The Prime Ministers We Never Had: Steve Richards talks to Nick Cohen

The Bunker – News without the nonsense

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News, Government, Politics, Society & Culture

4.6 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 5 September 2021

⏱️ 37 minutes

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Summary

What stopped Heseltine, Ken Clarke, Dennis Healey and Kinnock from taking the top slot? Why didn’t Barbara Castle become Britain’s first female PM? The Observer’s Nick Cohen talks to the political columnist and podcaster Steve Richards about his new book The Prime Ministers We Never Had… the intriguing factors that prevented these politicians from reaching power… the tragedy of the Miliband Brothers… and the alternate futures we could have seen if these flawed talents had won. “Those with a formidable past tend not to take the crown BECAUSE of that past.” “If Heseltine had won the leadership contest in 1990, he would have redefined the Tories as a pro-EU party.” “The Dennis Healeys and RAB Butlers were TOO good. They alienated their own parties.” “Ken Clarke used to say ‘My hobby is standing in Tory leadership contests and losing.’” “Ed Miliband destroyed David – but David destroyed Ed too. Because Ed then lost all sense of who he was.” https://www.patreon.com/bunkercast https://www.hive.co.uk/Product/Steve-Richards/The-Prime-Ministers-We-Never-Had--Success-and-Failure-from-Butler-to-Corbyn/26113646 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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1:14.8	podcast live from a studio since COVID hit in March 2020 and to celebrate this
1:20.4	occasion we've wheeled out the big guns and bought in Steve Richards
1:25.2	political commentator, performer, podcaster and author of a fascinatingly oblique book about British history from Rab Butler to Jeremy
1:36.3	Corbyn called the Prime Ministers we've never had.
1:39.2	Steve, why did you want to write about politicians who in their own terms in the terms of society
1:47.0	failed to get to the top? I wrote a book and did a BBC series on modern prime ministers and then did some a short
1:57.5	series on prime ministers we never had and I found people were more interested in
2:01.7	them than the prime ministers and I found people were more interested in them than the Prime Ministers and I found
2:04.6	myself more interested. The reason being that all the characters in this book were
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