Tories have got a majority of 80.

  • It's a bigger win than I think either of us expected.

  • I think, as we showed at the end of the last talk,

  • we both sort of thought the Tories were going to make it.

  • But I certainly didn't think you were

  • going to be anything like as big as that.

  • No.

  • So how did we get here?

  • Have we got any prediction?

  • We have.

  • In fact, I happen to know that people refer

  • to this backdrop as the shed.

  • So I'm going to root around in the shed, where

  • I have some of our old artwork.

  • People have also criticised us for using paper,

  • saying we should be recycling.

  • So I hope they notice that we are recycling...

  • Reusing.

  • ...our drawings.

  • So essentially, everything the Tories tried to do worked.

  • And everything the other sides tried to do to stop them

  • failed.

  • It's really quite as simple as that.

  • So the Tories managed to break through this so-called red wall

  • of Labour heartland seats, not just right across the north

  • of England but into Wales, where large chunks of Wales are now

  • Tory.

  • It's true that the Labour party hung on in a lot of London,

  • which stays red, and in other urban seats.

  • But the Tories also held on in the south of England

  • against the Lib Dems.

  • The Tories' biggest losses were in Scotland, where they

  • lost seven of their 13 seats.

  • Other than that, I think they lost about four seats

  • in the rest of the country.

  • The Liberals took Richmond Park in London.

  • But a lot of their big targets they didn't make.

  • And they didn't unseat.

  • No seats off them.

  • No.

  • And the Lib Dems didn't manage their scalp

  • of the night, which was supposed to be the foreign secretary

  • Dominic Raab in Esher.

  • But instead of Dominic Raab being the Portillo moment,

  • the Portillo moment was Jo Swinson, the Lib Dem

  • leader in Dunbartonshire, decapitated by the SNP.

  • Very sad end.

  • And Nicola Sturgeon barely able to contain her joy.

  • Did you see the video there?

  • It's been a tough fight between the Lib Dems

  • and the SNP in that seat for the last three elections.

  • It's been an awful election for the Liberal Democrats

  • and for poor old Jo Swinson in particular.

  • Right.

  • Let's draw a results map then.

  • Look, I'm going to do one of my absolutely

  • wonderful geographical messes.

  • Maybe a bit simpler than last time.

  • Here we go.

  • And here's Northern Ireland.

  • That's the Isle of Wight.

  • How's that?

  • Is that Okay?

  • That looks like something I put on my dresser, I think.

  • Okay, Okay, so the SNP is just so

  • dominant north of the border, no.

  • And actually, that's really interesting,

  • because even though the Tories did way better than

  • we were all expecting in England and Wales.

  • Actually, we'd begun to expect that the Tories would hold

  • onto some seats in Scotland.

  • But the SNP really did very well indeed.

  • They basically chased the Labour party out of Scotland.

  • They played the grievances of Scottish voters

  • at being forced into a Brexit they didn't vote for.

  • And it has paid off for them in, and it has paid off for them

  • in this election.

  • On top of which, Nicola Sturgeon was easily

  • the most effective political performer

  • on television in the debates.

  • This has obviously raised-...

  • what's going on down there?

  • I don't know.

  • I'm just adding the south-west.

  • Carry on, carry on.

  • This has obviously raised questions

  • about a second Scottish independence

  • referendum and a new push.

  • And the SNP certainly are very emboldened.

  • And this will be something that's weighing heavily

  • on Boris Johnson's mind.

  • But you think that this unexpected majority of 80

  • actually means the story, as it continues from this point,

  • could be much more interesting on Brexit and on the union,

  • right?

  • Because if Boris Johnson had had a much slimmer majority

  • we may have got out of the parliamentary deadlock

  • of the hung parliament.

  • But he, the prime minister, would still have not properly

  • been in control and possibly would

  • have been still under the influence of the European

  • Research Group, the arch-Brexiteers

  • in his own party.

  • The Brexit deadline coming up.

  • He had said he would get the whole trade deal negotiated

  • by the end of 2020.

  • But actually now that he's so powerful

  • and has had such a convincing win,

  • he's got way more room to do more interesting things

  • and to be more flexible, right?

  • And not only has he got a big majority,

  • but the opposition is shattered.

  • The Labour party is down to just over 200 seats.

  • It's going to be fighting itself for the next six months.

  • The Liberal Democrats hammered.

  • Only the SNP are cohesive.

  • So not only has he got a big majority,

  • but he's got it at the time when the opposition is very weak.

  • Brexit is now going to happen.

  • Correct.

  • By the end of January, the UK will

  • have left the European Union.

  • So that uncertainty is gone.

  • So that's happening, he has more room for manoeuvre and also

  • just more authority.

  • He's just won a big election.

  • So that's the biggest Conservative victory

  • since Margaret Thatcher in 1987.

  • So he's got all that authority.

  • We don't know the extent to which he

  • wants to decouple from the ERG.

  • We know some of his advisers have contempt for them.

  • But we're not sure.

  • But I think the point that you're making and which I agree

  • with, is that...

  • what?

  • No, it's fine.

  • Do agree with the point you think

  • I'm making, because it's not the one I'm making.

  • You actually said it.

  • And I was going agree with you.

  • This is most unfair.

  • Because of the threat of Scotland,

  • because of the new seats that he has won,

  • it might change his approach to the Brexit discussions.

  • He's now got to conduct the next stage of talks,

  • the trade talks with a mind to not doing anything that pushes

  • Scotland further away and keeping happy

  • these new seats that they have won,

  • the so-called red wall, the manufacturing

  • heartlands, as were at least, in the north and in the Midlands.

  • All these seats...

  • There are still Labour seats there.

  • Yes, of course there are.

  • But I mean, it is quite striking how much blue

  • there is there now.

  • Those seats have different priorities

  • to the wealthy south.

  • Quite.

  • And they've got MPs who are going

  • to have to be mindful of those things

  • if they want to keep their seats this next election,

  • because as Boris Johnson said, they've been lent these votes.

  • They haven't got them in the bag yet for keeps.

  • So it's manufacturing areas, areas where the export

  • industries are important.

  • So for that, you need close trading relationships.

  • So that means you're going to have

  • to go for a softer Brexit, maybe a very soft Brexit.

  • We might be getting our hopes up.

  • I think if he sticks to his deadline,

  • it's only him forcing this deadline of 2020 on himself,

  • the only type of trade you can get

  • is a very thin one, basically tariffs and quotas.

  • The big sticking point is the issue of regulatory alignment.

  • That's the thing that makes frictionless trade possible.

  • That's going to be what a lot of these places want to see.

  • Having talked up the benefits of freedom

  • from regulatory alignment, he's going

  • to have to think about if he really wants that.

  • He's going to have to think about how

  • he prioritises a European trade deal ahead of a US trade deal.

  • US trade deal is the big political prize of Brexit.

  • Economically, it's worth nothing like as much.

  • It's not even comparable to a European deal.

  • Let's talk a bit about Northern Ireland, because the DUP,

  • the Democratic Unionists, who had been in coalition

  • with Theresa May, had then been key allies

  • until Boris Johnson put together his oven-ready exit deal.

  • But actually, in the election, the DUP

  • has done really badly in Northern Ireland.

  • So they're sort of disempowered as the voice

  • of Northern Ireland.

  • It's gone from sort of orange to green.

  • But of course, in Boris Johnson's current withdrawal

  • agreement there is the erection of a border in the Irish Sea.

  • What happens with that?

  • That's still going to cause some problems, isn't it?

  • My deeply cynical view of this is that Boris Johnson really

  • just doesn't care very much about Northern Ireland.

  • You know, he worked... it was hard when he was trying

  • to become leader.

  • And although he would not seek the reunification of Ireland,

  • I don't think he would think of it in the way he thinks

  • about the loss of Scotland.

  • Oh, my goodness.

  • And the unionist MPs, as you were

  • saying, for the first time, they're

  • in a minority of elected MPs from the province.

  • That's an extraordinary thing.

  • It has to be possible that a border poll is

  • coming in the next decade.

  • A border poll being a referendum on which

  • the whole island of Ireland votes

  • as to whether to become the republic or not the UK.

  • It's in play.

  • And these border checks, I don't think they necessarily

  • force Northern Ireland into the hands of the Republic,

  • because it's actually got quite a preferential deal

  • in this Brexit deal.

  • But it does mean that Northern Ireland has

  • to look towards the European Union

  • as much as it looks towards the UK for its economic policy

  • and future.

  • So it's kind of basically two huge existential

  • topics continuing to be in play, the future of the UK

  • as a union, and also Brexit and the relationship

  • with our closest allies and former fellow member states.

  • But of course, the reason that the Tory party

  • has won this stonking majority is

  • by saying, we'll just get Brexit out of the way,

  • because there's a whole other agenda.

  • Let's just talk a bit about what happened to Labour.

  • This is the worst set of results for Labour in terms of seats

  • in the Commons since 1935.

  • It's catastrophic.

  • Think that actually, after a few years

  • in which unanswerable laws of politics

  • seem to have been suspended.

  • I think actually what happened here is they returned.

  • The fact is, the Labour party presented the country with

  • a manifesto that was so far to the left of what

  • the country's ever shown itself ready to accept that they

  • rejected it.

  • And they put at their head a leader

  • who the country not only thought was too left wing,

  • but actually thought was weak.

  • They thought, you've got this extraordinary agenda.

  • And there's no way you can deliver it anyway.

  • You're not good enough.

  • So it's interesting that thing about weakness, because I think

  • you said you'd been speaking to some pollsters who had said

  • the catastrophic thing about Jeremy Corbyn's prevaricating

  • on Brexitv- was he Leave, was he Remain?

  • This idea he'd remain neutral in a referendum.

  • And also possibly his kind of slightly shrugging attitude

  • to whether the SNP got their precious second referendum

  • on Scottish independence.

  • It was as much whether that made him look like a weak leader

  • as it was about the issues themselves.

  • That's right.

  • I mean, I think...

  • It's really interesting that, because you'd think people

  • would care so much, for example, about keeping

  • the country together.

  • You would.

  • But I think they also care more immediately

  • about the issues around themselves and their own lives.

  • And constitutional issues always seem more existential

  • until they're right upon you.

  • A bit abstract.

  • More abstract - that too, that too.

  • Well, I should have thought abstraction.

  • But I think it's going to be very interesting how the Labour

  • party attempts to process this, because it's very clear already

  • that all of the Corbynites are working.

  • They had a script they circulated on election night,

  • even before we knew the results, to explain

  • why they'd done so badly.

  • And the whole structure was blame it on Brexit.

  • So they've hung on, as we had explained, in London.

  • They've also hung on in sort of central Manchester

  • and other cities.

  • But they've done really, really badly in smaller towns.

  • And these are the places where people's job prospects are not

  • good, there's a lot of poverty.

  • But these have always been absolutely staunch Labour

  • territory.

  • And now they've been persuaded to vote Conservative

  • for the first time.

  • So it's a huge redrawing of the map.

  • It really is.

  • Brexit is the lever that Boris Johnson used to prise open

  • the Leavers, as it were.

  • And he...

  • Oh, dear.

  • I didn't even plan that one.

  • But it wasn't just about Brexit for all of these people.

  • I think it was also about...

  • Could you just move your glass for a second. .

  • I'm going to do my little...

  • I think it was also about the factors that got them voting

  • for Brexit in the first place.

  • The working class vote in a lot of these places

  • swung heavily to the Tories, even in the Remain seats.

  • It wasn't just in the Leave seats,

  • because I think this notion of saying to people, you're poor,

  • you can't help yourself, we the state

  • are going to provide all the things for you,

  • take these free things, is not actually that appealing

  • to a lot of people.

  • They want a sense of aspiration.

  • They want a path out.

  • They want a notion that if you do this for me,

  • I can climb out myself, of whatever hole I'm in.

  • I can improve my life.

  • I just need a bit of help.

  • And I think the Labour agenda of lots and lots of public

  • provision, lots of free stuff, didn't actually speak

  • to people's own sense of pride.

  • So when Ed Miliband was Labour leader in the 2015 election,

  • their policy programme was ridiculed by one of their US

  • Democrat advisers as vote Labour, get a free microwave.

  • And there was a sense with this Labour manifesto,

  • it was like get a whole new fitted kitchen or whatever

  • else, your list of bribes.

  • And someone who'll cook for you.

  • And actually, interestingly, the polling conducted by Lord

  • Ashcroft, I thought, was so interesting,

  • because it showed that the Labour leavers who rejected

  • the Labour party this time and voted Conservative,

  • the sort of fear of a second referendum and unpicking Brexit

  • was only their third concern on their list of concerns.

  • Their number one concern was they

  • worried about Jeremy Corbyn in Number 10 Downing Street.

  • And their second concern was this crazy list

  • of spending pledges.

  • Yeah, and the two are linked, of course.

  • They didn't trust him making all predictions.

  • I think that's absolutely right.

  • And of course, Labour supporters will argue that this was all

  • down to a vilification campaign.

  • And it is true that any Labour leader, and him in particular,

  • has to weather a hostile media environment.

  • But the truth is, that's the weather.

  • And you have to be able to deal with it.

  • And Jeremy Corbyn showed no readiness

  • to deal with that agenda.

  • He thought after 2017 they'd found a miracle way around it.

  • But the truth is, he didn't go out and contest it.

  • He frequently was absent in major points

  • in British politics, particularly after Brexit.

  • And people looked at him and just thought, you're not there.

  • So the other thing with the Labour vote is it piles up

  • in places they don't need it, right?

  • So even though it's true that lots of people

  • registered to vote in the last few weeks before the election,

  • even though there may have been a slight increase

  • in young people turning out to vote, which they don't do

  • in such great numbers as older voters who tend to vote

  • Conservative, those votes, again,

  • were in places they didn't need them.

  • And Jeremy Corbyn going around the country doing his election

  • rallies, he kept turning up in safe Labour seats to rally

  • the faithful rather than reaching out.

  • Although, some of these seats the Tories took were safe

  • Labour seats quite recently.

  • I was talking to our data genius John Murdoch

  • about what are the demographics showing.

  • And he hadn't got all the data yet.

  • But what he said was he thought that the really extreme

  • division of young and old that characterised the last

  • election, where Labour absolutely mopped up to about

  • 40-something years old, and the Tories,

  • the other side of that line.

  • He said he didn't think it was quite as sharp this time.

  • And that actually, there were younger voters voting

  • Conservative in these kind of seats,

  • and that the divisions we're seeing,

  • they were around social class, wealth, and education.

  • The interesting question, or one that is going to play out,

  • is whether Labour lost all these seats,

  • because it tried to pander to the Remain side, or whether,

  • had it failed to pander to the Remain side,

  • it would have done worse.

  • Clearly, the Corbynite narrative is

  • very much, we tried to pander to Remain, that's why we lost.

  • I don't think it's as clean as that,

  • because I think Labour got a lot of seats.

  • And it saved itself in a lot of places

  • by dint of being the only Remainish party.

  • So the other party that had a really bad night

  • was the poor old Lib Dems.

  • Look, here we are.

  • And as we've said, Jo Swinson actually

  • lost her seat by 100-odd votes in East Dunbartonshire

  • in Scotland.

  • They picked up a few seats from the Tories

  • but not a lot of the ones that they'd hoped for.

  • Being the sort of outrageously optimistic types, even

  • in near-death experiences, they're

  • very chatty about the number of second places they've

  • lost for another election.

  • But of course, with a comfortable majority

  • now, there isn't going to be another election as soon as we

  • possibly thought they would be if there

  • were a hung parliament.

  • So they're going to struggle, the Lib

  • Dems, to find any relevant role, aren't they,

  • in this parliament?

  • Yeah, I mean, I've been really rough on them.

  • If you think back to June, talk of them getting back

  • to 50 or 60 seats did not seem at all incredible.

  • It's been the most brutal squeeze.

  • And it's happened in a very, very short space of time.

  • They didn't have a great campaign.

  • But I still think most of it was down

  • to just the brutalities of the first past the post system.

  • So I think they had a bad campaign.

  • But I think there's a kind of political law of physics,

  • which is that if the electorate are quite happy to see

  • the Labour leader in Downing Street,

  • they're comfortable voting Lib Dem.

  • And that's in this territory here.

  • If this territory here is worried about the Labour party

  • in power, they don't vote Lib Dem,

  • because they're worried about letting Labour in.

  • Well, that's was absolutely what we saw under Tony Blair.

  • I mean, the Lib Dems' greatest recent period of success

  • was in the era of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.

  • That actually - mistakes just didn't - if were a Tory voter,

  • losing didn't look that big a risk.

  • And actually, I suspect for some moderate Labour voters,

  • the same way.

  • Actually, it's only David Cameron, what could he

  • do to the country?

  • So I think you're completely right.

  • The more stark the choice, the harder

  • it is for middle parties.

  • I mean, the Lib Dems' high watermark was 2005 under

  • Charles Kennedy when...

  • You think in share of the vote, it was 2010 or so.

  • Yeah, but in seats, it was 2005.

  • And I think that's really interesting, because I think

  • people were happy to have Blair in Downing Street,

  • but they wanted to give him a kicking over Iraq.

  • Yes, but without that sort of friendly factor towards

  • the Labour leader more broadly, they just struggle.

  • And I think they've completely lost touch with that idea.

  • I think both the parties of the left,

  • the Lib Dems and the Labour party,

  • because the Lib Dems still are kind of centre left,

  • for all the Nick Clegg coalition era,

  • they've just completely lost touch with this sort of law

  • of British politics.

  • What can they do about it?

  • It's not a law they can affect.

  • No, there isn't.

  • So there's nothing they could have...

  • I don't know...

  • Well, they can hang on in there and build.

  • I mean, they're in government in Wales as it happens.

  • A lot of the MPs who stood as independents defied the whip,

  • they all lost their seats.

  • The MPs who defected from Labour to the Liberal Democrats.

  • Gary Locke.

  • They all lost their seats as well.

  • You know, some really brave and good people, Luciana Berger,

  • Sam Gyimah, Anna Soubry, David Gauke.

  • They're all gone.

  • So parliament has lost a lot of these people who

  • stood up and were counted on Brexit and other issues

  • during that campaign.

  • And it's going to be a much more monolithic parliament.

  • So what do you think's going to be

  • the most significant point of tension

  • then in the next few months?

  • I think that the SNP is, to some extent,

  • talking the talk on an early referendum.

  • I don't think they either expect or necessarily want

  • that referendum in 2020.

  • The polls aren't yet showing them a majority

  • that they would win.

  • So I think for the moment, they want

  • to talk the talk about the beastly English are not

  • letting us have our referendum.

  • Let the Brexit talks go on, and see how that plays out.

  • If they win in 2021 in the Holyrood Scottish

  • parliamentary elections, they're going

  • to find it very difficult not to demand a referendum.

  • And although Boris Johnson's people were saying today,

  • well, we're simply not going to have it, there's been one,

  • I think, what are they going to do, turn Scotland

  • into Catalonia?

  • They're going to refuse to allow a referendum?

  • I don't see how that works.

  • So I think we've got a year of shadowboxing.

  • And then we'll see where we are in a bit.

  • You know, when May took over as prime minister,

  • she made a big deal of flying up to Edinburgh on the first day,

  • shaking hands with Sturgeon, and saying this is going

  • to be an inclusive process.

  • Of course, it wasn't at all.

  • But it would potentially be possible to actually

  • then conduct the trade negotiations,

  • work towards the final Brexit deal

  • in a way that includes Edinburgh and perhaps

  • a newly revived Stormont Northern

  • Irish assembly and the Welsh.

  • Is there not a way binding all together?

  • Because with the DUP weakened, that's

  • a chance to revive the Stormont assembly.

  • The problem with it is conducting these talks

  • with the SNP.

  • If you're conducting it with Holyrood,

  • you're conducting it with the SNP there.

  • And they have no incentive to be helpful in terms of what

  • Boris Johnson wants to achieve.

  • And it's win-win for them.

  • Either they get a much softer Brexit

  • than he wants to give them, or they

  • get to say their Brexit strategy has

  • been denied by the brutish English government.

  • So I don't know about that.

  • But I think he could include more Scottish Conservatives

  • and try to use people like Ruth Davidson,

  • for example, much more to project a Scottish sense.

  • And I do think it could be the cover for him showing

  • much more flexibility in the next year of trade talks

  • than we necessarily were led to assume when

  • we looked at the manifesto.

  • Do you think we should talk about the Brexit party?

  • Well, they just faded away, didn't they,

  • having decided to stand down?

  • But then they potentially took quite a lot of votes off

  • the Labour party and made it easier for the Tories to win

  • those seats.

  • It does look like in quite a few seats, they made a real...

  • We've lost our pale blue.

  • You've got the pale blue.

  • It made a real difference to taking votes from Labour.

  • There were seats where they split the vote.

  • And the Labour MPs like Dan Jarvis in one of the Barnsley

  • seats survived, because the Brexit party and Tory party

  • vote split.

  • By and large, they weren't unhelpful to what Boris Johnson

  • was trying to achieve.

  • I still thought in the last week,

  • it was quite hard to understand what the Brexit

  • party were playing at.

  • Nigel Farage was saying he was going to spoil his ballot paper

  • or then start a new party called the Reform Party to campaign

  • for proportional representation so that they

  • could have a permanent say.

  • Is what we're concluding from all this

  • that he's, Boris Johnson is so empowered now

  • by this majority of 80 that he can be a kinder, gentler Boris?

  • Well, it's possible.

  • We ought to find out.

  • We'll need a little bit more about the new MPs

  • and see what the composition of the new Conservative party is.

  • I think you're right that he is empowered.

  • For a while at least, he's going to be able to do what he wants.

  • He'll reshape his cabinet.

  • Some of the people who were less lovable

  • might find themselves out.

  • The Rees-Moggs?

  • I wasn't going to name names.

  • I'm going to name a name again.

  • The Rees-Moggs?

  • Anyway, he'll have a bit of a honeymoon now.

  • He'll have the honeymoon he didn't really

  • get when he won the leadership before.

  • And he will be able to take the Conservative party,

  • the government, and therefore the country in the direction he

  • wants for a while.

  • The nature of the trade negotiation

  • is, well, Britain is still the weaker

  • partner in all of these talks.

  • And Scottish nationalism is a force that he can't control.

  • So it's been a very, very good week for Boris Johnson.

  • He's won.

  • He's been vindicated.

  • He's going to get a period of political grace.

  • But I don't think it'll last five years.

  • So I would say that he can do what he wants now.

  • It's just that we don't really know what it is that he wants.

  • Do you think he knows?

  • No.

  • On that cheery thought.

We've all had enough of this.

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