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The Rest Is Politics: Leading

172. Neil Kinnock: Trump, Thatcher, and Why Labour Lost In 1992 (Part 2)

The Rest Is Politics: Leading

Goalhanger

News, Government, Politics

4.63.2K Ratings

🗓️ 26 January 2026

⏱️ 65 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Why did Neil Kinnock believe the fight against Margaret Thatcher was an existential one? What would Kinnock do to tackle the threat posed to Labour by reform? Why did Labour lose the 1992 election? Alastair and Rory are joined by former Labour leader Neil Kinnock to answer all this and more. Join The Rest Is Politics Plus: Start your free trial at therestispolitics.com to unlock exclusive bonus content plus ad-free listening, early access to episodes and live show tickets, an exclusive members’ newsletter, discounted book prices, and a private chatroom on Discord. Social Producer: Celine Charles Video Editor: Adam Thornton  Producer: Alice Horrell Senior Producer: Nicole Maslen Head of Politics: Tom Whiter Exec Producers: Tony Pastor + Jack Davenport Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

Thanks for listening to The Restis Politics. Sign up to the Restis Politics Plus. To enjoy ad-free listening,

0:04.9

receive a weekly newsletter, join our members chat room and gain early access to live show tickets.

0:09.3

Just go to therestispolities.com. That's the rest is politics.com.

0:13.8

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0:19.9

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0:33.5

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0:36.5

Sign up for your £1 per month trial at shopify.com.com.

0:45.1

Welcome to the rest of Pollage leading with me, Alastair Campbell.

0:51.1

And with me, Rory Stewart.

0:52.5

And we're now on the second part with Lord Kinnock.

0:55.2

So in the first part, we've had this extraordinary journey of this precocious young only child

1:01.7

from a working class background in Wales who becomes a very young MP in his late 20s

1:06.5

is on the left of the Labour Party who's rebelling against the government 79 times, who actually

1:14.1

at that period was in favour of leaving the European Union and then comes in, in the early

1:20.6

1980s, takes over in 1983 after a catastrophic Labour defeat as a leader of the Labour Party and has the job of trying to rebuild the Labor Party as a winning political machine.

1:33.4

And he has an extraordinary problem. We learned in the last episode about the fights with militant tendency and people trying to drag Labor to the far left.

1:41.9

You Neil were in this incredibly polarized environment represented by, you know, Margaret

1:47.5

Thatcher and the right of the Tory party in the one hand, Tony Benn on the left to the

1:51.3

Labour Party and the other, and you were trying to navigate towards what you saw as reasonable

1:56.0

middle grounds on councilhouse sales, on Arthur Scargle and the miners strike, you go into the election

...

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