The Edition: Labour’s civil war is distracting from the real crisis
Best of the Spectator
The Spectator
4.3 • 826 Ratings
🗓️ 14 May 2026
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week: William Moore is joined by The Spectator’s political correspondent Noa Hoffman, Telegraph columnist and Planet Normal co-host Liam Halligan, and The Spectator’s real life columnist Melissa Kite.
They unpack Tim Shipman and Noa Hoffman’s cover piece on the mounting coup against Keir Starmer. As Wes Streeting makes his move, Ed Miliband waits in the wings and Andy Burnham’s allies search for a route back to Westminster, is Labour now openly preparing for life after Starmer?
Also this week: Britain’s mounting economic crisis. Liam warns that the government is running out of road with the bond markets. Could a turn to the left push Britain towards a full-blown fiscal reckoning?
Plus: the death of the traditional B&B. Melissa explains why fussy guests, vegan breakfasts, TripAdvisor and the tyranny of instant reviews have made hospitality more fraught than ever.
Produced by Oscar Edmondson.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
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| 0:34.1 | Hello and welcome to the edition from The Spectator. |
| 0:39.2 | I'm William Moore, the Spectator's Features Editor, and the latest edition of the magazine |
| 0:44.0 | has just gone to print. |
| 0:46.0 | To talk about what's in it, I'm delighted to be joined by the Spectator's political |
| 0:49.5 | correspondent, Noah Hoffman, the Telegraph columnist and co-host of the Planet's normal podcast, |
| 0:55.0 | Liam Halligan, and the spectator's real-life columnist, Melissa Kite. |
| 0:59.6 | Our cover this week is Red Alert, and in it Tim Shipman and Noah Hoffman |
| 1:04.6 | write about the coup against Kirstama and how Labour's fate will be decided. |
| 1:10.2 | Well, Noah, I'd love to start with you, since you co-wrote this excellent and very revealing cover piece. |
| 1:14.6 | And, well, I called it a coup there at the beginning, but I suppose it's more accurate to call it coos, |
| 1:19.6 | plural, because there's so many moving factions right now. |
| 1:22.6 | Broadly, the state of play is that the parliamentary Labour Party has decided that Kirstama |
| 1:30.2 | is done for. The number of MPs truly loyal to the Prime Minister, and by that I mean, |
| 1:35.8 | are not behind his back or behind closed doors saying, look, publicly, I'm declaring I support |
| 1:40.2 | him, but deep down I know it's over. They're very small and rapidly dwindling number. |
| 1:46.0 | So what we're expecting to happen is Wes Streeting will be the first person to make a move |
... |
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