Emily Thornberry on the Corbyn era, being left out of government and Starmer’s first year
Political Currency
Persephonica
4.1 • 1.5K Ratings
🗓️ 28 August 2025
⏱️ 78 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Political Currency’s summer specials continue! This week, while Ed Balls is away, George Osborne is joined by one of Labour's longest-serving and most compelling figures, Dame Emily Thornberry.
Thornberry takes George inside the Corbyn-era shadow cabinet and explores the tantalising 'what if' of 2017: what would a Prime Minister Corbyn really have been like, and how would the British state have coped?
From her unique vantage point as a senior backbencher, Thornberry offers a frank assessment of the new government's first year. She argues for more confidence and a clearer plan to tackle the problems Starmer’s cabinet inherited, warning against being "buffeted about” by criticism. Throughout, she reflects on two decades in Parliament and why, despite rebellions and disappointments, she remains “Labour through and through”.
Plus, Ed and George reunite to explain the brutal art of a government’s first reshuffle. As Westminster braces for Sir Keir Starmer's first major shake-up, they reveal what it's really like to be hired, fired, and moved sideways by a Prime Minister.
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Credits:
Producer: Miriam Hall
Senior Producer: Silvia Maresca
Video Editor: Maha Albadrawi
Executive Producer: Ellie Clifford
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Transcript
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