This is Spectator Radio and you're listening to The Spectator podcast with Lara Prendergast.

Hello and welcome to the Spectators podcast. I'm Lara Prendergast. This week a new centrist party

finally formed. So what does this mean for British politics? Plus we talk about artificial intelligence and ask, is it something to fear?

And finally, we look at Hindus and ask why are they often so crass?

So, it's finally happened.

This week, a cross-party group of moderate MPs broke ranks and formed a new centrist group.

They're not quite a party and in the end

there wasn't anything in particular that triggered it. The former Tory and Labour MPs just decided

that finally enough was enough. James Forsyth writes in this week's cover article that though the group is

small, they could cause big problems for both parties. Katie Balls spoke to James, Gavin Chuker, a former Labour MP and one of

the founding members of the Independent Group, and Joe Twyman, director of Delta Pole, to see what they

make of the new party. So Gavin, how did the independent group come together? I think after the 2017

election, it became clear that the idea stay and fight and the

kind of Corbynite strain that had taken over the leadership was going to take over the party.

You see a Labour Party now that's captured at every single level, constitutional committee,

leadership, parliamentary Labour Party, you know, if we were to force a vote of no confidence while

we were in it, I'm not convinced that this PLP would pass a vote of no confidence in Jeremy Corbyn,

for example. And then it becomes, well, what's your response going to be? Because you can't go out

there and advocate a Corbyn government. That means you either slink off or you try and develop

something different. And so I think

for me, my thinking started to solidify about 18 months ago. We stayed in to try and shake the best

outcome on Brexit. It's clear Corbyn is not going to be dragged, kicking or screaming to a people's

...