Going the way of the dodo? The decline of Britain's two main parties.
Analysis
BBC
4.6 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 15 July 2019
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Recent polling data and election results paint a picture of woe for Britain's two main political parties. Of course both Labour and the Conservatives have suffered periods of decline throughout their history. But arguably never before have both parties been so riven by internal divides and suffered such a loss of public confidence at the same time. Edward Stourton looks to historical precedents for guidance on today's political turmoil and asks if the two parties' decline is now terminal. With Tim Bale of Queen Mary University of London; Lord Lexden, official historian of the Conservative Party; Deborah Mattinson of Britain Thinks; Charlotte Lydia Riley of the University of Southampton; John Sergeant, former BBC Chief Political Correspondent; and Adrian Wooldrige, author of the "Bagehot" column at The Economist.
Transcript
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| 0:41.0 | Hello, thanks for listening to this edition of Analysis. podcasts. Edward Sturtin is going to explore whether Brexit could spell the end for the two main political parties in Britain. |
| 0:57.0 | And what are they going to make you now? |
| 1:01.0 | This question was asked of her husband by a lady with whom perhaps the readers of this |
| 1:05.6 | volume may have already formed some acquaintance. The lady was the Duchess of Omnium and her |
| 1:11.6 | husband was of course the Duke. In the Prime Minister one of the series |
| 1:16.7 | of Palliser novels Anthony Trollope paints a vivid picture of British politics in the middle |
| 1:21.9 | of the 19th century. In order that the middle of the 19th century. |
| 1:23.0 | In order that the nature of the question asked by the Duchess may be explained, |
| 1:27.0 | it must be stated that just at this time the political affairs of the nation |
| 1:31.0 | had got themselves tied up into one of those truly |
| 1:33.6 | desperate knots, from which even the wisdom and experience of septogenarian statesmen can |
| 1:39.4 | see no unravelment. |
| 1:42.0 | The heads of parties were at a standstill. In the House of Commons there was, |
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