This is Spectator Radio and you're listening to The Spectator podcast with Isabel Hardman.

Hello and welcome to The Spectator podcast. I'm Isabel Hardman.

Despite the shambolic Tory government, Labour is still trailing in the polls.

This week, we ask, is Corbyn cracking up? Plus is wearing a

hijab necessarily oppressive, and last have younger members of the royal family brought into a

narrative of victimhood. So first up, is Labour splitting? Despite everything that's ailed this

Tory government, Labour is still trailing behind in some polls,

and others show that the Conservative Party would still win a general election if one were held today. So what's wrong with the Labour Party? Nick Cohen writes in this week's cover piece

that the cult of Corbyn is cracking up. He joins me now, together with Stephen Bush, political editor

of the new statesman, to discuss.

So, Nick, you paint quite a depressing picture of the Labour Party at the moment. What's going on?

Well, and the Tory Party. I mean, I think we've, as a spectator podcast, you've got to emphasize everything you can say about the Labour Party, you can say about the Conservative Party as well well it depends where you are it's well what's going on is there's a split coming but

the splitters are split among themselves so to speak there's going to be perhaps quite soon who

knows you're doing with politicians about eight or so breaking away they don't from the labour party

yes they don't have a name for a new party. Have they come up with any rubbish names?

Well, you do sit there and you wander and you think, oh God, they're going to hire some kind of brand consultancy and call themselves egg or orange or something.

That's just going to happen. And from the point of view of the people who think what's happening with the Labour Party, their lack of internationalism, their anti-Europeanism,

their personality cults, they're anti-Semitism. Eight seems a rather prophetic number in a way,

but then on top of that, you talk to lots of MPs, including, I spoke to many MPs if I could for this

piece, including MPs who you'd have fought, I would have fought anyway.

Well, you know, they'll be going and they're not because they're social, I think it's an important division between people who just want a new party and people who are social democrats and want

a social democratic part, or they want the old Labour Party back in the way.

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