← The Rest Is Politics
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- [00:00]
Alistair Campbell
Thanks for listening to the Rest Is Politics. To support the podcast, listen without the adverts and get early access to episodes and live show tickets, go to therestispolitics.com that's therestispolitics.com this episode is powered by Fuse Energy. Now a lot of politicians like to talk about the future of renewables, but Fuse is on the ground building clean energy for the here and now and.
- [00:22]
Rory Stewart
They'Re making it happen. Thanks to you. Fuse Energy is putting the power in your hands by inviting you to refer land to Fuse that can then be used for renewable projects.
- [00:30]
Alistair Campbell
So we already know Clean Energy has cut a leaf 104 billion pounds from the UK's energy costs since 2010. But Fuse wants you to benefit directly from the green Revolution. That's why you can win £2,000 for a successful land referral, be it your land or somebody else's land that is.
- [00:47]
Rory Stewart
20 acres or over could be transformed into the renewable backbone of this nation, benefiting all of us for generations to come.
- [00:53]
Alistair Campbell
I'd love to know how many of our listeners have 20 acres of land. We shall maybe find out. You can watch the energy revolution from the sidelines or you can join it today.
- [01:01]
Rory Stewart
Turn idle land into forward progress with Fuse. Contact fuse@landuseenergy.com to start a referral and have the chance to win £2,000. Oh, such a clutch off season pickup Dave. I was worried we'd bring back the same team. I meant those Blackout motorized shades. Blinds.com made it crazy affordable to replace our old blinds. Hard to install? No, it's easy. I installed these and then got some for my mom. She talked to a design consultant for free and scheduled a professional Measure and Install hall of Fame Son. They're the number one online retailer of custom window coverings in the world. Blinds.com is the goat. Visit blinds.com now for up to 45% off with minimum purchase plus a free professional measure. Rules and restrictions apply. Welcome to the Restless Politics Question Time.
- [01:49]
Alistair Campbell
With me, Rory Stewart and me, Alistair Campbell. So Rory, we're going to talk about your AI series, which I'm thoroughly enjoying. We're going to talk about Keir Starmer and the Customs Union and the Single Market and a few interesting things he said about that. We're going to talk about the Bondi beach terrorist assault and the Continu political fallout. We're going to talk about Roman Abramovich and his lawyer, Tory Shadow Attorney General. And we're going to talk about the curious world of the release of National Archives. First question we had a very foreign policy based main episode. Let's start with a more. Well, it's a bit foreign but quite domestic. Finley Morris, who is from Devon, is a trip plus member. Is there anything in Keir Starmer's comments about the single market worth getting hopeful about? Or is this yet another lukewarm statement which doesn't excite anyone? This is a comment on an interview that Keir Starmer did with Laura Kuenssberg on the BBC. It follows some interventions from West Streeting, David Lammy and others suggesting we should get closer and closer and closer to the European Union, particularly the single market. Sum it up I would say Keir Starmer was basically saying, got to protect these trade deals that we've done with the us, India and the European Union. Not going the whole way, but we've made lots of different progress on food, agriculture, Erasmus, other areas and we're going to keep going in that direction. Q Headlines the next morning of the right wing papers, Starmer prepares for full Brexit betrayal. I wish, right?
- [03:19]
Rory Stewart
Yes, you wish so, yes. The story that I got at least was that David Lammy, Minouche, Shafiq, who's the economic advisor, Wes Reaching. We're pushing more for a customs union and just to remind again listeners, Customs union is basically not free movement of people. It's instead a big trade deal from the point of view of the farmers in Cumbria, who I care a lot about, definitely much more beneficial, don't have the customs problems and you also don't have the problems of cheap meat coming in from Australia and New Zealand. Single market is essentially the situation that Norway finds itself in, which is it's not in the customs union, it's in the single market, but it has free movement of people, et cetera. I would have thought of the two. The single market is probably tougher for Keir Starmer to sell because the free movement of people bit is the bit that.
- [04:12]
Alistair Campbell
And he was clear he wasn't going that far.
- [04:14]
Rory Stewart
So I then want to come back to you because again you were saying in the car that if Labour is looking for something to do now, what they need to do is come full out for rejoining the European Union, hold a referendum on it and actually it's almost their only option left given where they are in the polls.
- [04:32]
Alistair Campbell
I wasn't quite saying that. What I was doing is I read a very interesting piece by Peter Kellner, pollster, strategic thinker and he was saying that even accepting that these are really volatile times and that it's very hard to find popular leaders anywhere in the world right now in democracies that Keir Starmer and Labour's ratings under Keir Starmer, although he said, actually, historically, they've not fallen as fast as, for example, in Thatcher's second term, first term, I think.
- [05:01]
Rory Stewart
Just for the Falklands, that's what it was.
- [05:03]
Alistair Campbell
And then the second one was, was it Sunak or Truss? I can't remember. But anyway, there was another example where there was an even more cataclysmic fall. However, we're talking about sort of 18, 20% satisfaction ratings. That is not good. And Peter was making the point that. That they need. Labor, really needs something. He calls it a kind of wow moment or a wow thing. And I don't necessarily agree with that, but it needs something that breaks open this current sort of very negative, very gloomy, very downbeat negative assessment of the government. And I think it could be that we just, you know, come right out and say, the speech I made when we did our politics tour, we come right and say, look, we've got to face the truth. Brexit has been catastrophic economically, strategically, politically and actually, over time, my big legacies, I'm going to take us back in. I'm simply saying that is what I would recommend as a possible. Now, there will be people in Downing street listening to this, thinking, the guy's completely nuts. But I just think we need. We talked about the stakes in Moldova, right? We've got to be fighting for big things. Big things.
- [06:13]
Rory Stewart
Well, I'm trying to sort of understand what the downside is. What I'd say to the people in Downing street is you're doomed anyway if you continue in the current way you are. Sama's not going to be able to win the next election anyway. He's going to struggle to remain as leader through to the next election. So why not go out with a blaze? Why not try to come up with one big idea? Now, you'd presumably have to reorient your electoral coalition because you'd worry that there would be people up in red wall seats who remain pretty firm on Brexit, who will feel alienated and betrayed. So you'd be hoping to pick up, what, Lib Dem, Green voters, centrist Tories, but you'd certainly win back, I think remain Tories like me, might look more kindly at a Labour government because instead of what we currently do, which is look at it and say, this is a bunch of slightly odd socialists who don't really like rich people and are going after wealth and shutting down private schools and putting up taxes and don't feel right. Suddenly there's a big thing where we can be like, oh, all right. Actually, Starmer's not too bad and he's doing something big and exciting in geopolitics.
- [07:12]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah. And which would lead to a better, stronger economy, would allow us to build on. Because I think one of the successes of Kir's leadership has been this E3 thing. Meltzer and Macron really do appear to have taken turn to rely on them. The E3 thing is meaning something. And so I just think that you're right. I think they're going to need something pretty big.
- [07:35]
Rory Stewart
And it's. You do it through geopolitics. In a way, the argument that didn't work during the Brexit campaign, but should have been pushed much more powerfully, which was the European Union actually had been the key to peace in Europe for 70 years. Suddenly now, with Trump in place, with Putin in place, you can put a very, very different argument. It feels statesmanlike. You can start invoking Winston Churchill. You can start talking about the benefit for the UK defense industry. What we don't need is to all push up our NATO defense spending to 2%, 3%, 5%, and then find that we're buying 70% of our kit from the United States and becoming ever more vulnerable and dependent.
- [08:11]
Alistair Campbell
Or that we're all as European countries buying the same things for the same reasons we could be doing together.
- [08:16]
Rory Stewart
Absolutely.
- [08:17]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah. Okay, Rory, here's a question from Daniel Trip plus member in Sydney. Following Australia's deadliest terror attack at Bondi Beach. Albanese Prime Minister is resisting intense pressure for a federal Royal commission while facing extraordinary personal attacks, including claims that he bears personal responsibility for the 15 deaths. Is this principal leadership or political miscalculation? And are the attacks on him legitimate or the populist exploitation of tragedy?
- [08:48]
Rory Stewart
Well, look, this is now the rawest, most contentious issue I'd say, in Australian politics. We have a huge number of Australian listeners. One Australian listener sent me no less than 256 separate WhatsApp messages. No fewer than 256 WhatsApp messages. Not correcting me on my grammar, but in this case talking about what happened over Bondi Beach.
- [09:11]
Alistair Campbell
All bad for Albanese.
- [09:13]
Rory Stewart
All of them basically saying these were endless sort of Australian newspaper articles and photographs saying that Albanese was essentially complicit. And the line that's being run particularly by members of the Australian Jewish community, but by other Australians too, is that Albanese and the Labour government did not do enough to clamp down on anti Semitism. They didn't spot the signs of increasing radicalization. They didn't really follow through with the national security measures that they could have taken. And that therefore they must bear some responsibility and a royal commission must be set up. And these things have become. You know, there's a Josh Frydenberg, who's a former treasurer, who is Jewish. This has really been a moment where he's been very dominant in the media. He's emerged very, very visibly moved on Bondi beach, embracing people. Whereas Albanese's response seemed a bit more wooden. He kind of reading his speech. In fact, if you watch him coming down Bondi beach, another Australian friend of both of us sent us a video of him going down that beach instead of Frydenberg, who was hugging people. And as we moved, you had a sense of prime Minister moving with security guards around him. So Albanese's team are going to be horrified to hear me say this. And I suppose I'm going to hand over to you to disagree agreeably and put the case for Albanese.
- [10:38]
Alistair Campbell
Do you agree with the. I mean, the question was about this idea that there should be this sort of royal commission. I'm not persuaded.
- [10:45]
Rory Stewart
I think he needs a royal commission. I think he needs the Royal Commission. This is the.
- [10:48]
Alistair Campbell
To do what?
- [10:50]
Rory Stewart
Well, firstly, it is for Australia, their 911 moment. This is the worst terrorist attack they've experienced. And there will be endless questions around what could have been done to prevent it and what lessons could be learned.
- [11:04]
Alistair Campbell
To be done by this guy Richardson.
- [11:05]
Rory Stewart
Why not have a royal commission? Everybody's asking for royal commission. I predict here on the show Albanese will agree to a royal commission within the next week anyway. In which case. And if that were true, why doesn't he do it early?
- [11:15]
Alistair Campbell
He may do. I'm simply saying I'm not convinced that it would be the right thing to do.
- [11:21]
Rory Stewart
But do you think it's the right thing to do? What he will actually do, I believe, which is drag your feet for four weeks, say you're not going to have.
- [11:26]
Alistair Campbell
It, and then announce it. You're going to do it, do it. But I. I can remember having lots of discussions on all sorts of different situations about what we would define, I guess, as public inquiries. Okay. I remember, for example, that when Marjorie Molem, Northern Ireland Secretary, was really pushing us to go full out for inquiry into Bloody Sunday. And, you know, Tony Blair just wanted to kind of really think it through and really say, well, what's this? Where's this going to lead Now, I would argue actually that was a good thing to do and it did lead to a sort of a form of closure.
- [12:02]
Rory Stewart
Where's it ever been a bad thing to do? Where's the Royal Commission ever gone wrong?
- [12:06]
Alistair Campbell
Well, on that I was about to say, when you put the cost of that against what was actually achieved, I think you can make the case both ways. Whereas what Albanese has done has basically said he's got this former head of the Australian intelligence services who's doing a review with access to everything that he needs to try to answer that question that you just put. What could have been done differently? I think when politicians come out and say explicitly to the Prime Minister of their country where something terrible has happened, this is on you, the blood is on your hands. I just think that's completely unreasonable.
- [12:45]
Rory Stewart
I think that's totally unreasonable. I agree with you. Totally unreasonable. And I also think that I don't support Australian Jewish friends of mine who are saying that this is a direct consequence of criticism of Israel.
- [12:56]
Alistair Campbell
If anybody who thinks that it is, I think that is a very dangerous argument.
- [13:00]
Rory Stewart
It's very, very important to say that one should absolutely be able to call out Israel, call out Donald Trump's United States, call out our own governments, point out when people are doing wrong and not be drawn into the. Oh, yes, but that might give succor to your enemies because that's always the way in which criticism is shut down. However, I'll lean into this once more. I don't think you, and you're a very good communicator. I don't think you're really convincing me and I suspect you're probably not convincing most listeners why they're not having a Royal Commission. And that's why I think Albanese is going to have to fold.
- [13:34]
Alistair Campbell
Do most of our listeners, hugely intelligent and well informed though they are, do they know what a Royal Commission is as compared to, for example, an independent inquiry or a public inquiry or. I mean, Royal commissions to me are what you do when you're going to. When you have an issue which cannot be resolved in any other way and which is going to lead to fundamental, consequential change for the country. That's why you have a Royal Commission.
- [14:00]
Rory Stewart
Why doesn't he want a Royal Commission? I mean, that's what he has to answer. That's the problem, because that's why I think he's going to concede one next week, because in every interview it's going to be like this. They're going to be like, why won't you do a royal commission and the answer is what? It costs too much?
- [14:13]
Alistair Campbell
No, the answer is cost is a factor. But that's not the answer you necessarily give at this stage. The answer is that a terrible, terrible thing has happened since when the government has already made changes, for example in relation to gun ownership, for example in relation to hate crime and hate preachers and so forth. He's actually done quite a lot and what happens in these situations and it's very hard to stand up against this and I, and I get the kind of the sense of pressure upon him to do it. But I think if you are a leader, you, you actually do have to sometimes step back and say, well, is it actually the right thing to do? And I think what he will do, all these people who signed petitions and said that this would happen, all sports people who've come out and all the sort of celebs and all the rest of it, is that by the time it happens, years down the track, look how long this Covid inquiry is taking. Right, well, you're going to talk about something here. Okay. It's not maybe as complicated as that, but it could be. And I've yet to see a royal commission or Republic inquiry at the end of which all of the people who asked for it then said, oh yeah, that's answered all the questions.
- [15:19]
Rory Stewart
I think that's right. But again, you're much savvier on politics than me. But I think the line you're taking might have worked if he'd been better in the immediate aftermath of the. Well, you said, if he'd communicated more powerfully, if he'd been more emotionally literate, if he'd seized the public mood more then the credibility and legitimacy he would have to resist the royal commissionable, given where he is, which is basically everybody thinks he's defensive, he hasn't got it and he's trying to cover up, he's go with the royal commission. What's he got to lose? Nothing really.
- [15:53]
Alistair Campbell
We shall see. I mean, the other thing I would. Whether you make this part of the argument or not, I don't know. But there have been other. Okay, nothing quite as horrific as this, but there have been previous disasters that have not had royal commissions. I just think sometimes we want to blame. We want to say that there's some sort of easy solution that could put this right and there isn't. And I think the blame game is just, I just think it's, I think that plays into the.
- [16:20]
Rory Stewart
But some of these commissions came on. I mean, I'm not, you know, I don't have a dog in this fight. But I was just rereading the 911 Commission Report. It is fantastic. I mean the world should be hugely grateful for that. That was an unbelievable bit of work and we learned so much about failure in U.S. intelligence services, coordination and everything.
- [16:38]
Alistair Campbell
But is there not a case with this that you know how one of the guys is dead, the other one I presume is going to spend an awful lot of time in prison? Are we really through two people and we have a Royal commission looking at all aspects of all gun laws and all this and all that? Are we really, really going to get to a place where you uncover the sort of scale of the thing that you had within 911 report? Look, I could be wrong and I suspect there'll be quite a lot of Australians listening to this thinking, what the hell are you on about? And you deserve to get smashed in the ashes. But I really. The other thing is I feel for Albanese on this because I think he's actually a decent guy. He's not the most natural charismatic speaker. He probably did make a mistake in reading from a script and not maybe going out. And Chris, I mentioned the New South Wales Premier, Chris Mims, he just got the tone right and it was a question of tone. But when you're dealing with something like that, I think I just, I guess I come from the place of thinking we should be a little bit more sympathetic to politicians when they're dealing with stuff which is fundamentally. He didn't give the guy a gun. He didn't say, I want you to go and sort of kill Jewish people because I'm recognizing a Palestinian state.
- [17:50]
Rory Stewart
I'm with you but we're not going to resolve this agreeable disagreement. But I think the fundamental issue here is that the Jewish community in Australia has a higher survival Holocaust survivor population than any population apart from Israel. They have been very, very conscious of anti Semitic attacks and hate crimes in Australia over the last few months. They have been predicting this would happen and it happened with them publicly celebrating their most holy religious festival on a beach with people turning up asking are you a Jew or not? And then killing 15 people, including a 10 year old.
- [18:30]
Alistair Campbell
No, listen, the thing was utterly horrific on every level, but ultimately it was one guy and his son who went out with the specific intent of doing what you've just described. And I think, however horrific, I think it is unreasonable and unfair to say Albanese should have known how to stop that and then worse, Albanese caused that. I just think it's unfair and we should.
- [19:00]
Rory Stewart
You know, I agree with you on that.
- [19:02]
Alistair Campbell
Okay, let's take a break and then we'll come back. Talk about your excellent series on AI.
- [19:12]
Rory Stewart
This episode is brought to you by the London Review of Books.
- [19:16]
Alistair Campbell
Where else could you find a huge fascinating read on the duality of Thomas Moore alongside a similarly fascinating read on the manosphere? The answer is the London Review of Books.
- [19:27]
Rory Stewart
It's a really amazing journal and what it does is it goes from incredibly profound intellectual thought, but also stuff that's really relevant to contemporary news.
- [19:38]
Alistair Campbell
So, for example, recently a brilliant article by Tony Wood, who writes about something Rory and I have talked about on the podcast, which is the rise of populism in Latin America. And he really delves into some of the characters historically, some of the current characters, the relations to Vox Party in Spain, and how this has all come together to impose a considerable change on the politics of that region.
- [20:00]
Rory Stewart
So, classic example of the LRB London Review producing a brilliant article. And you can get a subscription for only £6.
- [20:06]
Alistair Campbell
And along with that subscription, hey, guess what? You get a free tote bag.
- [20:11]
Rory Stewart
Get a 6 month free print and digital subscription along with your tote bag and you do it for just £6 by subscribing now at LRB Me Politics.
- [20:25]
Alistair Campbell
That's LRB Me Politics.
- [20:34]
Rory Stewart
Welcome back to the Restless Politics with.
- [20:36]
Alistair Campbell
Me, Rory Stewart and me Alistair Campbell. And Rory Mohale is a TRIP member in South Africa who says I'm really enjoying Rory's AI miniseries. And for those who don't know, this is an excellent mini series for Restless Politics members where Rory is talking with Matt Clifford, who has been advising UK governments of both colours on AI. Mahaly goes on. As a teen myself, I feel the debate has lost serious momentum in schools. It was once heavily discussed. Now teachers and students seem bored to the point where it's not allowed in debate classes. We talk a lot about informing ministers of this issue. How do we engage the younger generation so that children maintain their creativity and authenticity whilst not rejecting AI completely as they develop? Before we answer the question, what did you learn from from doing it? I've learned a lot from listening to it. I thought the first episode I felt understood a lot better at the end of it, kind of what it was and how it worked. And the second episode actually found really interesting. I actually thought it was more about the politics of it. I was fascinated by your suggestion that actually you do not buy the idea that this, the artificial general intelligence has to happen. You actually think that if Trump and Xi Jinping got together, they could just say, no, we're not doing this. I sense that you're moving to a much more skeptical.
- [21:56]
Rory Stewart
Yeah, well, I mean, I think the reason to be terrified is that the people making these decisions have so much vested interest and money bound up with it. So one fact which I think is really important is that Elon Musk, Sam Altman, Dario Mode are on record back 10 years ago saying that they are seriously worried that artificial general intelligence could lead to the extinction of humanity. Ten years later, they're all running companies which are racing to build this thing and are predicting that artificial general intelligence could emerge in a year or two. And they're still saying that there is a 20% chance, or in one case a 15% chance, that it could kill us all.
- [22:43]
Alistair Campbell
To go to the question is this, why are people getting. I don't think people are getting bored. I think people are still fascinated by it. I wonder if it's part of the numbing down thing. We're not willing even to acknowledge and to process what that might mean, because Matt Clifford, your interlocutor, I sense, is just in that place of, well, it's happening anyway. Just get on with it.
- [23:02]
Rory Stewart
Yeah, so the story that they're telling is it's too late. The genie's out of the bottle. Somebody's going to build artificial general intelligence anyway. So I, Elon Musk, Sam Altman, need to build it before the bad guys, and my artificial general intelligence will be able to control that. So if you're Musk, you think you have to build it before Demis has. If you're Altman, you feel you have to build it before Musk. All of them feel they have to build it before Mark Zuckerberg and all the Americans feel they have to build it before the Chinese, because they're not.
- [23:33]
Alistair Campbell
Exactly driven by public service, these people, are they?
- [23:35]
Rory Stewart
Well, they think they're saving the world. So the story they tell themselves is, if I can build the superintelligent super robot first, my superintelligent super robot can protect the world from everybody else's evil. Superintelligent super robot. You then talk to the other one.
- [23:49]
Alistair Campbell
I think we've seen enough of Elon Musk's superintelligence in other forms to be worried.
- [23:54]
Rory Stewart
You then talk to the other ones and they're like, no, no, no, that guy's evil. If he builds it first, he's going to destroy the world. That's why I have to build mine first to stop him, et cetera. But the actual madness of This, I came across a quote from Sam Altman at lunchtime, and I just want to share with you to get a sense of how very, very strange. This is not a joke. This is Sam Altman giving an interview. Sam Altman's the head of OpenAI, so responsible for ChatGPT. I quote, I think that AI will probably most likely lose lead to the end of the world, but in the meantime, there will be great companies created with serious machine learning.
- [24:27]
Alistair Campbell
Source.
- [24:28]
Rory Stewart
It's quoted by a guy called Dan Wong.
- [24:29]
Alistair Campbell
But it's real.
- [24:30]
Rory Stewart
Yeah, I believe it's totally real. I think that AI will probably most likely lead to the end of the world, but in the meantime, there will be great companies created with serious machine learning. Now, look, who knows whether it will lead to the end of the world. Might be only a 1% chance it's going to lead to the end of the world. World. If the people building it keep telling us that there's a significant chance that we'll lead to the end of the world, the obvious question is, why are we not stopping it? And they say, well, it can't be stopped. In fact, actually, at the moment, of course, it could be stopped in theory, because it requires such enormous data centers. You can see these things from space. There are basically only five companies in the world that's able to do this. So if Trump and Xi Jinping wanted, they could shut it down.
- [25:10]
Alistair Campbell
Now, just. Do you really think they could?
- [25:13]
Rory Stewart
Absolutely. Because in the end, planning permission, these things require.
- [25:19]
Alistair Campbell
We're going to slow down planning permission.
- [25:21]
Rory Stewart
Yeah. These things require the kind of energy to power a city of a million people. I mean, and all you would have to do is get these five companies shut down and you could stop the whole thing. Now, of course, there are many reasons why you wouldn't do that. One of them is that they represent 20% of the entire global stock market, and they have bet trillions on this technology, and there would be a big dip in the stock market if you did it. You might worry also about lots of other issues, but there's something very awkward going on at the core of this. You've got scientists, including the godfathers of AI, the people who produced the first large language models. So, Geoffrey Hinton, for example, Yoshua Bengu, who we're interviewing, saying they're terrified and they want to stop. You've got Mustafa Suleiman, who we interviewed, going out on the Today program, sounding, I think, much more cautious about this technology we've heard, and even before you get into the existential risks like Wiping us all out. There's a serious possibility that it would lead to massive disruption, loss of jobs, wipe out of economic value. Because Darren Mode is talking about creating trillion dollar or billion dollar companies run by two people with no employees.
- [26:31]
Alistair Campbell
And Matt Clifford just kept coming back and talking about Hockey Stick and the Industrial Revolution was marvelous.
- [26:35]
Rory Stewart
The problem is that somebody like me who's grumbling about this is increasingly being excluded from meetings with the people reading this industry who now increasingly call me a Luddite.
- [26:47]
Alistair Campbell
Oh, because you started out when you first started talking about this, when we first started the podcast, you were a bit of a fanboy for the whole thing.
- [26:54]
Rory Stewart
Well, I use it all the time. I'm absolutely obsessed with its power and I'm very, very aware of how much more powerful it's getting that, you know, it was doing GCSE mathematics two years ago, then A level, it's now doing advanced graduate level mathematics very powerfully. Its improvement in terms of its ability to write software code is going up and up. So I can completely see.
- [27:15]
Alistair Campbell
But. But if I can plug this week's leading. It thinks that Kate Garvey, Jimmy Wales wife, is actually married to Peter Mandelston.
- [27:25]
Rory Stewart
Absolutely.
- [27:26]
Alistair Campbell
So it gets a lot wrong.
- [27:27]
Rory Stewart
It gets a lot wrong. It hallucinates, it makes errors. So then you have this very strange thing of this very powerful, very plausible, very articulate, but somewhat inaccurate thing being inserted right into the middle of our society, our economies. I think politically part of the problem is that I remember talking to a U.S. congressperson about this. She said, frankly, we don't understand this. We feel very insecure about it. You talked to us about technology and we all slightly don't want to talk about it. And consequently, I've been talking about this since the election that despite the fact this is probably the thing that in the next 10 years, for better or worse, will change the world more than anything else. Election campaigns are still run as though they were happening in the 1980s.
- [28:14]
Alistair Campbell
Well, I know you've done two episodes, you've got a third one coming out on Friday, which is where you're joined by Tino Quellar to talk about who's winning the AI race. One thing I don't know whether you do cover this in future episodes, I'd be interested to know Matt Clifford's assessment of the politicians and AI. Does he talk about whether Rishi Sunak knew what he was on about? Whether Keir Starmer knows what he was on about? Whether they actually asking the right questions?
- [28:39]
Rory Stewart
He's quite favorable towards them. I Mean, Rishi is an uber geek and you know, I've seen him with these guys and he really does, but he's a techno optimist. I mean, so I'm fond of Rishi Sunak, but he's well over on the techno optimist side on this. Peter Karl, I think, really got into this, but then of course was reshuffled off. There's an amazing Labour junior minister now leading on AI who actually worked with me when he was in defra, called Kanishka Narayan, who I worked with very closely because he was one of the key advisors at DEFRA when I was the junior minister at defraud. And he's taken over this. He's been listening to the miniseries, corresponding with me. He really gets this stuff. He's unbelievably smart and over the detail of this stuff, what's lacking is the bigger, broader political conversation, the engagement of ordinary MPs of political messaging, of the public, because in the end the public gets to have a say. Does the public want this developed? Do we want to be completely dependent on the US for this stuff or do we want to develop our own UK European large language models? What kind of risk? I mean, these are the biggest questions in politics today and we haven't begun on them. Listen, if you're interested in this or any other issues around AI, because we don't just talk about threats, we also talk about the incredible opportunities that it can provide to transform our economy, transform productivity, please sign up. Become a member of the Restless Politics by going to thereesterspolitics.com and you can listen not just to this miniseries on AI, but some of the other great miniseries that have been done, including some of our recent series on J.D. vance and Rupert Murdoch. Question for you coming from Thomas Matthew from Dorset. Can the Tories credibly lead on Ukraine when their shadow Attorney General is representing a sanctioned oligarch?
- [30:35]
Alistair Campbell
The sanctioned oligarch being none other than Mr. Roman Abramovich, owner of Chelsea Football Club. Ex owner of Chelsea Football Club. Look, I think there is.
- [30:44]
Rory Stewart
Did you ever meet him?
- [30:45]
Alistair Campbell
I met him once at a Chelsea game. Not to talk to properly. And then I remember once when Chelsea played at Burnley when we first got promoted to the Premier League and Abramovich's security people came ahead of the game to stake it out and they said they wanted 12 seats or something like this, you know, in a quite a small section of the ground where the Burnley directors and their guests all sit. So in the end he didn't, he never came. But I Met him once at Chelsea. And I've just read a book over Christmas, actually, which, where he figures quite large. It's called where's the Money Gone? And it's by a guy called Adrian Goldberg who works for Byline Times, and it's an assessment of modern football. And Abramovich and Putin actually figure quite large in this. And I actually do think that Abramovich, he quotes. In the book, he quotes Tony Banks, our former sports minister, sadly no longer here. And Tony Banks, who's a massive child, was a massive Chelsea supporter. And he was one of the rare voices that said, I'm really, really worried about this guy coming in and buying a football club. We don't know where his money's come from. We don't know anything about his character.
- [31:56]
Rory Stewart
We then discovered, didn't we? Because there was this amazing, very, very long moment where Russian oligarchs trusted the British courts to provide fair justice.
- [32:05]
Alistair Campbell
So the reason for the question is that Olson, who is the shadow Attorney General, so that is Kemi Badenok, the person Kemi Badenok is appointed as the Conservatives Attorney General, should there be a Conservative government?
- [32:16]
Rory Stewart
And to put it in context, a really big senior lawyer. I mean, you know, more so than Keir Starmer, like a really big leading lawyer.
- [32:24]
Alistair Campbell
Kirsten was the Director of Public Prosecution.
- [32:26]
Rory Stewart
Okay, well, maybe like Kirstama, anyway, a big, big name in the Professional. Maybe like your friend Helena Kennedy.
- [32:32]
Alistair Campbell
Okay.
- [32:32]
Rory Stewart
Yeah.
- [32:33]
Alistair Campbell
So he is now representing Abramovich in a case where the government is seeking to get back from Abramovich money, which Abramovich said as part of getting rid of Chelsea, should be going to quote the victims of the war in Ukraine. Okay, so that case is going on in Jersey. I think it is.
- [32:49]
Rory Stewart
And is this the fund that was supposed to be Chelsea Football Club was sold. And this is sort of supposed to be a charity fund.
- [32:55]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah, this is a fund that was going to be used to help people in Ukraine, which has been stuck.
- [32:59]
Rory Stewart
And before Ukraine, the idea was, I think it was also for UK charities, because at one point, a charity dice involved was applying for this fund, and the money never got released.
- [33:07]
Alistair Campbell
Well, the money's been stuck and Ker has set a deadline. I can't remember what it was, but unless you get on with this, then we're going to take it to court. Wolson is representing Abramovich. So the question for you, Rory, as Kemi bed not spokesman, is that appropriate that Lord Wolfson, her shadow Attorney General, is representing Roman Abramovich in what is clearly a politically incredibly sensitive case?
- [33:33]
Rory Stewart
Well, I think it's probably unwise. I mean, it looks pretty peculiar, I guess. Presumably the defense that Wilson would make.
- [33:42]
Alistair Campbell
Is the old taxi rank thing.
- [33:43]
Rory Stewart
Yeah, it's to say, look, he, to be fair to him, never criticized Keir Starmer for defending whatever Keir Starmer's accused of defending or indeed the current Attorney General of Labour government.
- [33:55]
Alistair Campbell
Yeah, that's when they were lawyers. He is now the shadow Attorney General. So if there were election tomorrow and Kami Badenot became Prime minister, this guy is the Attorney General.
- [34:05]
Rory Stewart
Right.
- [34:06]
Alistair Campbell
Is that remotely appropriate? I think it is very, very weird.
- [34:09]
Rory Stewart
Right. Well, I'd be interesting to talk to friends of yours. Have you talked to friends of yours who are lawyers? Is their view that it's a bit weird or are they saying lawyers just get to defend whoever they want?
- [34:17]
Alistair Campbell
Look, this probably, technically, I think if you went to the law Commission with a complaint about this, they'd probably say, well, no case to answer, as I know, but I think the politics of this are really ugly and they should have seen it coming. Unless I think we can assume that Lord Wilson is getting very, very top dollar to be representing Roman Abramovich. Anyway, it's, I, I, I think it's a mistake.
- [34:39]
Rory Stewart
But, but in general, this case aside, we do agree that in general, it's not fair to attack lawyers for who they happen to be defending or representing.
- [34:47]
Alistair Campbell
No. In fact, one of the most unpleasant parts of my job when I work for Tony Blair was that Cherie, his wife, was constantly being vilified for frankly, whoever she sort of stood up and defended, they would find a reason to say, you know, why on earth is she doing this? As though she was part of the government, but this guy would be part of a government. So I think this is in many ways a lot worse. We're agreeing agreeably, but we're uncomfortable about.
- [35:11]
Rory Stewart
The facts of the case.
- [35:14]
Alistair Campbell
Right, last question. This is from Katie in Bath, or Bath, as you would call it. The National Archives released 600 Blair era files this week. Different outlets led with entirely different stories from the same material. The Guardian on a speech to the Women's Institute. Painful memories, the Times on Zimbabwe regime change. Al Jazeera on what it called Iraq war crimes. How did the journalists decide which details become the story in releases like this? And what determines, who determines what is newsworthy from decades old memos?
- [35:49]
Rory Stewart
Well, it's pretty amazing, isn't it? And so these are, this is, these are, these are archives from the very beginning of your time in government.
- [35:56]
Alistair Campbell
Well, the Women's Institute, which was One of the most painful reminders of this.
- [36:01]
Rory Stewart
Where he was slow clapped.
- [36:02]
Alistair Campbell
I was actually quite pleased at the way this was reported because I think we could put it into the Alastair was right all along category. I was very, very, very worried about.
- [36:12]
Rory Stewart
This speech, about him going to talk.
- [36:14]
Alistair Campbell
To the Women's Institute is fine, but don't go along and talk to the Women's Institute and make a sort of big speech about the future of the country and the future of government and the big political message. Cherry had just given birth to Leo, so maybe there was a bit of kind of new labor, new life, new hope around. He went and made this speech. What was so funny about these memos? So there's me, Jonathan Powell, Angie Hunter, Peter Hyman, I think the Guardian, that was the main coverage of this. And I. I was saying things like, I'm really, really worried about this speech. You're sounding like John Major. And I this is not what they want. This is not what they expect. And it became one of these sort of. It went on for days, these arguments.
- [37:01]
Rory Stewart
Why did he think the Women's Institute was the appropriate audience for some grand speech?
- [37:07]
Alistair Campbell
Middle England, in fact, on the day. We very rarely fell out. We didn't fall out over this. But I basically said I thought this is a really bad idea. He should just go up and sort of, you know, be nice and be Tony Blair and not worry too much about a big speech. There's a big audience, about 6,000 women.
- [37:25]
Rory Stewart
So there could be a speech where he'd just be like, the Women's Institute are wonderful. Aren't you wonderful? Let's celebrate.
- [37:30]
Alistair Campbell
British and I'm here today. I'd love to talk to you about, you know, the future of something or other. But it was like a big. And we briefed it. He wanted us to brief it as, this is like a big moment in the calendar and this is the fight back starts here. So anyway, I decided I'm not going to go to Wembley, you know, on your own head bit. Off you go. And Angie Hunter went with him with the car. Angie had been arguing very much for this speech. She saw herself as the Middle England voice, which she was in many respects. So I used the time while Tony went off to have this meeting in my office with down in Downey street with John Prescott. And John and I were talking about whatever we're talking about, and I had the TV on in the background, and Tony's speech was live on the news because we'd build it as a big deal. And at one Point. John Prescott's just looking at Tony. He goes, oh, what's going on? He says he's got his Bambi look on and he's. His Bambulu was where he just looked a little bit scared. And what happened was he started the speech and then there was a few tuts and then there was a little bit of sort of heckling. And then eventually there was this one person starts to slow and before you know it, he's got thousands of women basically slow handclapping the speech. So the headline of the Daily Mail the next morning was, death, Middle England turns its back on Blair. He was heaven for them. So, yeah, but anyway, that. So the Guardian series newspaper, and this is the answer to Katie's question, there are hundreds of these memos get released.
- [39:06]
Rory Stewart
Of which a more controversial one, certainly from the point of view of people in the Middle east, is what Al Jazeera picked up on, which is that Blair seemed to be resisting. He seemed to be coming back to Royal commissions, a big investigation into allegations of British soldiers conducting atrocities in Iraq.
- [39:22]
Alistair Campbell
So what happens with these is that the British papers, I mean, the system's changed over time, but essentially some papers get released fairly early, after the events have been covered. There's a whole kind of system where. So low. So, for example, I think a couple of years ago, loads of stuff came out about the Good Friday Agreement and some of it was quite controversial. And so it was quite difficult because what's happening is you're in the. You've. You've been there as a minister, you're in these meetings, there's somebody in there who. Who's taking notes, who's writing it up, who's filing it away. Now, the truth is, most of the people who are involved in that and players in that, they're not reading the notes of the meetings because they're on to the next thing. These meetings get recorded and then out they go. And then, of course, big decisions. There's all the kind of internal correspondence and of course we'd, you know, to Tony's regret, we'd brought in freedom of information anyway. So we always assumed this stuff's going to come out at some point anyway. So I. I just thought it was fascinating to see the. The different stories that people picked on the question of. Katie's question about how the journalists decide. I think actually these days, because journalism isn't kind of what it was and there are fewer of them doing more stories and covering more. I suspect most of them rely on the press association, the Press association go in there, they sit down, they get quite a lot of time. They go through everything. They put out loads of stories and then the papers kind of make their take their pick.
- [40:46]
Rory Stewart
Well, Alistair, thank you. That was a wonderful kind of insight into that weird and wonderful world you'll be coming up.
- [40:52]
Alistair Campbell
How long ago were you a minister?
- [40:54]
Rory Stewart
I left and I was there 2015. 2019.
- [40:57]
Alistair Campbell
So you're 10 years from the start, so it won't be that long. Rory.
- [41:01]
Rory Stewart
Yeah.
- [41:01]
Alistair Campbell
Before you be, New Year's Eve will come along. Wake up. And something really stupid that you suggest during the one that came out a couple of years ago when I suggested suggested that Rangers play Celtic. But that's shirts before the games.
- [41:12]
Rory Stewart
Yep.
- [41:12]
Alistair Campbell
I mean bad ideas.
- [41:14]
Rory Stewart
Okay, well, so thank you. Lovely to see you in Moldova. Look forward to speaking again soon.
- [41:18]
Alistair Campbell
See you soon.
- [41:18]
Rory Stewart
Bye.
- [41:19]
Alistair Campbell
Bye.
- [41:25]
Rory Stewart
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