The Douglas Alexander One
Political Thinking with Nick Robinson
BBC
4.6 • 2.4K Ratings
🗓️ 20 June 2025
⏱️ 43 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Trade Minister explains how a penalty shootout played a role in his government appointment.
Douglas Alexander has the same job that he had 20 years ago in Tony Blair's government. He reflects on how the world has changed in that time, and his motivation for returning to politics after a humiliating defeat in 2015.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. |
| 0:04.8 | Hello and welcome to political thinking. |
| 0:06.9 | There are some who wish the Prime Minister would have a kind of love actually moment |
| 0:10.6 | when he's standing alongside Donald Trump. |
| 0:13.5 | In other words, they want Kirstearner to behave like the fictional Prime Minister, |
| 0:17.3 | played by Hugh Grant in the movie, to put a US leader in his place. Instead, |
| 0:23.1 | Sakeer is proud to boast of how well he gets along with Trump and to brandish his trade deal |
| 0:28.7 | with the United States as evidence that it's all worth it. Together with new trade deals with the EU |
| 0:35.0 | and with India, the Prime Minister says he's putting prosperity |
| 0:38.1 | ahead of politics. My guest on political thinking this week is the trade minister, Douglas |
| 0:44.5 | Alexander. He's a veteran of the Brown Blair years, and he lost his seat when Labour were |
| 0:49.8 | almost wiped out in Scotland by the SMP in the 2015 election. |
| 0:55.0 | But after almost a decade working outside the Westminster bubble, |
| 0:58.8 | he chose to come back to politics, Parliament, and to a ministerial job. |
| 1:05.6 | Douglas Alexander, welcome to political thinking. |
| 1:07.6 | Hi, Nick. |
| 1:08.3 | It is almost a year since you returned to this Westminster bubble, to Parliament, to government. |
| 1:15.3 | Was it worth it? |
| 1:16.3 | What are the good things? |
| 1:17.1 | What are the bad things? |
| 1:18.4 | It's hard, but it's great. |
| 1:20.3 | The truth is, I guess the world is much more challenging than the last time I was in politics. |
... |
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