← Political Thinking with Nick Robinson
Political Thinking with Nick Robinson
Preparing Farage for Power: Danny Kruger on defecting to Reform UK
00:43:29
How can Christian conservatism save our society?
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- [00:00]
Danny Kruger
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Nick Robinson
Hello and welcome to Political Thinking. The Conservative Party is over. Over as a national party, over as the principal opposition to the left. With those words, my guest this week on Political Thinking abandoned the party he'd been all his life and joined Nigel Farage's Reform UK instead. Danny Kruger was not just the only serving Conservative MP to have switched sides, he was also the only Tory to defect with more of a future than a past. Having been speechwriter to one Conservative leader, David Cameron, and political secretary to another, Boris Johnson, he was seen as the next generation of Conservative leadership. There's one other thing which makes him unique. He's an ideas man who published a book arguing for the revival of religion, Christianity, in order to roll back the ideas which he says are undermining families, neighbourhoods and the country. Danny Krueger, welcome to Political Thinking.
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Danny Kruger
Thank you.
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Nick Robinson
Nick, you have only just defected from a party. You've been in, what, two decades? How are you feeling now? Is it painful? Is it remorseful? Are you excited?
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Danny Kruger
All of those things? It was painful. It is painful and it was very painful on the day I did it. Not an enjoyable experience. I don't recommend it if you're trying to have a good day to leave the party of more like 30 years. I mean, as a student, I went to the Conservative Party Scottish Conference and I have been involved in all sorts of ways and levels over that time and I've got a lot of good friends who I know are hurt and only a few have had a go at me and they weren't friends anyway. The people I care about are, I think, know, silently regretful and sorry.
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Nick Robinson
I said in the introduction, you worked for David Cameron, you worked for Boris Johnson, but much more recently, you tried to get Robert Jenrick elected. You were campaign manager for his campaign. What was the moment then? Because that isn't very long ago when you thought, actually, game's up.
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Danny Kruger
Yeah, it was over this summer. There wasn't a specific moment, but a year ago when the. Well, we lost the election last July, there was a leadership election then I supported Rob. What I hoped then is that the party would recognize the scale of the challenge it faced. And that meant, I'm afraid to say, repudiating a lot of the recent past of the Conservative Party doing something quite painful might have involved some internal controversy. I think Rob was up for that, but he didn't win. We've had a different strategy, or the Conservative Party had a different strategy, which was to maintain unity at all costs and to Go away and do some serious thinking and then come back when the public were ready to hear from us. Them. I respect that strategy. I think it was the wrong one and it hasn't worked.
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Nick Robinson
But I didn't notice what you did then.
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Danny Kruger
The we and the. And the.
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Nick Robinson
You almost said us.
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Danny Kruger
I'm more. I'm constantly saying that rather than them. I mean, listen, you know, reform is very different from the Conservative Party, but I'm still a Conservative and I still have a lot of friendships in the Conservative Party and I regret what has happened on a personal level, but if.
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Nick Robinson
They'D chosen a different leader of the Conservative Party, and he has Robert Jenrick in, if he had not just apologised for immigration policy, which Kimmy Badenoch has done, not just apologised for the level of spending and tax and debt, which I think Kemi Badenoch has done, what else would he have done that would have meant, ah, right, yes, I can stay a Conservative.
- [03:26]
Danny Kruger
Well, listen, I don't want to get into a critique of Kemi's strategy. I think the fundamental one was the suggestion that the best thing to do for the Conservative Party is to disappear from sight for a year or more and to not make deliberate and bold policy pledges that were needed. So the fundamental one, and the reason, actually I supported Rob for his leadership and Sylla Braveman before that in the previous leadership election, was because they recognized we need to get out of the echr, that fundamental principle about sovereignty and the practical necessity of extricating ourselves from a legal framework that prevents us from delivering what the public all want, which is an end to uncontrolled illegal migration. That's what we needed to do back then and we still haven't. We, the Conservative Party, still haven't done it yet. Who approached who I approached, Nigel, is probably the most accurate way of saying it. Obviously, conversation's gone on in a very informal way. I mean, I know Lee Anderson well, having been a colleague of his previously. I didn't know Nigel well and what happened was I approached him to say over the course of the summer, I think you're right, I don't think the Consola Party is going to come back from this. I think you represent the best chance that the country has, but also those of us of a Conservative disposition have, and I think I should join you.
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Nick Robinson
That's the flattery. But did you also, as someone doing something rather important for him as well as for you say, but I need to know this and I need to know that.
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Danny Kruger
Yes. So what I wanted to. What I. Exactly. So the conversation essentially went along the lines of, I think you're right, but I need to have confidence that you're serious, not just that you have the right analysis and diagnosis of the country's problems, because in a sense, those are obvious. I think he's articulated them with clarity and courage for many years and deserves credit for that. But in a sense, we can all see what the problem is, those of us on the right. Anyway, what I need to know, and I think what the whole country wants to know, is will reform actually deliver? Will they make a plan for government that is coherent, credible, responsible and radical? And that's the conversation we had over those over the last few weeks. And the good news is he said, yes, I do, and I'd like you to help deliver it, which I was pleased about.
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Nick Robinson
So intriguing about this is it's not many weeks ago that you said of them there is a problem, they would like to spend money like drunken sailors. Now, that was July.
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Danny Kruger
So in July. Yeah, that's true.
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Nick Robinson
At that stage you thought they were not fit.
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Danny Kruger
Well, I was very worried about that. I said, I think if you gave the full quote, you'd hear me saying, I agree with the Reform Party's position on many things.
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Nick Robinson
It's quite a big but, though, isn't it?
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Danny Kruger
Well, the but was because of what they were saying at that time about the welfare reforms that were being introduced by the Labour government and they were opposed to them, in other words, and they wanted to maintain the spending on the. They want to scrap the two trial limit for universal credit. And I actually think they're in the right place on that. But I was very concerned at that stage before the summer that they didn't seem to have any real plan about reducing welfare spending overall. And I'm glad to say that since then, they had a party conference in which Nigel Farrow said very clearly they absolutely are going to cut welfare spending. He said it again at the press conference this week. So, on that very important question, will they bring down overall public spending and particularly on welfare, they're in the right position, and so they're not going to spend money like drunken sailors.
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Nick Robinson
Thankfully, now, Nigel Farage is not the only person that you met this summer. You Met Vice President J.D. vance. Do you share his analysis of what is wrong, not just with this country, but possibly with the west, if you still use that idea?
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Danny Kruger
I think I do, yes. I mean, I absolutely do. Where I'm hesitant is perhaps in the tone and some of the examples that Americans Cite about Britain. I think they've got a very, very negative view of the state of our country. But fundamentally, I do agree with what the Vice President is saying about the state of our country, both the problems we have due to mass migration over many years and the problems of an overweening state that is restricting personal liberty and free speech in particular. So, yes, I think he's right to say what he said and to challenge the west in general, in Europe most of all.
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Nick Robinson
You mean you don't like the language we heard this week from Donald Trump, the talk of an invasion of migrants, of Sharia law?
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Danny Kruger
Yeah, I mean, listen, I think it's acceptable for politicians to speak in sort of democratic language, we might say. I think one of the problems we've got is that there's an expectation that the tone that politicians use has to be extremely sort of highfalutin or professional. And quite frankly, does it have to be true?
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Nick Robinson
It's simply not true that Sharia law is being introduced?
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Danny Kruger
Well, there are a number of Sharia courts operating in the UK which are explicitly tolerated by the British system. So I do think it's a legitimate concern. We absolutely have to be very, very mindful of the imposition of alternative legal systems in our country. So I think that's a legitimate concern, concern that people have in this country and abroad. And I do want to insist that I think it's acceptable. And Boris Johnson needs to get in trouble for this as well, using language that ordinary people use, like invasion. And then a whole sort of deluge of opposition and sort of tone policing kicks in from the media and from opposition parties, as if he's not allowed to use plain English.
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Nick Robinson
It's interesting you say that, because I read in preparation for this interview, a book you published a couple of years ago called the Covenant. My God, you're gloomy, aren't you, Danny? I mean, you say at one point society is depleted, contaminated and at risk.
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Danny Kruger
Yeah. Wow. Don't you think, Nick? I mean, you're, you're, you know, you think everything's going fine. I think there are real reasons to be very, very worried about the state of our society. There are also massive reasons to be optimistic, as if you read on in that book, you would have seen. I have.
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Nick Robinson
And we'll talk about the ideas that.
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Danny Kruger
You think might make a difference. It could be absolutely tremendous for our country, and I'm very optimistic on that front, but I very worried about it.
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Nick Robinson
Hold on a second. I want to remind you that you make a comparison with the monuments like Stonehenge, you say in the introduction of the book, our own great monuments, our towers and our temples, our intelligent machines face the fate of the Neolithic ones to be ruins, broken masonry, only bones in holes. To speak of who we were. You sound like a man with one of those sandwich boards saying the end of the world is nice.
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Danny Kruger
Well, you know, there are, there are, there is that possibility. I mean, their technology is now accelerating to the point where we could extinguish ourselves at the press of a button or the crack of a vial. You know, there are huge dangers representing, presenting themselves to us. But let me emphasize, I mean, I'm being romantic there about my own constituency. I represent this amazing Neolithic landscape with the monuments of these extinct civilizations. And I was making the point, not totally flippantly, but with some irony, I think, about the fact that civilizations pass and there's no. We have no right to exist as a culture or civilization. And I do think there are serious threats to the UK specifically, but to the west in general about the way we are going. But as I say, the great thing about this country and our culture across the west is that it always has the seeds of renewal in it. And I think if we remind ourselves of the way we should live, which is an inherited set of understandings, I think we can fit ourselves for the 21st century very successfully.
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Nick Robinson
Well, let's explore that a bit because Christian conservatism is how you've defined your thinking, this belief in family and neighbourhood and country. Before we come to exactly what you mean by that, let's talk about the roots of it. Usually when I interview people on this program, their roots are in their childhood. But your conversion to Christianity comes later, doesn't it? Comes with meeting your wife?
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Danny Kruger
Yes, yes, my then girlfriend. So that's right. In my mid-20s, I grew up an atheist in an atheist family, but I mean a small C conservative one with I think a real, just inherited respect for the kind of values that I now have. So there wasn't a great wrench in terms of my worldview, but except fundamentally, I came to believe in the Christian faith and that happened thanks to Emma and the moment, there was a moment of conversion there. Unlike my defection to reform, I can pinpoint the moment. It was when I was reading CS Lewis, Mere Christianity and somewhere in that book, between starting and finishing it, I became a Christian. And yes, I was in my mid-20s then.
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Nick Robinson
And that shapes your life. I mean, some people come on this podcast, say Shabadha Mahmood, for example, the new Home Secretary, Faith Trumps everything. For me. It's more important than party, it's more important in the end than countries. Is faith the defining, as it were, goes through you like a stick of rock.
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Danny Kruger
I respect Shamana for saying that, and I think that's right, but I think that applies to all of us. So, yes, the answer is absolutely. Of course, I would hope, I would put my beliefs, my faith ahead of anything. That's what we're required to do as believers, if it's fundamental, foundational above all. But I actually think, Nick, that applies to all of us. I mean, how else do we proceed in our lives from day to day except guided by our values, our metaphysics, what we think we're here for, what we think matters. So I think we are all religious beings.
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Nick Robinson
And yet, as you made very clear, your parents were not, in the case of. Your mother is not.
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Danny Kruger
Nan's religious too. She just has a different religion.
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Nick Robinson
What do you call her religion?
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Danny Kruger
Atheism. I mean, you know what atheism is, is the belief there's nothing out there except me. You know, I'm. I could poke my head up into the. Into the supernatural and I look around and I just see myself. I mean, that's what I think is so empty about it as a religion, but fundamentally it is one. It is a belief about what exists.
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Nick Robinson
Do you have debates on that level with. And let's tell people who don't know who your mother is that she's pruleath known for Bake Off? Do you in at home when you get together?
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Danny Kruger
Yes, we've had that.
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Nick Robinson
We've had philosophical debate.
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Danny Kruger
Yes, yes, absolutely. I mean, my mum is absolutely brilliant. I have huge love and respect for her and she's been such an important influence over me, including in this idea that, you know, you follow your values and your beliefs and you live them out. She's been nothing but supportive of me and my politics. She doesn't agree with everything I stand for or say. And she and I disagree profoundly on the assisted suicide debate, where she's been a very prominent campaigner for it. I'm very against it, but yeah, we are. We've always been able to discuss this. As my sister and my late father, it's never been difficult to disagree. Well, in my family, which is a great blessing.
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Nick Robinson
How was it growing up with a mother who, even when you were a child, was very prominent and independent?
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Danny Kruger
I don't know. What was it like growing up without it? I mean, this was my childhood, wasn't it? Yeah. I mean, I had never Struck me as stranger until I was older, that my mom was in the papers when I was young. Maybe be different now. I mean she's like mega famous. She was quite a big deal in the 80s. She was on TV a lot. We didn't have social media. So I think, I think of being a celebrity like she is now is probably a different order, but I'm very detached from it actually.
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Nick Robinson
Do you think of it as a life of privilege? I mean, you were fairly well off. You went to Eton, you went to.
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Danny Kruger
Oxford, massively, of course. Yeah, I, I have always been very conscious of that. And without sounding too pompous, I hope I recognize the responsibilities that that brings to that. I've been very blessed in this life, materially and relationally. I mean, fundamentally the best blessing you can have is a happy upbringing. But yeah, I know materially I have had.
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Nick Robinson
Easily reflecting on what you thought though, that's been. You've been on a journey, not just from one party to another. Looking back, you were honest enough to describe yourself, and I quote, as a horrible little Thatcherite. Were you that horrible?
- [15:11]
Danny Kruger
No, I mean, it's not that horrible, but I was a sort of purist libertarian as a teenager. I grew out of it as I wish everyone would, who still holds to that philosophy that, you know, we're just solitary individuals. The only rule is don't hurt others, get on with your life. You know, the idea that everyone is selfish and that's good because it'll produce good for everybody else. I just don't think that's an adequate worldview. It wasn't actually Thatcher's worldview either. Of course. He was much more of a proper conservative. But that's the caricature that I was momentarily taken with. Taken with. But it didn't last. I read Edmund Burke, I read. I became a communitarian at university. That's what, that's what, what's interesting when.
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Nick Robinson
I read this book, it's not just that you've, as it were, inadverted commons. I don't mean this patronizingly grown up, lots of people do that you actively reject pretty much everything you used to stand for. You think individualism is the root of evil in our society, don't you? Is that too strong? I mean, in the book you talk about the contest between something you call the idea and the order. And the idea that you dislike, I think is individualism, isn't it?
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Danny Kruger
Yeah. I mean at its simplest it is. It's the idea that we're self creating beings who can decide what is good and bad and what is actual reality? I mean, we can create reality. We can decide. I mean, the most obvious recent example, we can decide what sex we are. You know, we can defy biological reality because that is our sovereign right as individuals. There's a sort of terrible narcissism at the heart, I think, of modern culture, which is unnatural. It doesn't make us happy. It runs against all that we understand about actually how human beings develop, that we are relational. And my conservatism proceeds from the idea that there's a we before an I, that in fact freedom and individualism are the products of a stable society and we can't be properly free unless we meaningfully belong. So that's my conservatism.
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Nick Robinson
Some people, when they heard of your defection, were slightly surprised by what they then read about you. Here is the guy who wrote probably one of the most famous speeches delivered by a leader of the Opposition. If you're old enough, you'll remember it well, which became known as the Hug a Hoodie speech. You wrote that speech for David Cameron, which was the idea of embracing people you might be fearful of, indeed embracing, as you did when you set up a charity for offenders, embracing having in your own home, which you did, people who've done terrible things in society.
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Danny Kruger
So I'm very proud of that speech. It was a lesson in political communication, because I discovered through it, you can't get more than one idea in a headline. And we were actually trying to say two things, both of which are true, both conservative, I think. One is if people break the law, they need to be properly punished. But if before that, and frankly, after they've been punished, they need the support of a community and particularly these young offenders. It was during the sort of hoodie scare of antisocial behaviour on our streets. Very real problem now as well, we do need to recognize these are young people who need the support of a strong family and a community, but they also need clear boundaries and they need swift punishment when they break the law. Those are not controversial ideas to me, and I'm proud that David Cameron was saying them.
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Nick Robinson
Many Conservatives wouldn't think as you did. And David Cameron said of saying, when you see a child walking down the road, hoodie up, head down, moody, swaggering, dominating the pavement, think what has brought that child to that moment. It's about emotion and emotional development. Most Conservatives, I suspect, at the Reform UK conference, you wouldn't get any applause for that view. They'd want you to stand up and say, punish them.
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Danny Kruger
Well, Both. Well, not punish them for walking down the street, I hope, but yeah, punish them if they actually commit crime. I think both those things are true, though, Nick, and that's the point we're making. And actually, I mean, I stand by. Thanks for reading it out. I haven't heard that for years, but yeah, that's. That's right. I mean, I spent daytime today, as you said. We set up a charity, Emma and I, working in prisons, still running, was there today with a bunch of our ex offenders. I'm very pleased that they felt the full force of the law for the crimes they did, but they also need support to not to reoffend. And I think a decent society recognizes the need for justice, but also the need for getting around ex offenders and young people at risk and saying, how can we put you on a better path? For me, that feels both right and perfectly conservative. And actually, I think I challenge your idea of reform voters, Nick. Seriously.
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Nick Robinson
Well, referring to Nigel Farage, let me ask you about him. I mean, if you had that conversation.
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Danny Kruger
With him, he'd agree with that, would he?
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Nick Robinson
Doesn't he believe in building many more.
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Danny Kruger
Prisons and deporting lots of people from prison? So do I. But listen, who actually doesn't think what I've just said is true, which is we need justice and we need rehabilitation and we need to help young people not go down a life of crime. Of course, Nigel thinks that. As do reform members, I'm sure.
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Nick Robinson
Let's return to what you called in your book the idea and why you see this idea, whatever it is, as a threat. I watched a fascinating speech you gave in the House of Commons not so long ago in a debate that you had called and organized, in which you called for a recovery of Christian politics and you spoke about Islam. We'll come to that. But you also spoke about what you called the other religion. That worries me even more, a deeply dangerous ideology of power. What are you talking about?
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Danny Kruger
Well, I wish we had a better name than Woke up, because I think Woke sort of trivializes this very powerful idea that is a combination, I think I said in the speech, of sort of Christian heresy, because it comes out of a sort of Christian idea about individual freedom and value, which is obviously admirable, but it basically repudiates all of these inherited associations and commitments around country, community, family, and at its root, it's about challenging the foundations of our society and taking an axe to the root of our country. So I'm very, very hostile to the whole, you know, the critical theory, the arguments around race around sex and gender that I think are, whether deliberately or not, aimed at the destruction of the things that make our society healthy.
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Nick Robinson
But it's interesting you talked earlier with your mother about disagreeing agreeably. You don't just disagree with these ideas. I mean, you said in the same speech, a wind is blowing, a storm is coming. I mean, you think this is a fundamental challenge to our society, to our country, which may go horribly wrong.
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Danny Kruger
That's right. I hope I can do it all courteously. I'm not picking on individuals. In fact, I have a great deal of respect and some affection for a lot of people I disagree profoundly with, including Muslims, by the way, who I mentioned, concern about the growth of Islam. As well, there are some brilliant Muslims, including in the House of Commons, who make a major contribution. Lots of. Lots of. Well, let me come on to that. But likewise with the sort of the woke, you know, the progressives, lovely, decent, intelligent people, just profoundly misguided in my view. And it's just an opinion and they'll think the same about me. I think, and I hope we can have these conversations in a civil way, even if we have to be very clear about our disagreement.
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Nick Robinson
What's the but on Islam, because you were clear in your speech, not just now, that you know, you didn't only respect and like Muslim MPs, you often agreed with them because quite a lot of them are like you, socially conservative and share views on whole series of social attitudes. But you did say, I cannot be indifferent to the extent of the growth of Islam in recent decades. Why can't you be indifferent to it?
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Danny Kruger
Well, I mean, on a simple numerical basis. I mean, the great thing about this country is it's always been a home for, you know, religious diversity and cultural diversity. And it's something that's, I think it's a products of our Christian heritage that we're very good at accommodating difference and we have real respect for freedom of conscience. You can believe whatever you like. And it's certainly not for a politician to start interfering in other people's religious beliefs. I do think we are. We have a Christian state and that is worth defending for reasons I set out in the speech.
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Nick Robinson
But what's the threat if there are too many Muslims?
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Danny Kruger
Well, the threat is primarily cultural, which is that we are talking about very large numbers of people who have a very different way of life and a different worldview and who live set apart. So I think it's a legitimate concern and it explains why there is such distress and disquiet in so many communities around the uk. And it should never be disparaged that the pace of change, the rate of immigration, is simply too great and too swift. So I think, forgive me, but you.
- [24:16]
Nick Robinson
Don'T just say, which plenty would agree with you. You don't simply say if the number of immigrants is too high or the rate of change of our society through mass immigration. You specifically say the growth of Islam.
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Danny Kruger
Yeah.
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Nick Robinson
So what's the specific point?
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Danny Kruger
The specific point is that Islam, as a great world religion, has all sorts of prescriptions about how to live, and primarily it's about living apart. I mean, obviously there are many Muslims who successfully integrate and we need more of that. The problem is that Islam brings with it the expectation that you will live in a certain way that is not conforming to the traditional habits of life of the uk. As I say, it's primarily. In fact, it's entirely a question of degree, because we have many little subcultures within our country that live apart. My concern is when whole cities essentially become Muslim, then we are. Then we got change that I don't think the people voted for and is not consistent with the best interests of our country.
- [25:10]
Nick Robinson
Just to explore that, is it about separation that you're worried? And there have been lots of official reports written about the dangers of that, not least by Baroness Louise Casey, for example. Or is it that you think Islam cannot, for many people, let's stress, respect free speech or free expression or the rights of women or a separate legal system, an independent legal system and so on?
- [25:33]
Danny Kruger
Well, certainly for anybody living in this country, they have to conform to the law and fundamentally to the values of our country. If they're going to live apart, they still have to live in a way that's consistent with British values and the British law. So, yes, I am concerned if it's, if it appears it is indeed the case that you have communities that are essentially living in ways that are incompatible with the way of life that we expect. But primarily it's the former point, the first point, which is that we are seeing a seg. We're getting a segregated society. We're seeing people living not just as there's always been in this country, sad to say, class divisions and some cultural divisions, but whole communities living in an entirely on British life.
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Nick Robinson
And you're a historian. If people say, well, they used to say that about the Jews and they said that about the Catholics and now you're saying about Muslims, Time, that's what produces an integration.
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Danny Kruger
Well, yes, but we talk about time. I mean, that's the point about scale and speed. You can integrate if it's slow and steady and gradual. What we've seen in the last generation is immigration on such a scale that integration that we've seen from previous immigrant waves of immigration just isn't possible.
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Nick Robinson
Well, it's clear, therefore you want to get immigration down, as I get it down fast. Let's turn to this idea that Christian values can shape government policy, because many of the things that you believe in opposition to, abortion, belief in the sanctity of marriage and the importance of marriage as a foundation of our society, for example, your opposition to assisted dying, those have traditionally been in our Parliament conscience issues in inverted comments, haven't they, up to individual members of Parliament. Do you think actually government needs to have a view of these things?
- [27:14]
Danny Kruger
No, I think those are conscience issues, certainly. Assisted dying, abortion, gay marriage. These issues that have been legislated for were free votes, and I think that's definitely the way to continue them.
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Nick Robinson
But I thought you're worrying that the country's going to come to an end, the government's got to do something about it. It doesn't do something by having another free vot.
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Danny Kruger
Well, no, I don't think it's appropriate for parties to set out manifesto commitments on conscience questions. They might be around implementation. So I do think there's a real problem, for instance, with the assisted dying Bill that's going through Parliament now. I don't think a good government would be giving time and support to a bill like that. It might be neutral about the principle, but I think there is a case probably for looking at the implementation of some of these issues. But, no, it's not for parties to dictate what are essentially moral questions for people.
- [28:05]
Nick Robinson
Perhaps there are things that you believe can be positively done, though. You describe marriage as the only possible basis for a safe and successful society. Now, if you're not saying, well, I want to reverse gay marriage, and you're not, are you saying that the state, that government, that potentially a reform UK government, shouldn't just throw the odd few quid here or there to people who are married? Because we've seen that over the years, haven't we, that actively government should support and believe in marriage?
- [28:36]
Danny Kruger
That's a very good example. So, you know, marriage is obviously a private matter, and yet people's decisions whether to marry are influenced by economic circumstances and by cultural signals. And I think it is the fact that the government at the moment sends all sorts of signals, economically and culturally, about couple formation, family formation. When you have Children, which at the moment are disastrous, frankly. I mean, we're seeing chronic rates of family breakdown, collapsing childbirth rate. So I think it is appropriate for the government to think how do our levers that we pull fiscally, legally, culturally influence these issues around family formation? And I would hope that we would, as a reform government, think about the household, think about the family, think about couples, think about the way children are supported in their early years in a way that makes it easy to do what most people want to do, which is to have stable families, to have children, to look after their own parents in a way that is consistent with decency and fairness, as close to home as possible. There are ways, I think, that we can shape our policy that reflects the kind of life that most people want to live.
- [29:39]
Nick Robinson
Can you shape the welfare state in that way? I mean, do you use the money that people give in their taxes and then is transferred to families to promote marriage? For example? Do you punish behavior you don't think is good through the world?
- [29:53]
Danny Kruger
Yeah, punish isn't the right word, but the welfare system has all sorts of incentives. I mean, most obviously you do better as a couple if you live apart than if you live together, because the state will support you. In two households, the state makes no.
- [30:08]
Nick Robinson
Distinction between marriage and living together. Should it?
- [30:10]
Danny Kruger
Well, it tries very hard. It has a concept of living together as a married couple. And it's a 15 page document that gives the DWP a sort of guide to trying to work out whether this couple is actually a real couple or not. And do they look like a married couple or not. I mean, it's very complicated and bureaucratic and intrusive. Marriage is great because you don't need to pry into somebody's circumstances if they've got that piece of paper. So I think we should be honoring and reflecting this great commitment that people make to each other to get married and actively supporting the stability for the couple themselves, for their children, and actually their elderly parents as well, often forgotten in these debates. I mean, divorce or separation is very hard on grandparents as well. So, yes, I would love us to work out a way to support the kind of stability, family stability, that, as I say, most people actually want for themselves.
- [31:02]
Nick Robinson
Is Nigel Farage up for this? He once said that he was a Christian. He said, you know, you can be Christian and fun, or you can be Christian and like Cromwell, be deeply puritanical and want to control everyone. I have a funny feeling he might have thought you're in the latter category.
- [31:18]
Danny Kruger
I didn't know he had it in For Cromwell, is it? Very. I mean, I don't know. Have we got time for that?
- [31:23]
Nick Robinson
Well, you did want to say that you wanted a revolution, rather like the Puritans had.
- [31:26]
Danny Kruger
Yeah. So I admire the Puritans, actually, who have been much maligned by history. They were not anti. Fun. They were also very liberal. No, absolutely not. They were very. And also.
- [31:33]
Nick Robinson
Did they abolish Christmas?
- [31:35]
Danny Kruger
No, no, only momentarily because it was a sort of. It was.
- [31:38]
Nick Robinson
And drinking lots of.
- [31:39]
Danny Kruger
No.
- [31:39]
Nick Robinson
And theater.
- [31:40]
Danny Kruger
No, no, no, no, actually. And. Well, listen, leaving those issues aside, which is.
- [31:44]
Nick Robinson
Which is a massive life of Brown notwithstanding abolishing Christmas.
- [31:49]
Danny Kruger
They didn't. They didn't. Okay, yeah. What they did do, they were proper liberals and they totally respected the rights of people to their own conscience. So they actually brought. Brought into our culture the idea of freedom of conscience. But listen, on the. Whether Farage is with them or not, I think he is.
- [32:04]
Nick Robinson
He's not much of a Puritan, is he? Let's be honest, not much of a.
- [32:07]
Danny Kruger
Puritan, but he does.
- [32:07]
Nick Robinson
Twice married. Yeah, likes.
- [32:09]
Danny Kruger
He's not judgmental, as I hope I'm not either. You know, none of us are perfect, especially in our family lives. So it's not for us to be finger wagging or holding ourselves up as better than anybody else. But what he does stand for genuinely is family. It's the first line of the slogan of the Reform Party. Family, community, country. He has himself said how important he believes family and marriage is and he would. And he said he'd like to see the state actually support marriage. So yes, I think he is up for this, but I hope he won't do it in a sort of your caricature of Puritan and finger wagging way.
- [32:38]
Nick Robinson
That might be one for an Oxford seminar rather than for political thinking. This slogan about family and country in particular has echoes of the politics of J.D. vance, as we said earlier, of the politics of the United States. Have we got a lot to learn from what is happening in the United States in terms of the backlash, if you like, against what you would see as progressive values?
- [33:05]
Danny Kruger
Well, listen, I hope we don't reflect or copy any of the divisiveness, obviously the political violence and the sort of extremes of rhetoric that are much just more traditional in American politics than ours. So let us please not import American style politics here. Nevertheless, the answer to your question is yes, absolutely. The Americans are like the rest of the west, waking up to the disaster of the progressive ideology that in a sense started in the U.S. well, maybe started in Europe as well. But particularly in the 60s in America that we imported here. So, yes, I'd like to see, I think we are seeing that sort of conservative cultural renewal over here, which is a positive one. All sorts of indicators of people becoming more serious, getting serious about this stuff. And the other thing, and this is maybe where you were going. Do I admire President Trump and his tactics? Well, I partly do because I think he, like Nigel Farage, recognizes how broken the American system was. And partly it's all about this kind of woke nonsense. Partly it's about immigration, but most fundamentally it's about is the government actually in charge? Is the elected government able to implement the will of the people in an election? And that's what has been so dysfunctional about Western politics generally.
- [34:21]
Nick Robinson
But I want to get at a, forgive me, I want to get at a contradiction here. You see anybody listening to you, watching, you will think he's a thoughtful man, quite gentle in the way he speaks, clearly puts his Christianity into practice in some ways with his work with prisoners. But your language, a wind is blowing, a storm is coming. There's a dangerous ideology that's hostile to families, communities and nations. Isn't that actually just a version of the violent language that we hear in the United States? You are, as a well educated, privileged man saying to people who have less privilege and less education, they're coming for you. They, the other.
- [35:07]
Danny Kruger
Well, listen, if they are going to.
- [35:08]
Nick Robinson
Undermine you, your family, your neighbourhood, your country, is it any wonder if people are then violent?
- [35:14]
Danny Kruger
Listen, if that's a version of the violent language, it's a very, very tame one. I mean, for goodness sake, how am I to speak at all if I can't say, can't use terms like that? I'm not inviting people, in fact, I'm actually discouraging any form of political violence. I think the reason why we have divisive politics, the reason why we have some toxicity in our politics, the reason why we have. Tommy Robinson, the reason why we do have real threats of political violence in our country is because the established parties have not acknowledged the scale of distress that the public feel. And that is cultural, it's economic, it's social. And if mainstream politicians like me can't say we have a real problem here and that we have to reflect in our policy the scale of the challenge, then we really are going to have the political violence that we all want to avoid. So I don't think it's inappropriate to use, I hope, strong and clear language to identify the threats.
- [36:12]
Nick Robinson
But the problem, I guess, with the word even Threat is that when it's combined with warnings about mass migration, is people feel that they're being described as the threat, that they, as individuals, are being described as the threat. And, you know, this week there was a controversy, wasn't there? Because Reform your uk, your new party, came up with a new policy on migration, saying that it would deport people who had what's called indefinite leave to remain. They were not British citizens, but they might have been here for many, many years. Do you feel comfortable with that?
- [36:43]
Danny Kruger
Yes, because what we're actually saying is we're going to end the status of indefinite leave to remain, which is a passport to mass migration, as we've seen millions of people coming to this country, initially temporarily, but then ending up here forever. So. And the policy is not to just arbitrarily deport them all, on the contrary, it's to invite them to apply for a property visa to get status that enables them to stay here because they are making a positive contribution because they speak English.
- [37:10]
Nick Robinson
Would a pensioner be able, who'd been here for decades, suddenly change status? Because, you see, the party got rather ambiguous about this and I was very careful to check this policy document from Reform uk, prioritising UK citizens, which is quite interesting language, in itself, made clear that indefinite leave to remain. Some people have been here on that status for decades. Think of themselves as British, paid taxes, worked in this country for years, they would suddenly have to leave the country.
- [37:41]
Danny Kruger
On the contrary, they will be invited to apply for a new status that reflects the fact they are properly members of this community. They should also, frankly, be applying for British citizenship if they, as you describe, and they'd be very welcome to do so.
- [37:55]
Nick Robinson
And even a pension. In other words, it wouldn't have to be someone working now and paying taxes.
- [37:59]
Danny Kruger
Absolutely not. And of course, there's no intention to have some sort of pensioner deportation program. What we're trying to do is to ensure that many of those people who've come into this country in recent years will have to leave voluntarily, because they will no longer be entitled to benefits which they shouldn't be getting in the first place, or to apply for a visa that enables them to stay as long as they are working and paying their way and can speak English.
- [38:21]
Nick Robinson
This leaves me with an interesting question for you, which is how you see your role now. Are you a backbencher who can express your views on whether you agree with Nigel Farrers on this or that? Do you now see yourself as shaping the future policy? Because, frankly, you're much more experienced than anybody else in Reform UK at writing policy. You've done it for two Conservative leaders, why not do it now for the leader of Reform? What do you see your role in future?
- [38:46]
Danny Kruger
So thank you. So I do have a role which is to work with Zia Yousef, who is the head of policy, to develop the plans for government. So this is what is so positive and as I said at the beginning, my concern about which I think the public have the legitimate concern, you know, reformer are great protest, you know, great campaigners, they've identified the problem and Nigel Farage has demonstrated his own vision and resilience and sort of right to lead. But, you know, will they actually be any good in government? And the great obligation on us now as a party is to prove that we are preparing meaningfully for government, which, of course Starmer never did. I mean, the great scandal of this government, he came into office with no plan and has hit the rocks so quickly. As a result, we will be different. We will approach the next election with a carefully worked out set of both policies, but also plans for delivery. And yes, and you ask, I mean, my role will be to lead that preparation for government work. So I'm liaising with a lot of experts currently working in the civil service, former civil service, former military think tanks, academics and the general public who experience the reality of what policy, what looks like on the ground, so that when we get into government, we know what we're doing and that the system as a whole has been told in advance, this is what is coming.
- [39:58]
Nick Robinson
But before then, you're not going to have a by election and say to your voters in East Wiltshire, I stood as one thing, I am now another. You should have the chance to choose.
- [40:07]
Danny Kruger
No, no, no, because I stood as the same thing I am now, which is someone opposing Labour, standing for Conservative values and representing my constituents as best I can. I think if you.
- [40:16]
Nick Robinson
You have to resign your seat and hold a byelectioner. An interesting commentator said not so long back, Nigel Farage on GB News, who referred to somebody who refused to resign their seat, having defected as the dishonourable member.
- [40:30]
Danny Kruger
Yes, I think that was the member for Bury north or south who literally crossed the floor. I think if you cross from Labour to Conservative from the governing party, genuinely, this is, of course, I mean, you completely repudiated the basis on which he stood for election. If you're now supporting the government that you opposed, I think that's a legitimate case for calling for a by election. Nick, I'm literally moving a couple of seats to the side on the opposition benches doing exactly the same thing I was doing before, which is voting against everything Labour trying to do.
- [40:57]
Nick Robinson
And maybe you'll be in government together with your old colleagues, Reform and Conservatives together, who knows?
- [41:02]
Danny Kruger
Well, listen, we are, I mean, it's a tragic reality that the personal dimension here, you know, I want to see Reform MPs elected everywhere. You know, it's very, very painful to see recognize decent, good people that I like and respect.
- [41:14]
Nick Robinson
You might well be working with them in the future. But the last and the crucial question which I failed to ask you before, do you watch your mum on Bake off?
- [41:23]
Danny Kruger
As I feel so sad. I've got to be honest, I don't watch it. I don't watch.
- [41:27]
Nick Robinson
Never.
- [41:27]
Danny Kruger
I mean, I have, but I mean, still, she does understand it's not my kind of telly. I, you know, I adore my mum and I think she's really good in it. When I have seen it. I like the bakers. They're always really sweet and entertaining, but I just, I just, just don't have the impulse really to watch it. My kids like it seeing their granny. But do you actually bake? No, I'm also a terrible cook. I mean, that's the other way. I let her down, I'm afraid. I, I, it's not, it's not an inherited skill. She has tried to teach me, but no, I'm no, I'm no Prue Daddy Krueger.
- [42:04]
Nick Robinson
You are yourself. Thank you for joining me on political thinking.
- [42:06]
Danny Kruger
Thank you.
- [42:07]
Nick Robinson
Well, Danny Kruger insists he's no puritan and he does want to have fun, but he is very different from Nigel Farage. And yet if what he says is correct, he sounds like the man who is writing the next manifesto for reform uk. And what makes that fascinating is that he has a very particular view of what that manifesto ought to say. Based on his Christianity. Based on his belief that progressive ideas risk undermining not just families, but neighbourhoods and the country itself. What he produces will be well worth keeping an eye on. Thanks for listening to Political Thinking. The producer is Daniel Kramer. The editor is Giles Edwards. Do also check out Amal Rajan's podcast, Radical. This week he interviews theoretical physicist Carlo Rovelli about the frontiers of physics today and why he thinks the current development of AI is like a nuclear arms race. You can find radical and political thinking as well as the full back catalogue of both on where else BBC sounds from BBC Radio 4, the Fort.
- [43:27]
Danny Kruger
Royal.
- [43:27]
Nick Robinson
Marines and Army pilots speaking for the first time.
- [43:31]
Danny Kruger
We felt there were Taliban fighters coming through this complex called Juggernau Fort. It was the most intense firefight I've ever been involved in. The word gets around that 4D is missing. The Apache pilot said to me, you just need four volunteers. We secure them to the Apache wings and we'll go back and get Lance Corporal Ford.
- [43:53]
Nick Robinson
Get me four marines and I will.
- [43:56]
Danny Kruger
Take them in and we'll get that boy home.
- [44:00]
Nick Robinson
Listen to the fort on BBC sounds.