The Starmer Crisis in Historical Perspective – Part 1

Past Present Future

D&HR Media Ltd

History, Politics, News, Society & Culture, Philosophy

4.7 • 747 Ratings

🗓️ 17 May 2026

⏱️ 73 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Today it’s the first of two episodes in which we try to make sense of what’s happening in British politics with a bit of historical perspective: how did we arrive at the current crisis and what might come next? David talks to five experts to get their perspectives on the seemingly endless chaos and the deeper causes that lie behind it. You’ll hear from historians Robert Saunders, Anthony Seldon and David Klemperer along with Hannah White from the Institute for Government and political scientist Rob Ford. How did it all go so wrong for Keir Starmer so quickly? Is this about his failings or is there something much bigger going on? Out now on PPF+: the second part of David’s conversation with Sarah O’Connor in which they discuss what happens when humans and machines work together: do they become more like us or do we become more like them? To get this and all our bonus episodes plus ad-free listening sign up to PPF+ now https://www.ppfideas.com/join-ppf-plus You can find out everything you need to know about this podcast – who we are, what we do, plus merch, events and full lists of all episodes including PPF+ bonus episodes on our website https://www.ppfideas.com Next Time: The Starmer Crisis in Historical Perspective Part 2 – What Comes Next? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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1:07.8	podcast.
1:08.8	Today, it is the first of two episodes in which we're going to
1:12.5	try and make some sense of what is going on at the moment in British politics, how we got to
1:19.3	this state of affairs and how we might get out of them, but also trying to give a bit of historical
1:25.0	perspective. You're going to hear a series of conversations with five
1:29.6	experts recorded over the past few days in which we are going to try and uncover the long,
1:35.6	the medium and the short-term causes of the current crisis. If you're a regular listener, you'll know that we don't chase the news on this podcast.
1:48.8	We are not one of those podcasts.
1:50.7	I did have a podcast of that kind a while ago that chased the news, particularly during the Brexit years.
1:56.7	And I can tell you it's exhausting.
1:59.3	But the current state of British politics is so interesting
2:03.3	and in many ways so unusual. It does seem to fit the remit of this podcast, which is to try and
2:09.4	connect the past, the present and the future. And there is a puzzle here, how we got to this point.
	...

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