- 15 minutes ago
The former chancellor and chair of the British Museum tells The Independent’s editor-in-chief Geordie Greig that much like the Bayeux Tapestry, which he has just brought to Britain, Brexit is not the end of the story
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Hello and welcome to The Talk Show. My name is Geordie Gregg and it's my privilege and pleasure
00:05to have George Osborne here today. One of the most prominent public faces of the last 30 years.
00:12Chancellor of the Exchequer, now Chairman of the British Museum. He has engineered possibly the
00:17greatest cultural coup for an exhibition we've seen since Tutankhamen, the Bayeux Tapestry.
00:23You cannot buy tickets, you cannot get tickets. It is a total sellout and there are other sides to
00:31him as well. There is the praising or the teasing for the number of jobs he's had. There is the
00:38editor of the Evening Standard. He is a multitasker and he is a person who has certainly given a lot
00:46to public the face of Britain as he now turns to probably the most public facing exhibition
00:53that Britain's ever seen. George, welcome. Thank you. It's good to be here. Yeah. I mean,
00:59so the Bayeux Tapestry, was that your idea? I'm not going to claim it was my idea at all.
01:09It's lost a bit in the mists of time but some point in kind of 2013, 2014 when it was
01:15clear that the
01:16Bayeux Museum was had to close for innovation. So that's why the tapestry is here. The museum where
01:20it's housed in France was closing for innovation, the idea started to be circulated that maybe
01:28it could come to Britain. So that was a full... But it seems like a brilliant political idea.
01:31Yeah. No, I mean, it then, you know, basically stalled. So there was an idea, there was an
01:37initiative. And one of our creators, Michael Lewis, who's the lead curator in the exhibition,
01:42says he suggested it. And then it actually got announced under the Theresa May government.
01:48But then it all fell apart. And when I became chairman of the British Museum, I think everyone
01:53assumed the idea was dead. But there was a very smart guy in the British Embassy in Paris,
02:00who was the deputy ambassador. This man is now the private secretary, or one of the private
02:05secretaries to the king, Theo Rycroft. And he said to me, you know what, George, I think you could
02:11revive this. And so we worked really hard to get the idea going. And President Macron said
02:18yes. And the tapestry's arrived.
02:20Tell us briefly, what is the magic of seeing it? It's 70 metres long, it's a thousand years
02:25old. It hasn't been in this country for hundreds of years. But what's caused this sensation?
02:33Three things strike you about the tapestry. The first is, even if you've never seen it,
02:39you know it. It's so instantly recognisable. It is the most famous physical object in British
02:46history. It's the most studied, copied, everyone's done a school class, you know, when they've
02:53tried to do something in the style of the Bayer Tapestry. I mean, it's just universally understood
02:56and known. So when you see it, even if you have seen it before in France, you go, oh my
03:01God, that's the Bayer Tapestry. And then second, I think what will strike people in this exhibition
03:06in a way, maybe it didn't when it was on display in Bayer, is just how big it is. It's
03:1070 metres
03:11long. I mean, if you think of how far 70 metres is from where we are sitting here, it's a
03:15lot,
03:15this is a very, very long piece of work of art. And then the third thing is just the kind
03:22of gripping human story. I think people assume it's, you know, foreign invader lands in ships,
03:29rides in on horses, Harold gets an arrow in the eye, and that's it. But that is only
03:34the end bit. That's the denouement, without giving the applause away. There's, you know,
03:40there's a lot beforehand of Harold and William becoming friends in France and going on trips
03:45together in France. And there's depictions of Westminster Abbey. There's, there's just,
03:49you know, so much sort of human detail that it's also just a very human story, which is,
03:54you don't need to be some expert in medieval history at all to understand.
03:58But there's a political element in, in, in what you've done. You've obviously, France and Britain
04:04getting closer together. So when does the Mona Lisa come back? When do the Elgin Margals go back
04:09to Greece? Reparations to other countries who've got, is this the beginning of, of a big cultural
04:17change in, in possessions? I think this is a demonstration of just how ambitious you can be
04:23with these loans. And remember, this is reciprocal. And this is a very important part of
04:27answering your question. We are sending to France, to museums in Normandy,
04:33the Sutton Hoo treasures, you know, the, which are probably one of the, you know, top five
04:38kind of most visited things in the British Museum and the chessmen from Lewis, which will be instantly
04:43recognizable. So this is not one way traffic. And of course, although this in particular tapestry
04:49marks the invasion of England and was made in Britain, almost certainly, and then, you know,
04:55traveled to France and hasn't been here for a thousand years, you know, this is not some act
05:00of reparation by France, obviously. This is a celebration of a shared culture and a shared history,
05:06even at times, if that was bloody. And that's what the loan going the other way does. So, you know,
05:11for the British Museum, the British Museum is a kind of remarkable product of the Enlightenment.
05:16It's one of the very few places in the world where you can see all these different comparative
05:19histories together. You can see the, you know, Greeks alongside the ancient Egyptians, alongside
05:24treasures from Africa and China and so on. And, you know, we want to do big ambitious loans,
05:31you know, and exchanges of artifacts, which could include the Parthen sculptures, the Elgin marbles.
05:38But it has to be, obviously, within the law. We can't give things away. Parliament prevents
05:43us from doing that. And there's this government, like every recent government has said, they're
05:47not going to change the law. And we want it to be an exchange. And, you know, the idea with
05:52Greece,
05:53potentially, is that some amazing treasures from Greece would come at the same time to us,
05:58so that, you know, both, you know, both museums, both countries are benefiting from this exchange.
06:04So Europe, the debate over Europe has been at the heart of much of the politics of your,
06:09the most dramatic parts of your life. Do you think the Battle of Hastings was a bigger loss
06:16than Brexit?
06:18Well, what's that? I mean, I didn't get an arrow in my eye.
06:23You're not king.
06:24You're not king.
06:25Hold on. Harold's two brothers were also chopped down at the battle.
06:30No, I, well, the Battle of Hastings is, the Bay of Tapestry is a reminder of,
06:36that, you know, politics has existed for all time. You know, it's a story of who's in charge
06:41of the kingdom. And, you know, it had pretty brutal outcomes in the past. And it's also a
06:50reminder of how intertwined our history is with the continent. And, you know, for Brexit, yes,
06:55it was, you know, it was, I think, well, certainly ended my career and the career of the, of David
07:02Cameron. But more than that, you know, it had a huge impact on the British economy, which Britain
07:08is clearly poor than it would otherwise be. And it's also not the end of a bit like the tapestry
07:15isn't
07:15the end of the story. Brexit's not the end of the story, because as you can see now, there's a
07:21whole
07:21conversation of how to re-engage in, you know, in, in the kind of issues that fundamentally,
07:28we're never going to solve, unless we're working with our European neighbors, like immigration,
07:33like the economy, like the regulation of new technologies.
07:36Does that mean rejoining?
07:37I don't, well, personally, I think it's going to be hard anytime soon to rejoin.
07:42But you're not ruling it out as a name?
07:45Well, I, you know, I think there's lots we can do before you even
07:48bring that question up. I mean, I think, you know, personally, I would rejoin the customs union.
07:53I don't think that was ever part of the Brexit debate. No one knew about the customs union.
07:57No one knew we were leaving it. It's had a devastating impact on trade from small and
08:02medium-sized businesses. Britain's basically gone off a cliff. It's a quite simple thing to do.
08:08And remember the people reason why we weren't supposed to be in the customs union,
08:11according to the Brexiteers, was these great trade deals we were going to strike with America.
08:16And that all looks pretty fanciful now. So I don't really understand why,
08:20I can understand why the conservatives didn't do it.
08:24Even if, you know, many conservative MPs voted remain.
08:28It's because, but I'm surprised that the Starmer government and now the
08:33Burnham government haven't taken this step because it's quite, you know, in the,
08:38in the things that are available for, but are they putting their politics before
08:42country by doing that? Because is it for political reasons they're doing that?
08:46Well, I think they would say, well, we promise not to do it. And to some degree, you know, they,
08:51you know, I mean, I would say the British kind of political classes also are, you know, more broadly,
08:59you know, the British business community, the, you know, the business lobby groups and trade unions,
09:04whatever have all been somewhat frightened to kind of revisit the Brexit issue. And so there's been
09:10a kind of conspiracy of silence about it. And yet now people realize you can't really look at sort
09:16of Britain's growth problem without beginning to think, well, how can we revive trade with the
09:20continent? How can we get investment? I'll give you a big example. There's autumn that's coming out,
09:24which is not on anyone's radar much. And then there's a kind of made in Europe rules around
09:30if you build a car that's sold in Europe or a European car, rather, you know, does it,
09:35it has to have a large number of its components made inside the EU. That's going to be absolutely
09:39devastating for the British car industry, which has taken a massive hit from Brexit.
09:43And you can't sort of talk about the future of the car industry, which, you know, the government is
09:47talking about this week, the Jaguar Land Rover, unless you confront that reality. So, so I think we will
09:54end up having a closer trading relationship. And the other key issue is security and the security
09:59of our continent dealing with Ukraine. It's interesting how actually the Brexiteers and
10:04Eurosceptics were most against cooperation with Europe on military things. But the combination of
10:09Ukraine and Trump has made Britain realize that its security is intimately tied up with the continent,
10:15which, of course, it always was, as the Bayer tapestry reminds us. But, you know, it's been kind of
10:21brought to the fore again. So what would you do if you, if you were in power again,
10:25what would be the most crucial thing to get us closer? Well, I think there are two, there are two
10:31things, if, you know, look, it's a different, if I was a conservative leader, it's a different
10:36situation because you've got to deal with the conservative parliamentary party and so on. But
10:41if I was Andy Burnham, which is, I'm not, and I'm not, you know, I'm a member of the conservative
10:46party. But if I was Andy Burnham, I don't really see the reason why you wouldn't really join
10:51the customs union, you know, now, by which I mean today. Now, you have to have a negotiation in
10:57the EU. It's not, it's not a one-way decision, but it's a pretty straightforward decision,
11:02more straightforward than the single market because, you know, on the current terms,
11:06the single market requires you to accept free movement of people, which I think everyone
11:10understands at the moment is a pretty complicated issue to sell in Britain.
11:15You've seen the brutalising side of politics and you, and you've seen, you know, the idealistic
11:21aim of trying to make our country a better place. How do you survive the very low points? I mean,
11:28if we think, you know, you were fired by Theresa May.
11:31Well, I didn't, I didn't survive, George. I went to, you know, edit the evening stand-up as a result.
11:36I followed in your great first steps.
11:38That's good therapy. But, but how did, because when you go home and, you know, everyone,
11:44the cliche is that politics always ends in failure. Yeah.
11:47Did you, do you feel that is the case? Do you think, what was the achievements,
11:52do you think, George, you've left behind as a legacy in politics?
11:55Oh, well, it's for other people.
11:56No, no, you, you, you must have things you're proud of.
11:58Well, there are certain things, you know, I'm proud, I mean, I'm proud of being a partner
12:02to David Cameron, forming a coalition government and offering Britain stable government for six
12:06years. People now look back on that six years of government and say, you know, wow, that was,
12:11you know, compared to everything that's happened since.
12:13And your view on six prime ministers in however many years?
12:16Well, utter chaos, partly brought about by Brexit and the, essentially the Conservative Party and the
12:21Labour Party swapping their voters without realising, you know, the Conservatives traded the
12:26middle class for the working class and nobody traded the working class for the middle class
12:29and then neither came to terms with it. But if, no, I mean, you know, stabilising the public finances,
12:38you know, all these issues today about bond markets, Britain at its limit on debt, you know,
12:43puts, I think, a new light on what was required back then to gain confidence and bring interest rates down.
12:49And then, you know, individual things like the Northern Powerhouse sugar tax that I look at.
12:55Did they steal your clothes, the Northern Powerhouse?
12:57No, not at all. I'm very much in favour of Andy Burnham continuing it on.
13:02I mean...
13:02But when you say continue, they're taking on a project you started.
13:06I'm not sure I started it, but I, you know, I, with others, but it was very much my view
13:13that we
13:13should have an elected mayor of Greater Manchester. I was really happy that Andy Burnham was going to run as
13:18the Labour candidate there because he'd been in the cabinet. It showed it was a big job that
13:22big politicians did. So you're responsible for him essentially being prime minister, is that right?
13:28I think you find Keir Starmer's, there's some of the responsibility for creating the opportunity.
13:34No, I'm, I'm a big fan of that regional division. You remember I, when I proposed it to the
13:40Conservative cabinet at the time, there were Conservative cabinet ministers who said,
13:44it's a disaster, we'll never be in charge, we're handing over control of Birmingham,
13:49we're handing over control of the North East. And then a couple of years later, there were,
13:52there were Conservative mayors elected for those areas. And the same cabinet ministers were saying,
13:58oh, well, you know, triumph. So I think you can't be too partisan about it. You have to think
14:03if it's good for the country, it's going to be good for your party. You know, ultimately,
14:07I am a believer that good politics follows good policy. You know, i.e. get the, get the policy
14:13right, get the economy growing. The thing about politics, I mean, it's not like, very, very Tony
14:18Blair that. Um, no, I, well, I think there are differences. The, um, you know, I think he came
14:25quite late in his premiership to wanting to do big lasting reforms. Um, but I think, um, you know,
14:32politics is you've got, there's no point telling a politician, don't worry about today's headlines,
14:37because if you don't worry about the day to day, you might be gone by the end of the day.
14:43You have to survive the day to day battle. But if you have no kind of longer term objective,
14:49if you're not trying and you're, if you're not prepared to make, take some risks with your
14:53popularity to try and achieve some longer term things, you will achieve nothing. And it's only when
14:58you're out of, I've been out of office for 10 years, you know, and out of politics, that you
15:02look back on the things you are proudest of. And they're not the kind of gimmicky announcements
15:07that, dare I say it, you know, secured the front page of the Evening Standard or the Daily Mail,
15:12or the Independent in it on that moment. It's the, it, things like the sugar tax,
15:17where we basically required companies like Coca-Cola to reduce sugar. Yeah, I got no end of
15:23bad press for it. You're taxing, you know, Coca-Cola. But now that's one of the things I'm proud
15:28to solve. So austerity, it's, it's got your name attached to it. Yeah. Is it, was it something,
15:34I mean, the, some of the estimates of it, it's cost the, um, state up to 560 billion pounds,
15:40of some, some think tanks have suggested, was it a damaging process or was it a necessary process?
15:45You, you know, I, at the time I was making an argument that if Britain didn't live within its means,
15:50the bond market would say no, people's interest rates would go up and the recovery from the crash would
15:57be destroyed. And of course that was happening in other countries around us at the time,
16:01like Greece and Ireland and so on. And, um, everyone at the time said, well, really? I would say,
16:06fast forward to now, the Liz Trust budget, the problems that the Labour government have got,
16:11you absolutely, these are not theoretical things. So what does John, John Healy need to do now?
16:16Well, I think fundamentally, you know, if you are, if you're looking at Britain from abroad, you are,
16:21you don't necessarily share the excitement that Britain's got a new prime minister,
16:24a new chancellor, another new chancellor. You know, they used to be, being an ex-chancellor used
16:29to be quite a rare thing. When I stopped being chancellor, there were really like three or four
16:33people alive who had done it. Um, now, of course, uh, to a penny, a bit like, you know, sort
16:37of
16:38devaluation. But, um, you know, so international investors, first of all, be like, need to believe
16:43that Burnham and Healy and the Labour Party and Labour government can control the public finances,
16:50manage that. So what should he do? But second, they've got to believe this is
16:55a country worth investing in. You know, why put, why put your, and I think you need to do both.
17:00So you need to... No, I get the wider picture of drawing people's confidence,
17:03but what are the policies that you need to do? Well, I'm not, you know, I gave eight budgets,
17:07so I've just done my kind of shift, but I am... Direction of travel, you know, do they need to
17:13cut?
17:14Well, I, I think the, um, they, you know, they don't have to take any leaf out of my book.
17:19They
17:19could take a leaf out of Gordon Brown's book, which they're probably more likely to do. Um,
17:23Gordon Brown, when he became the chancellor in 1997, after a long period of conservative
17:29government, you know, Margaret Thatcher, John Major, uh, when people were worried about what
17:33a Labour government would do for business, he introduced a big, big tax break for entrepreneurs,
17:38uh, cutting capital gains tax for entrepreneurs. And, you know, I'll, I think it did help the
17:44entrepreneurial spirits back then and politically sealed the deal between new Labour and the
17:49entrepreneurial class. If I was Healy, I would be looking for something surprising, you know,
17:53and people don't expect from the, from the centre-left chancellor. But do you think Starmer,
17:59and we're going to find out with Burnham, do they appreciate and like the rich entrepreneurs?
18:06Well, I think if you look at, uh, I don't think, um, John Healy's had a kind of stage on
18:10which to
18:11No, but, but, but, but, but, but. Andy Burnham in Manchester, you know, I was an MP in the
18:15Manchester area for a long time. Um, the, uh, you know, he, he did a good job at welcoming
18:21investment into Manchester, attracting businesses into Manchester, understanding that, you know,
18:26the public, public money, public money can only go so far. It's the private money you really need
18:31to leave her in. And that's, there's vastly more private resources than public resources.
18:36Look at, you know, I work for a, uh, an American tech firm, OpenAI. If you look at the capital
18:41budgets, the spending of these big tech technology firms, it absolutely dwarfs what budget I had
18:47when I was Chancellor's Exchequer. So, you know, you want to attract some of that and big companies,
18:53global companies, they're thinking, you know, do I, do I invest in Britain? Do I invest somewhere else in
18:57Europe? Do I invest in some part of the United States? You know, do I go out to Asia? I
19:02mean,
19:02they're, you know, they're not remotely sentimental about Britain. And so you've got to send, at the
19:07moment, the message has, you know, is one of, you know, we've had, they've had lots of governments,
19:14Brexit's been a mess, you know, they're not very pro-business. This, the last lot, you know, the
19:20Starmer, uh, government, you know, they raised tax on business. So Healy and Burnham need to send a kind
19:25of electric shock through the system, and get noticed around the world, Britain is back,
19:31Britain's a place to invest. And with David Cameron, I tried very hard, and to be fair,
19:35Nick Clegg, you know, we tried really hard to send that message that Britain was open for business.
19:41And do you think they will succeed in doing that? At the moment, they've, they've cut non-DOM,
19:45they've put NI, they've done everything which has not been helpful to us. Well, I think, you know,
19:50I'm less partisan than I once was. Um, it was the SUNAT government that got rid of the non-DOM
19:55status.
19:57Right? And the first- Error?
19:59Well, yes, I think so. Yeah. So why did they do that? Well, because I think they were playing
20:04politics with Labour and Labour, they were trying to outmaneuver Labour and of course, but-
20:08So that was that again, that is putting party before- Well, I think it's-
20:12The benefit to the nation is what you're saying. Um, I think it's, uh, yeah, I think also, you know,
20:17I don't think anyone thought, including probably the leaders of their government, that they were
20:20going to get re-elected. So I think you need to kind of be thinking what- I mean, I,
20:26I charge more
20:27for non-DOMs to claim that tax tax. So I'm all for, you know, like the French finance minister
20:32in the 18th century, plucking the goose without the goose quacking. But you don't want to pluck the goose
20:36and end up, you end up with a dead goose. I mean, that's- What do you think it's cost
20:40Britain, that policy?
20:42Well, I don't think we truly know, but I, um, you know, I'm struck by the number of people
20:47I do come across who appear to have moved out of Britain. And, um, I don't think, um,
20:54I don't think yet we have the kind of proper estimates. You know, it's, there's a delay
20:57in when people have to actually declare they've left. So how should, how should John Healy cut debt?
21:02Well, I think you do have to, you have to go back to the thing that of course I was
21:07known for,
21:09and, uh, but ultimately is, you know, a critical part of putting your finances in order,
21:14which is constraining public spending.
21:16Austerity.
21:17Well, you can call it, yeah, austerity, or you don't have to go back to austerity
21:21in the sense of you don't have to have as tight budgets as, you know, back then I had a
21:2512%
21:26budget deficit, but, um, so it's nothing like that, but, um, that I inherited. But it's, um,
21:32but, you know, if you think of the kind of triangle, there's a, you can either raise taxes,
21:37but we're quite, and I'm no doubt there are, you know, I'm not, I've raised VAT. I'm not against
21:42raising taxes and, you know, Margaret Thatcher's most famous budget in 1981 was a big tax rising
21:49budget. So conservatives aren't against raising taxes, but, um, if they need to, because they're
21:56fundamentally for sound of finances, but we are quite close to the limit of, you know,
22:00what are the taxes you'd raise that wouldn't damage that further damage the economy?
22:05Second thing you can do is you can cut spending. Third thing is you can borrow more money. Well,
22:09the bond market said no to borrowing more money. Taxes can't really go up much. So you're left with
22:15constraining spending. And ultimately the way out of the whole thing is to get the economy growing.
22:22And, and the way you do that is to bring confidence so that private investment comes in.
22:27So the new-ish conservative leader appoints as chancellor, um, someone who was part of the
22:34building of the Liz Truss budget. Well, I think to be fair to Andrew Griffiths,
22:39you know, he's, he was a junior minister in the treasury. I think anyone who was one of
22:43the junior ministers when I was chancellor would say, uh, George didn't really show us the budget
22:47until, you know, you can work on bits of the budget as a junior minister. You are not parties
22:53of the whole thing. And so I, when Andrew says I was a junior minister, I wasn't showing the budget.
22:59Uh, that would be my experience of the treasury. Do you commend the move of putting in there?
23:04And how's Kemi doing? Well, I think she's, um, she's doing pretty well in the circumstances.
23:10I mean, given that everyone wrote her off and everyone wrote off the Tory party and so on.
23:14I think the basic challenge remains, you know, I think in some ways she's building quite a,
23:20quite a person, quite a, quite a following as a leader, um, and developing a kind of public
23:27character, which is great. And that's definitely the right way around. You'd rather have that
23:31than the alternative, which is your party strong and you're weak. But the problem is the conservative
23:36party remains very weak. And so she, to some degree is sort of, you know, ahead of where the
23:43party is. And I don't yet sort of see an obvious path for them because I don't know whose voters
23:49they're going after there. Are they trying to squeeze reform or are they trying to win back,
23:53you know, liberal Democrat voters or labor voters? Think all those seats, you know,
23:58around the M25, like Tunbridge Wells or Aldershot that now have labor or liberal Democrat MPs.
24:05Well, what's the plan to win those back? And what should it be?
24:08Well, I personally think you still have to appeal to, you know, just more of the sort of,
24:14you know, center ground. It's not an original observation, but I think they, you know,
24:18their view is more, well, we've got to chase reform, but in doing so you do, you know,
24:25I'll give you an, you know, when I was a conservative chancellor, the, one of the leading indicators
24:31of whether you were a conservative voter was that you had a college degree. Right now,
24:36one of the leading indicators of whether you're a conservative voter is you don't have a college
24:39degree. Now I'm not against trying to attract the support of non-college educated people, but,
24:43you know, to just sort of give up on the kind of, you know, whatever, half of the population who
24:49went to university seems to me like a strange thing to want to do. So I would, I would try
24:55and,
24:56and ultimately, you know, you can, it's quite hard to out reform reform. Now they've got a problem.
25:02They've got to try and squeeze reform, but, um, fundamentally the best way to squeeze reform in my
25:08view is to look like the most credible replacement to the labor government. And then you can say,
25:15well, you might not like us, but, and you would not do a, as some conservative commentators are
25:21saying, join up with the rule, become a, become a coalition. You're, you're, you're the king of
25:26coalition. Well, I think you have to, um, look, I think, I think before the election, there's no prospect
25:33of a deal. I think after an election, if conservative MPs and reform MPs put together
25:40would form a majority, I don't, I think most people know they would in some way form a government.
25:46So there would be a coalition. I think realistically, if it was a choice of like after the election,
25:51if reform and the conservatives can do a deal, there'll be a government. If it doesn't have to
25:56be a coalition, but it could be something much weaker than that. Could that happen with a reform
26:02prime minister rather than a conservative prime minister? Well, it depends who gets the most seats.
26:05Right. So if Kemi Badenoch's strategy, quite understandably, is to try and do better than reform.
26:12Is she right to ban people who, standing as Tory party candidates, who don't back on the policies
26:19from the right, on net zero, um, or leaving the CHR? You know, we've got Amber, Amber, David Gawke,
26:27Grant Shapps recently, um, probably Ken Clarke, Nick Soames. Is that the right way to?
26:33Well, I don't like, there's a trend that started with, um, Boris Johnson of, you know,
26:38we fired Ken Clarke from the Tory party and fired Phil Hammond and fired Nick Soames and, you know,
26:45fired Rory Stewart. And, you know, that's not, I don't think that's a route to success. And I don't
26:50think anything that's happened to the Tory party since would suggest it is. So I think, um, this kind of,
26:55I'll be, you know, if you don't agree with me, you can't be with me is, you know, wouldn't be
27:00my
27:00approach. I think you want to be a broad church and then have strong leadership and strong direction
27:06within the broad church. And, you know, but I would say generally the best way to lead the Tory party
27:12is to get yourself ahead in the polls and be successful. Anytime you're not leading the Tory
27:18party is quite... Who's been the most damaging prime minister in the last five years?
27:21Oh, I don't know. No, I mean, you've got quite a choice. You've got Liz Truss, you've got Boris.
27:28Well, I don't know. It's a sport for choice, aren't you? It's a... I have some, I have some
27:33sympathy for Rishi Sunak who had to kind of pick up the pieces. What did you think the Johnson legacy
27:39will be? You and I know him very well. Um, I think fundamentally, you know, he took us out.
27:45Yeah, if he had not backed Brexit, we would not have left the EU. I mean, he was the kind
27:52of critical
27:54swing vote because sudden, you know, the Brexit campaign went from being something that was a
27:59little bit kind of too right wing, very associated with Farage to suddenly having this very popular
28:06London mayor in charge of it. So he is, that is his legacy. He, and, you know, if you look
28:11at what
28:12happened afterwards and when you've got the chance to be the prime minister to do something about it.
28:16And you, you must have had conversations with him to try and persuade him to remain,
28:20remain. How did they... Well, I think I come back to the Bay of Tapestry, which is, you know,
28:25in the end, it was not... I think anyone who thought Brexit, I mean, in some, to some degree,
28:30I would say this was, you know, my mistake and the mistake of the, um, remain campaign or
28:36particularly the, you know, the kind of Tories in it, which was, we thought it was a debate about
28:42the merits of being in the EU. I think Boris Johnson sort of is a debate about who's going
28:47to be the prime minister. And, um, you know, throughout our history, issues are important,
28:52but, you know, political personalities are also important. And, um, uh, you know,
28:59so if you look at the story of the Bay of Tapestry, it's all about like, you know,
29:02some theory about whether oaths should be honoured and... But that, you know, that's not the real
29:08issue. William wanted the crown. In some ways, you're the Zebedee of public figures. You, you,
29:15you bounce back. That's sort of dating us a bit. I'm not sure when the magic roundabout was last on
29:21television. Well, you've got great bouncing coming back into, you know, and there were low moments.
29:27I remember being at the Olympics when you were booed, and it must have been a... It wasn't the
29:35best day, no. But was it a, can you, was it a frightening moment? No, not particularly. I mean, it
29:39wasn't, um, it was, it was the Paralympics and I'd gone to present a medal. I actually thought,
29:46I remember thinking, how should I be presenting a medal before I went out? Um, and so I, I was
29:53more
29:53like kicking myself. Why did I, I should never have done that. And then, uh, the, the, the more
29:58kind of upsetting it was when my children were there at the time, you know. What do you think
30:03the... I have more sympathy now when I go and watch a football match for the player on the field
30:07who's
30:07been booed by the whole stadium. What do you think was the, um, sort of lightning rod which caused them
30:15to do that? I don't, I think it was just like, who wants this politician presenting a medal, you know.
30:20I, I mean, I'm not saying I was at the time the most popular person. It did teach me a
30:24lesson which
30:25I had to go out there and it was the beginning actually of me getting out of my bunker and
30:31kind of going around the country and putting on my high-vis jacket and, you know, um, saying,
30:37you know, if you do, in a democracy, if you're doing these things that affect people's lives and
30:41political decisions really do, you know, if you make a welfare change, that's money you're taking away
30:46from someone or if you raise a tax, you're taking money away from someone. You know,
30:50you can't just sort of sit there and go, well, put up with it, you know, I'm not going to
30:55explain
30:55myself. You have to, you know, it's quite easy for politicians to get sort of, sort of trapped
31:01in Whitehall or Westminster and not want to, because, because who wants to go out there and get booed,
31:07but it's a very important part of being a successful politician that you can kind of,
31:12you know, if you think of 20, you know, by 2015, the economy was booming and everyone thought,
31:17you know, I was some political genius and then we're going to lose the referendum. So
31:21you've got to take the lows with the highs and remember the highs are, you know, probably going
31:27to be followed by a fall. And the other side of the coin was actually a very moving moment at
31:32Lady Thatcher's memorial service when you were possibly unfairly kidnapped by the cameras and seen
31:41quite tearful. Was that a welling up? I mean, I do well up at funerals and anyway, but,
31:49so, you know, I did, I had met Margaret Thatcher a bit, but I wouldn't say I knew her or
31:56she
31:56certainly didn't know me. I thought it was the whole kind of occasion. It was the great kind of
32:03state funeral. I know it wasn't, you know, but you know, I mean, in the, in St. Paul's Cathedral and
32:11the Elgar and the, I'm not sure Elgar was playing, but in my mind, Elgar's playing and the
32:16coffin and there's an actual dead body at the middle of it all. So, and was it the passing of
32:23an era as
32:24well as sort of, you know, I mean, obviously she's high church Tory, you know? Well, she was,
32:30of course, I think, you know, there were lots of things I would identify with her and, you know,
32:35she was very pragmatic, picked her battles, very keen on winning over aspirational middle-class
32:41people rather than rejecting them. She, of course, you know, was very pragmatic about engaging with
32:46the European Union or EUC as it was at the time. She cut spending when she had to, she put
32:52up taxes
32:53when she had to, but she also unleashed the kind of enterprise economy. I mean, she definitely made
32:57the most of the job. That was the thing actually that most, I think she enjoyed the job, right?
33:02I mean, I don't know because I was not, you know, I was a teenager at the time, but I,
33:09I can tell you
33:10in the six years I was chancellor, I pretty much loved every day. You know, I really enjoyed it,
33:14even the difficult days, which we've done, which we talked about. And, um, the people I have no
33:19time for are the people who are miserable about it. One thing I like about Andy Burnham a lot,
33:24and I saw him at the, um, opening of the tapestry last week, is he loves being prime minister. He
33:30enjoys it. He's got a big kind of, talking about children's characters, tiggerish bounce in him.
33:37He must, he wakes up every day and says, it's great. I'm the prime minister. And I have to say,
33:41I would say the last few prime ministers, maybe since Boris, have not sort of demonstrated that,
33:47like, uh, I really, um, enjoying this. There's a, they're a bit like, oh, you know,
33:52woe unto me. And I'm like, well, you know, there's plenty of other people who want to do the job.
33:56Is he going to be a better prime minister? Or is he a better salesman than Starmer?
33:59Well, I think he definitely is a much better presenter. And, and I think if you can't make an
34:05argument and you can't, you know, it's a bit of a non-starter. So I think he's got a better
34:10chance
34:11than Starmer. But let's be clear. I mean, by the way, Keir Starmer, there was no, you know,
34:16as leader of the opposition, he was very effective. So it's sort of odd that he kind of couldn't make
34:20it work as prime minister and, and didn't seem to have a kind of conception of what he really wanted
34:25to do in the job. I think the big question for Burnham is that, like, what do you actually now
34:29want to do with the job? And, um, but if Starmer came in on being sort of kind of quite
34:34safe,
34:36the vote was going to be quite Blair, right? Actually, that was the, that was the perception.
34:39Well, wasn't it more that his, you know, after the chaos of Jeremy Gordon, Jeremy Corbin and
34:45Boris Johnson, here's like a safe pair. Stability cut candidate. Yeah. But do you think he did veer to
34:53the left? Do you think he, I think it was more, I don't, it's, you know, I just think he
34:56was not
34:57able to show the country had a plan. I think it is a, one of my favorite political phrases,
35:02which actually comes from the financial crash, is plan beats no plan. It's better to have a plan,
35:08not to have a plan. Now, then we can have a debate about whether it's a good plan or a
35:12bad plan.
35:13But plan beats, you know, you know, you've spent your life successfully editing newspapers.
35:19People, what people want from a newspaper is like what they want from a government. They want
35:24like a decision, not like on one hand, on the other hand, it's always all terribly hard. You've
35:28got to understand, you know, you're being paid as the prime minister or the chancellor to just
35:33get on and make some decisions. And if we don't like those decisions, we'll get rid of you. But if
35:36you can't make decisions or you can't put the, you know, articulate a kind of reason for those
35:43decisions. Of course, that came into play quite severely with Theresa May in your meeting with her when
35:48she said, I do not want you in my government. And that must have been, listen, you've, you've had a
35:52trajectory
35:53of success, of success, of success. Was that the first fall you'd ever had?
35:58Um, I wouldn't say it was the first fall because I'd had, you know, there was a moment when I
36:03was on the
36:03front page of the news of the world. There was a moment when, uh, I got on the wrong boat
36:08in Corfu. There
36:09was a moment in, as you remind me of the Paralympics. So I'd had moments where, you know, but it
36:16was all going
36:16down the plug hole. But then I kind of crawled back out, you know. And, um, I think with that,
36:21that was, you know, I kind of knew it was the end of the era. I don't, you know, my,
36:26my complaint
36:27at the time was more how she was sort of, how she was firing me. I remember just sitting there.
36:33What happened?
36:34Well, I was just in the cabinet room and she started explaining, sort of telling me I needed
36:39to get to know the Tory party better. And I, I was just sitting there. I had a slightly out
36:42of body
36:42experience because I just thought like, um, well, you know, if it was me, I'd be just doing this a
36:47completely different way. I'd be saying, you know what, Teresa, you've done such an enormous amount
36:52for our party. You, more than anyone else, will understand the difficult situation I'm in. I've got to
36:57bring in the people from the Brexit campaign. You understand I've got to form a new cabinet.
37:02Uh, you, uh, you would, and I'd be like, you know, I can see that because I could see that.
37:08But, um, but, you know, she didn't do that. But, um, did you shake hands?
37:12Well, do you know, there was a nice moment. I can't remember. Yes, I think we did shake hands,
37:16but, uh, there was a nice moment, uh, last week when, um, she came to the British Museum and I
37:21publicly
37:21thanked her for initiating the, uh, kind of negotiations on the, on the Bay of Tapestry. And,
37:28you know, I remember thinking before I gave my, I was introducing,
37:32it was quite an, you'd like this, get up and say, you're introducing the president,
37:35the king, and the prime minister. And I was like, oh, but one of the things is you can't
37:40talk for that long as a result. And I was thinking, should I, should I make a particular
37:43reference to Theresa May? I think I will. I said, yes, I should do. And she was there in the
37:48audience.
37:48So I take it you no longer want her chopped up in a freezer. We don't comment on the private
37:53editorial meetings in the Evening Standard. Can you imagine such a thing in your day that
37:58such a thing would leak? But it was never denied. Um, but it was never confirmed.
38:04Well, as Sigmund Freud said, there is no such thing as a joke, even if it was a joke. Um,
38:09but you know, that's been the flip side of, of, of the media, isn't it? Because you've, you've had,
38:15you've been policymaking and policy dissecting, running a, the powerful Evening Standard and
38:24obviously being Chancery's checker, which is more powerful?
38:28Oh, I think the, look, the Chancery's checker is a, is a very powerful job. If, if, if, if,
38:35you know, well, I'll give you some things. If your party is behind you and you get things done,
38:41otherwise it's a point, you know, you can announce things, but they don't happen. And, um, if the world
38:46and the bond markets let you do it, because if you think of in our lifetime, you know, Alistair
38:52Darling when the banks are crashing, Norman Lamont when, on Black Wednesday, this is not a
38:56comment on either of those individuals. They weren't really authors, those situations, but they
39:00were the people in the middle of them when it happened. The Chancery's checker can be the most
39:04powerless job in the whole country. So if John Healy gets the budget wrong and the bond markets take
39:09fright, he'll look utterly powerless. Um, but newspaper editors, yeah, absolutely. And, uh, people in, uh,
39:16run media organizations absolutely have a, and you're still a big public voice. It's changed
39:21because of, I mean, the independent is an example of a very successful adoption of a digital strategy.
39:27But, you know, obviously the way information is disseminated now is very, very different.
39:34And so just sort of going to the owner of the newspaper and, you know, the editor and saying,
39:40please be nice to me. They still do it, the politicians, because why not? But it's probably
39:47not by any means sufficient. I always, anyway, it was a bit, I always thought to some degree,
39:54you know, it's not the somewhat won it, it's the somewhat worked out who's going to win it.
39:59And then to some degree, you know, newspapers follow opinion as well as lead it. I mean,
40:06great editors do, you know, can. You can change the mood and the tide.
40:11Yeah, and you can make it really difficult on a day-to-day basis or, you can create the kind
40:17of
40:18daily weather. And some, you know, obviously they, you know, better than me, there are some
40:22examples of really brilliant campaigns that have changed people's thinking. But no, fundamentally,
40:27there's a huge amount of power vested in the politicians.
40:29And even at moments like when Peter Manson is photographed having a pee outside your house
40:37after dinner. By your old newspaper, I think it was. Yes, it was. Do you think there was a
40:47seriousness in exposing those sorts of stories as well as a fun?
40:53No, I actually felt very sorry for Peter because, you know, we have young children,
40:58he'd left. I won't get into the whole story, but he didn't want to come back and knock on the
41:02door.
41:05Anyway, there's a bit of me that I don't like the kind of British, it's by no means the newspapers
41:12only and newspapers do like lots of amazing jobs out there in giving platforms to, you know,
41:18the art of the people and taking on the powerful. But I don't like it when the kind of British
41:23establishment, I can't think of a better word for it, is in kind of full blood cry, like a sort
41:30of
41:30pack of hounds chasing the wolf, sorry, chasing the fox. You know, that, I don't like that bit of
41:38sort of Britain, I mean, it's true, you know, when they're down, you kick them again.
41:42You know, and I absolutely have, you know, been part of the pack of hounds. I've, you know,
41:49as a politician, piling on when your, when your opponent's falling, or as a newspaper editor. So,
41:56you know, I'm not, this is, I've been fully guilty of this, but it's something quite unpleasant when
42:01it's in full, and I think, you know, I'm sure you would have felt it sometimes as an editor, like,
42:07I'm piling on another day. This person, I mean, we had that, you know, terrible case over the
42:13summer of the Cambridge professor. You know, it was a very legitimate media story there,
42:19but of course, it ends up in a, what appears to be a suicide, and it's just, you know.
42:24Yeah, they're these tricky decisions, and it's the extent and the volume and the
42:29quantity, which can. And I think you can become a bit inured to it. I think if you're a politician,
42:35you're so used to being on the front page of newspapers, and being talked about, and if
42:40you're editing newspapers, obviously your daily, you know, your sort of daily work, you sort of
42:45forget for an ordinary, for somebody who's not used to being in the papers, or only used to a bit.
42:51It's absolutely, you know, can be completely crushing to be
42:55subject to that kind of media firestorm. And being a father for the second time around,
43:01you're married again, and you have two, two new children.
43:05Three.
43:05Newish.
43:06Three, three children.
43:08As, is it better second time around?
43:12In terms of...
43:13Well, it's absolutely, well, I'm very much, you know, happily married and in love with Thea,
43:20so that's lovely. But the children are wonderful. But there's,
43:26you know, and there's, like, you know, one of them was in a new nursery class today, and one
43:34started, you know, year one last week. And that's all wonderful. But at the same time,
43:38you know, last night I was having dinner with my 25 year old son chatting about his, like, summer.
43:44And, you know, they're all, as you know, the great thing about parenting is there's lots of
43:50different stages, and whether they're 25 or five, it's, it's really lovely.
43:55And the older ones, have they shared your politics? Or is it, sometimes they're interesting?
43:58Oh, well, they can speak for themselves, and they would, um,
44:01I'd definitely get a big ticking off if I did speak for them.
44:04Peter Hall used to have children from one to, I think, 39.
44:07Right.
44:07I mean, you said it eternally kept him young. Do you feel that it, it, it sort of replenishes
44:11that sense of joy at renewal?
44:14Well, I just feel very lucky to be a kind of father to all these great kids.
44:19Yeah. And finally, you've spent your life in, you know, between politics, economics,
44:25America, and Europe. And now you're sitting above the Bayeux Tapestry,
44:31which tells the story of Britain being shaped by a relationship with Europe.
44:36What's going to be the next chapter of Britain's story today?
44:40Well, I think there's, um, I think the world is changing quite rapidly. And, um,
44:47there's a kind of major risk for Britain and Europe that it, that we become increasingly
44:51economically irrelevant. And if you're economically irrelevant, ultimately, you become irrelevant,
44:58full stop. And, um,
45:01Shall we become Luxembourg?
45:02Well, you know, or we become a kind of great museum, which I'm all for great museums.
45:08Not as an entire country. I think the, um, we've got to kind of rediscover our
45:15entrepreneurial ambition. I don't just mean economically, but just to be confident about
45:20ourselves and our place in the world. You know, I see it working for a big American
45:24tech company, you know, the United States economy for all the problems in Washington is just sort of
45:30powering ahead. These enormous companies are created, you know, and that, you know, there's,
45:37there's just not that energy at the moment in Britain and indeed in the rest of Europe.
45:42Now, I think you can re I'm, I'm optimistic and I think it's possible for Andy Burnham to do this.
45:47You can reinvigorate Britain. There's so many great, uh, things you can sell for Britain,
45:53you know, and London's a fantastic city. The country is amazing. It's got lots of great advantages.
46:02They just need to be presented in a clear, positive plan about the future. So that's the big task for
46:08the autumn. Were you a bit, when Tony Blair gave a sort of forewarning about what Burnham might do,
46:15um, about, about economics at the world stage? You know, the bit, he hasn't really had to take
46:20a difficult decision. You sound as if you're quite enthusiastic. Well, I do think he's got,
46:24he hasn't got the, um, he's got the skills and he seems to have assembled a pretty good team.
46:30You know, I know James Fennell and people like that. So he's got the kind of ingredients, right?
46:34But now big, you know, the next eight weeks, you've got the budget and you've got, you know,
46:40this 10 year plan. So it's all to kind of play for. But if you're not watching the budget in
46:47October,
46:47you can apply to get a ticket to the Bay of Tapestry because you said at the beginning,
46:52I'm just going to pick it up. Newspapers love being, and newspapers love being corrected.
46:57And it's all sold out and you can't buy a ticket that we are about to put on sale again,
47:03hundreds of thousands of tickets, uh, on the 21st of October. So people watching or listening to this,
47:11you can apply. There'll be plenty of opportunities to get, uh, this is for, um, uh, coming to see the
47:18tapestry at the end of the year and the beginning of next year. And then there'll be actually another
47:21opportunity as well after that. So please persevere. Um, you know, it's not as bad as Glastonbury.
47:26You will get through George Osborne. Thank you very much indeed.
Comments