The '£7 billion' government secret
Electoral Dysfunction
Sky News
4.4 • 764 Ratings
🗓️ 18 July 2025
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
So in this episode, Beth, Ruth, and Harriet talk about the massive breach, the secret court hearings, and the constitutional chaos it’s unleashed.
Plus - the fallout from the latest Labour rebellion. Four MPs have lost the whip - officially for repeated defiance, but unofficially? A government source called it "persistent knobheadery".
So is Keir Starmer tightening his grip or losing control? And how does this compare to rebellions of Labour past?
Oh and singer Chesney Hawkes gets an unexpected mention.
Responding to claims in the podcast about whether Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle could have scrutinised the government, a Commons spokesperson said: "As has been made clear, Mr Speaker was himself under a superinjunction, and so would have been under severe legal restrictions regarding speaking about this. He would have had no awareness which organisations or individuals were and were not already aware of this matter.
"The injunction could not constrain proceedings in parliament and between being served with the injunction in September 2023 and the 2024 General Election Mr Speaker granted four UQs on matters relating to Afghan refugees and resettlement schemes.
"Furthermore, as set out in the Justice and Security Act 2013, the Speaker has no powers to refer matters to the Intelligence and Security Committee."
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Okay. |
| 0:01.4 | Nobody. |
| 0:02.6 | Shut up. |
| 0:04.5 | Okay. |
| 0:05.4 | Hello and welcome to, sorry. |
| 0:07.9 | Hello and welcome to Electoral. |
| 0:09.5 | Roos making me laugh. |
| 0:10.6 | Let me, Ruth, stop it. |
| 0:15.6 | Hello and welcome to Electral Disfunction from Sky News with me, Beth Rigby. Me Ruth Davidson and me Harriet Harmon. And I hope you two have had a better week than the four Labour MPs that have lost the WIC this week. I've had a good week. They've not had a good week. They've had not had a good week. But let's come to them later. Let's hear about Ruth's week. Come on. Why have you had a good week? |
| 0:38.7 | I met a childhood hero this week and can I just say was as lovely in the flesh as you would |
| 0:43.8 | hope to meet. I met drum roll. I met Tresne Hawks ladies and gentlemen. I know. Him of the long |
| 0:52.6 | blonde flowing locks. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, when I was a pre-teen, like he was on my wall. Actually, I feel a bit bad because I slightly fanguerled over him. He is genuinely a fundamentally lovely man, restored my faith in humanity. Was this on the Masked Singer? I knew you were going to go on that. No, I can't sing for Toffee, so it definitely wasn't the mass singer. Well, you've had a good week, Ruth. As I was saying, there's people that have had a less good week, and there's been quite a lot of quite serious and heavy news this week. We're going to talk about those MPs that have lost the whip, what it means to breach party discipline and what it says about |
| 1:28.0 | Stama's leadership. |
| 1:30.1 | But first we're going to reflect on that huge revelation this week about how a list of thousands |
| 1:34.1 | of Afghans at risk from the Taliban were threatened to be put up on Facebook, how it was |
| 1:38.8 | kept secret for years, and how it's now costing the UK billions and billions of pounds. |
| 1:48.7 | First of all, on this Afghan story that's running this week, |
| 1:51.7 | I think it's important that we do a bit of a background |
| 1:53.4 | because it all goes back to the 11th of September 2001 |
| 1:57.2 | when after the Twin Towers attack, |
| 2:00.6 | the UK first got involved in Afghanistan as an ally of the US. |
| 2:05.3 | So our military joined the US-led coalition to try and dismantle Al-Qaeda and remove the Taliban |
... |
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