Do the Tories hate free trade? Plus, Reform hits new polling high
Coffee House Shots
The Spectator
4.4 • 2.1K Ratings
🗓️ 7 May 2025
⏱️ 15 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Conservatives have gone on the attack, despite the fact that a trade deal with India was supposed to be one of the major gains from Brexit – an example of how Britain could ‘venture out into the world’ and open up trade with fast-growing economies. Are the Tories now against free trade?
Interestingly, Kemi Badenoch omitted to ask about the trade deal at PMQs today, choosing instead to question Keir Starmer on the ongoing concerns around winter fuel and the pressure from many elements within his party to at least water down the policy. Can Starmer afford to U-turn?
James Heale speaks to Michael Simmons and Paul Goodman.
Produced by Oscar Edmondson.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The post-mortem has begun on a historic set of local elections, but where does each party go from here? |
| 0:06.1 | Is reform unstoppable? Is Kemi the one to lead the Conservative rebuild? And do Labor really get it? |
| 0:12.0 | This evening, the spectator is hosting a special panel discussion with James Heel, Michael Gove, Zia Yusuf and Jacob Rees-Mogg to unpack these questions as well as the broader implications of the locals on British politics. |
| 0:24.2 | For tickets, go to www.combe.combe.combeauce.combeauce Live. |
| 0:34.0 | Hello and welcome to Coffee House Shots. I'm James Hill and I'm joined today by Michael Simmons, our economics editor and Paul Goodman, Conservative Peer and former editor of Conservative Home. Now, Paul, it's been a very difficult week for the Conservatives. Obviously, on Friday, you saw one of the worst ever Conservative performance in the local elections. And now today, a poll has come out from EUGELF, which shows reform on 29%, labour on 22%, and the Conservatives |
| 0:55.5 | weigh down on 17%, which is their joint lowest rating ever, along with June 2019, just before |
| 1:03.1 | Theresa May handed over power to Boris Johnson. How is Kerry Bain not doing, and how does she kind of |
| 1:08.8 | pull her poll ratings and a party out of this slump? |
| 1:11.7 | So the cautionary note at the start is about the incredible volatility of British politics. |
| 1:17.1 | So in 10 years, you've been through five Conservative leaders, three Labour ones, Brexit, |
| 1:22.6 | COVID and the Ukraine war. |
| 1:24.9 | So you never quite know what's going to happen next. |
| 1:27.4 | But the trajectory |
| 1:28.5 | for the Conservatives is grim. I mean, this year, 23 councils were up and about 1,600 councillors. |
| 1:36.8 | Next year, it's 86 councils and over 3,000 councillors and Scotland and Wales. And it's not obvious what Kevin Bayne |
| 1:46.5 | can do turn the situation around quickly, given that so much of what's happening is a result of |
| 1:53.4 | the Conservative legacy in government, a voters feeling both the Conservatives and Labour have let |
| 1:58.4 | them down. And the voters, I think, not having immense |
| 2:01.6 | confidence in reform, but feeling that they're willing to give almost anything a go. I think |
| 2:07.3 | all Kimmy Bein-Lock can do is trying to ensure that she sticks to the three main things that |
| 2:13.5 | interest voters most, which are immigration, the NHS and the economy. And I've found the |
| 2:18.8 | relative silence of Kemi Bain and on the economy over the last six months, given the fact that |
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