Hello, hello, I'm Hugo Rifkin, and now we're going to be unpacking the politics of the day as another of Kirstemer's inner circle abandoned ship.

We're talking about that to West Streeting borrowing other MP staffers, Angela Rainer's hair and Al Carnes's pint.

And joining me are two people who promised they're not plotting to replace me, although they would say that. And the Times column is Seb Payne. Hello, Seb. Hello, Hugo. How are you? What do you care? I'm just trying to be nice, okay? I won't bother in the future. And also the incoming TV critic for the Sunday Times, Charlotte Ivers. Yeah, so I'm not quite replacing you, Alamai, but I'm sort of taking a similar job to the job

you had a while ago a bit later. I think we can maybe call this a coup. I mean, yeah, that works. I mean, you're doing Sunday, I did Saturday. Yeah. It is the best job, I think, in written print journalism as being a Saturday TV critic. It's a lovely job. I hope you really like it. Saturday rather than Sunday, what's so much better about Saturday?

Weekend.

Weekend, yeah.

I always forget there's a paper on Sundays as well just you've got you've got you've got so much space you can you can watch what you like you can really get into it it's a lovely lovely gig yeah I'm looking forward to it I've been sort of preparing like rocky yeah what do I need to do so I've been watching all the things that I've missed and that mainly consists of sort of 2 p.m on a Tuesday, I'll be sitting there in my pajamas watching

Sopranos and what do I need to do? So I've been watching all the things that I've missed. And that mainly consists of sort of 2pm on a Tuesday. I'll be sitting there in my pyjamas watching the sopranos and going, yeah, this is a good job, isn't it? I like this. Hard life, Charlottes, isn't it? I mean, the bad weeks, my worst week as a TV critic was it was when a new series of, it was the last series of House of Cards dropped in its entirety, and I had to review it because it was the end of House of Cards, but I'd sort of failed to plot, failed to watch the previous maybe four serieses. So it was like cramming all of them into a Monday. It was just slightly losing your mind, wondering how many of them you can watch on a high speed. My main opinion of House of Cards, the US one, is it is just too, too long, which I imagine you shared by the end of that day watching all of this in one week.

Yeah, yeah, that was quite a week.

I'm like, oh, six. opinion of House of Cards, the US one is it is just too, too long, which I imagine you shared by the end of that day watching all of it.

That was quite a week. I'm like, oh, for 600 words at the end of it. Very odd. Anyway, I hope you love it. I'm sure you will. Let's talk about some actual news. Kirstarmer's position as Prime Minister looks more vulnerable than ever.

Tim Allen has now quit as Kirstarmer's Director of Communication,

saying I've decided to stand down to allow a new number 10 team to be built.

I wish the PM and his team every success. He only lasted six months. He was brought in during the last PM reset in September 2025, which wasn't that long ago. If you reset that often, as has been discussed, there's probably a problem with your boot loop.

Seb, but Tim Allen was close to Peter Mandelson.

So is Jonathan Powell.

He's still there.

Morgan Missweeney's just gone.

What a mess.

Yeah, it's not great, is it?

And it feels as if that we are in what you could call the death zone for prime ministers.

So Theresa May was there in 2019.

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