Quite right!: Who could replace Keir Starmer? – Q&A
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The Spectator
4.4 • 785 Ratings
🗓️ 17 November 2025
⏱️ 33 minutes
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Summary
To submit your urgent questions to Michael and Maddie, go to: spectator.co.uk/quiteright
This week on Quite right! Q&A: Could Britain see a snap election before 2029? Michael and Maddie unpack the constitutional mechanics – and explain why, despite the chaos, an early vote remains unlikely. They also turn to Labour’s troubles: growing pressure on Keir Starmer, restive backbenchers, and whether Angela Rayner’s sacking has boosted her chances as his successor.
Plus: should the Scottish Parliament be abolished? And on a lighter note, if you won a free holiday but had to take one Labour MP, who would you choose?
Produced by Oscar Edmondson.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | If you'd like to submit your questions for Quite Right, next week, you can do so at Spectator.com. |
| 0:05.0 | com.uk, forward slash, Quite Right. |
| 0:12.4 | Hello, I'm Michael Gove, editor of The Spectator. |
| 0:15.4 | And I'm Madeleine Grant, assistant editor and parliamentary sketchwriter at The Spectator. |
| 0:19.5 | And this week on Quiet Rights Rights Question and Answer Special Edition, |
| 0:25.0 | we'll be discussing whether or not there may be a general election before 2029, |
| 0:29.7 | whether the Scottish Parliament should be abolished, |
| 0:32.5 | and who, if we were fortunate enough, to win a holiday abroad on the condition that we took a Labour MP, we'd take with us. |
| 0:42.1 | So Michael, the first audience question comes from Sheridan Guinness. |
| 0:46.6 | He says, there seems to be a high likelihood that there will be a general election before 2029. |
| 0:52.5 | I would love to know about the mechanics of how a government |
| 0:55.4 | would have its term ended prematurely do tell. Well, maybe there should be an election before |
| 1:00.7 | 2009, but I actually think it's unlikely. So for a general election to occur, the prime minister |
| 1:08.0 | either has to lose the confidence of the House of Commons or ask the monarch for a dissolution. |
| 1:14.5 | And I think in either case it would require the Prime Minister and the Labour Party together |
| 1:21.7 | really to believe that they should go to the country. |
| 1:25.8 | And even if Kirsteines's replaced, which you might |
| 1:27.8 | touch on in a moment, I don't think that any current Labour Prime Minister would want, given the Labour's |
| 1:33.7 | poll rating overall, to face the electorate. And I certainly don't think Labour MPs would want to |
| 1:38.0 | face the electorate. And so Labour MPs overall, whatever their views of Kirstonga, whatever their concerns about the future, |
| 1:46.5 | are unlikely to consent to any leader asking the king for a general election, and they're unlikely |
| 1:53.0 | to desert Kirstonga en masse, or indeed any Labour leader en masse, and call for an election. |
... |
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