Are prime ministers too dependent on their top advisers?

Will Labour's leadership hopefuls grapple with the UK's real problems?

As new revelations about the cost and delays to HS2 stun Westminster, the team debates our failures to build. And as the Burnham and Streeting teams gear up for a fight the other side of Makerfield, will the face off deliver substantive plans? Plus: John Swinney is going on. The SNP government is going on. ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Will Andy Burnham make it to Downing Street?

After a crazy week, in this weekend edition the team takes stock of how we got to a full blown leadership crisis in Labour. Will the most dangerous challenger make it in Makerfield's by-election? Do the explosive set of results from May 7 contain a wider warning than Reform's march across the North West? And perhaps Brenda from Bristol should brace for yet another one. Plus: politics and vitriol. ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Why do British prime ministers have such a short shelf-life?

Reunited in the studio to compare notes in the middle of Starmer's leadership crisis, the team ask what has gone wrong in less than two years. Is this story of disenchantment a uniquely Labour one? Is it all about the electoral pressures on the party, Starmer’s mistakes, or has the UK developed an allergy to incumbents? Plus: Gordon Brown's surprise comeback under the spotlight. ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

What is behind the UK's transformed electoral landscape?

With a few reminiscences of past elections thrown in, the team debate a fractured voting public in the run up to May 7th. Are we a UK of "fed-up-niks" and does malaise spring from economics? How intense is the political fervour to left and right? Plus: the hard-to-decipher polling in Scotland. ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Are prime ministers too dependent on their top advisers?

After Morgan McSweeney’s first public appearance - in front of the Foreign Affairs committee - we explore the dependence of some prime ministers on their chiefs of staff. Why do they make themselves dependent even when the dependency can lead towards their doom? Plus, did McSweeney emerge as a more complex figure than his caricature and where does this all leave Starmer? ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.