00:00Let's talk to Paul Taggerts, a professor of politics at the University of Sussex.
00:04Paul, when academics like you write your books, what will the chapter, Why Is He Gone, say?
00:14Well, I think the chapter will say basically that while he might have been seen as a successful,
00:19relatively successful, Prime Minister in international terms,
00:22because domestically he was unable to really ride the vision forward of getting the country out of the cost of
00:31living crisis
00:32and to give the appearance that the country was moving forward.
00:36So the international context is very different from the domestic one.
00:40So it's about losing the party. He lost his MPs, as your segment there showed.
00:44The new MPs were all welcoming the new Andy Burnham coming in.
00:48He lost his MPs, but he also got the sense that he lost momentum in terms of the country.
00:53And the point is that Labour doesn't normally find it very hard to get majorities.
00:56Two years ago it got a thumping great majority.
01:00And I think the Labour MPs are very scared that we're going to squander this
01:03and to lose it over the five-year term with somebody who wasn't seen to be delivering
01:07on the core things of economic growth and a vision for getting Britain moving in a particular direction.
01:13Seven Prime Ministers in ten years from two different political parties. Why?
01:22Yeah, it does seem like a lot of Prime Ministers, doesn't it?
01:24But it's turbulent times. It's turbulent times internationally and domestically.
01:30The nature of politics internationally is very difficult.
01:34But also, I think, the nature of politics at home, people who have been less supporting the mainstream parties,
01:40whether much they might cheer, those parties are not getting the support that they used to get.
01:45So I think it's harder for leaders these days to hold on to power for a long period of time.
01:52Part of that's because of the crisis they face.
01:54Part of that's the internal crisis of the break-up of the norms of politics that we've become used to.
02:00So we are going to get a new Prime Minister in the UK.
02:04In real terms, apart from the face, what will change?
02:10Well, the hope is that the change will be a much clearer vision and an alternative path forwards.
02:17The difficulty is we don't really know what that path forwards will be.
02:20Andy Burnham has made his name, although he's originally a national politician,
02:25but recently as the mayor of Manchester, as a regional identity.
02:29And he's going to come in and try and presumably take some of that agenda
02:34from what's been called the sort of Manchesterism,
02:37the sort of policies he's pursued in Manchester of social growth,
02:40of infrastructure rebuilding, to try and put that nationally.
02:45So the idea is that for some it looks like a left-wing move for the party.
02:50For others it looks like an attempt just to move away from starmerism,
02:53if such a thing even exists.
02:55But if it doesn't look different, things will be the same.
02:58Let me ask you about the relationship between Keir Starmer and President Trump.
03:03It always looked rather fractious.
03:07Mr. Trump last night suggesting that Keir Starmer was going to go,
03:12almost foreseeing his resignation before Keir Starmer had actually announced it.
03:17How difficult has that relationship been?
03:21I think that relationship has been extremely difficult.
03:23The UK has always prided itself on having some sort of special relationship with the US,
03:28whether that's symbolic or substantive as a matter of question,
03:31but that's the way the UK has seen it.
03:33And I think that Starmer's had great difficulty in sustaining that.
03:36But of course, he's no different from any other politician across the world.
03:40Trump is extremely hard to deal with.
03:42He vacillates.
03:43He changes.
03:44So I don't think it's out of the ordinary that the relationship the UK has had with the US.
03:49But perhaps that loss of faith, that loss of a special relationship is more important for the UK than the
03:55UK.
03:56Paul, good to talk to you.
03:57Thank you for that.
03:58Paul Taggart, Professor of Politics at the University of Sussex.
