07/06/2025

The Week in Westminster

BBC

Government

4.2 • 239 Ratings

🗓️ 7 June 2025

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

George Parker, the political editor of the Financial Times assesses the latest developments at Westminster.

Following the publication of the Strategic Defence Review, George discusses the recommendations made in the Report with its main author, the Labour peer Lord Robertson, who is a former secretary general of NATO and a former Labour defence secretary and with Penny Mordaunt, the former Conservative defence secretary.

Amid mounting concern at Westminster over the humanitarian situation in Gaza, George is joined by Conservative MP Sir Roger Gale and Labour MP Jon Pearce, the chair of Labour Friends of Israel, to discuss the latest.

To discuss the results of the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election in Scotland, George brings together Jamie McGuire, who was a Labour councillor until he defected, a few days ago, to Reform UK and Kezia Dugdale, a former leader of the Scottish Labour Party who is now at the Centre for Public Policy at Glasgow University.

And, finally, ahead of next week's Spending Review, George speaks to crossbench peer, Lord Macpherson, who was the Permanent Secretary at the Treasury and to Conservative peer and former Cabinet Minister Michael Gove, who is the editor of the Spectator magazine.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is George Parker of the Financial Times with The Week in Westminster.
0:09.2	It was a week when money dominated debate at Westminster, or more precisely, the lack of it.
0:15.7	Secere Starman knows we're going to have to spend more on re-arming Britain for a dangerous new world,
0:21.0	but doesn't know yet where all the cash is going to come from.
0:24.8	Meanwhile, Chancellor Rachel Reeves was locked in fierce negotiations with ministers
0:29.8	over how to divvy up scarce resources between Whitehall departments for the next few years.
0:36.0	We'll be hearing later from veteran treasury Mandarin Nick
0:39.2	McPherson and former cabinet minister Michael Gove on how those haggles tend to play out.
0:45.3	We'll also be talking about the government's response to the crisis in Gaza and reflecting on a busy
0:50.8	week for Reform UK, losing a party chairman, but claiming they almost won a Scottish
0:57.0	parliamentary by-election. But we'll start with the publication of the government's long-awaited
1:02.3	strategic defence review. This was how the Prime Minister framed it, speaking at the governshipyard
1:08.4	on Monday. We are moving to warfighting readiness
1:12.6	as the central purpose of our armed forces.
1:16.6	When we are being directly threatened by states with advanced military forces,
1:21.6	the most effective way to deter them is to be ready.
1:25.6	The Labour peer George Robertson, the lead author of the review, is a former Secretary-General
1:30.7	of NATO and also served as Defence Secretary under Tony Blair.
1:35.3	And the former Conservative MP, Penny Mordant, was the first woman to hold that post under
1:39.9	Theresa May.
1:41.2	I started by asking Lord Robertson, is Britain ready to fight a war at the moment?
1:46.6	Not really, no. I don't think we were in any position to do so, but we didn't need to be.
	...

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