The New Statesman Podcast

By The New Statesman

News & Politics

What's The New Statesman Podcast about?

Unrivalled analysis of the latest in UK politics, with Anoosh Chakelian, Andrew Marr and the New Statesman politics team.
New episodes Tuesday and Friday.
Send us a question on anything related to UK politics, in Westminster and beyond, by emailing [email protected] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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LAST EPISODE

Rishi Sunak’s first 100 day...

02.02.2023

Rishi Sunak is marking 100 days in office just after Britain was hit by the biggest day of industrial action in a decade and the IMF predicted that the UK will be the only major economy to shrink in 2023. ...

The New Statesman Podcast episodes:

02.02.2023 Rishi Sunak’s first 100 days, with Andrew Marr Rishi Sunak is marking 100 days in office just after Britain was hit by the biggest day of industrial action in a decade and the IMF predicted that the UK will be the only major economy to shrink in 2023. ...
01.30.2023 Are the Lib Dems winning here? After a series of by-election victories, could the Lib Dem election machine be powering the party back to its late 90s levels of popularity? Anoosh Chakelian, Freddie Hayward and Ben Walker look at the party’s recent performance, how it is ...
01.26.2023 The return of Tory sleaze Rishi Sunak promised to draw a line under the scandalous Boris Johnson era when he became Prime Minister, but Tory sleaze seems here to stay. He is facing serious questions over the integrity of his party after a succession of ...
01.24.2023 How to fix the NHS, with Phil Whitaker With the crisis in the health service growing, the New Statesman’s medical editor Phil Whitaker speaks to Rachel Cunliffe about his prescription for fixing it. They discuss how the system is currently broken, why the Health Secretary Steve Barclay and ...
01.23.2023 SPOTLIGHT: Are we there yet?: The EV story - with Wejo A special podcast from Spotlight, the New Statesman’s policy supplement - The New Statesman podcast will return tomorrow. In 2020, the UK announced the end of new petrol and diesel cars by 2030. At the time, Boris Johnson’s government pledged ...
01.19.2023 From Scotland to Stormont, is Rishi Sunak losing the Union? Rishi Sunak’s government has decided to block legislation to simplify gender recognition passed by the Scottish Parliament using a mechanism that’s being described as the “nuclear option”. The decision has precipitated a constitutional crisis, with Nicola Sturgeon calling the decision ...
01.16.2023 Why Britain’s economy has never been worse, with Duncan Weldon Will Dunn, the New Statesman’s business editor, is joined by the journalist and former political adviser Duncan Weldon to discuss how Britain is facing a decline like never before. They talk about the country’s long history of economic woe and ...
01.12.2023 Is Rishi Sunak's anti-strike law a trap for Labour? After the Prime Minister and the leader of the opposition met across the despatch box for the first time in 2023, Anoosh Chakelian is joined by the New Statesman's Political Editor Andrew Marr and Freddie Hayward to analyse whether Rishi ...
01.09.2023 How do the SNP and Welsh Labour compare with the Tories in England? In a devolution special for the New Statesman Podcast, we take a look at how the NHS crisis - and other political problems - are playing out in Scotland and Wales. Our Scotland editor, Chris Deerin, returns to the podcast ...
01.05.2023 Sunak vs Starmer: The battle of the New Year’s speeches Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer welcomed in 2023 with speeches setting out their priorities for the year and beyond. Anoosh Chakelian, Freddie Hayward and Rachel Cunliffe discuss Sunak’s five pledges and why he appears more Blue Peter presenter than prime ...
01.02.2023 Will Labour change the voting system? Half of Britain (51 per cent) wants the voting system to change, according to the British Social Attitudes survey, while only 44 per cent want to retain the current system. Most Labour supporters are in favour and this year the ...
12.29.2022 From partygate to Trussonomics, 2022 in review In a special episode of the New Statesman Podcast, Harry Lambert joins Anoosh Chakelian to look back at the year in politics. They cast their minds back to the three prime ministers, two monarchs, one controversial beer and korma, and ...
12.28.2022 SPOTLIGHT: How connected vehicle data is going to change the world - with Wejo In the very near future, your car will use data from your mobile device to help you navigate and stay safe. But vehicles already generate useful data. In the first episode of a three-part special partnered series with Wejo, the ...
12.26.2022 The best of culture in 2022 A special Boxing Day episode hosted by Rachel Cunliffe, looking back at the best (and worst) of the year in culture. She is joined by Tom Gatti, the New Statesman’s executive editor for culture, Kate Mossman, senior writer, and Rachel ...
12.22.2022 Rishi Sunak could face more NHS strikes next year It’s been an unprecedented week of strike action involving both nurses and ambulance workers – and the government still refuses to negotiate with NHS unions over pay. Anoosh Chakelian and Zoë Grünewald, the New Statesman’s political reporter, are joined by ...
12.19.2022 Why Love Actually has ruined politics, with Jonn Elledge In a special festive edition of the New Statesman Podcast, NS columnist Jonn Elledge speaks to Rachel Cunliffe about the highs and lows of the year, how Love Actually messed up our politicians, and why residents of a town in ...
12.15.2022 Are strike politics trickier for Rishi Sunak or Keir Starmer? Nurses in England, Wales and Northern Ireland went on strike today for the first time in their history. With the UK facing “winter lockdown” following the latest wave of strikes and with inflation still high, Rishi Sunak’s government is under ...
12.12.2022 What politicians get wrong about immigration, with Sunder Katwala After figures showed record net migration to the UK in 2022, is immigration still a toxic political issue? Freddie Hayward talks to Sunder Katwala, director of the think tank British Future, about how public attitudes to immigration have changed, the ...
12.09.2022 Are British prime ministers too powerful? With Armando Iannucci \| Westminster Reimagined The writer, satirist and broadcaster Armando Iannucci returns to the New Statesman Podcast to co-host our third series of Westminster Reimagined. In six special episodes Iannucci explores parts of British public life he believes to be broken, and is joined ...
12.08.2022 Is Rishi Sunak’s authority starting to crumble? With Andrew Marr Keir Starmer dubbed Rishi Sunak the “blancmange prime minister” – comparing him to a particularly weak and wobbly dessert – after he U-turned on new onshore wind farms and mandatory housing targets this week under pressure from Tory MPs. Rachel ...
12.05.2022 Can Labour end “trickle-down” education? Keir Starmer has used Winchester, the elite independent school Rishi Sunak attended, to attack the Tory party over tax benefits for private schools, saying it amounted to “trickle-down education”. Meanwhile, the Prime Minister defended private schools as a personal choice, ...
12.02.2022 Can Britain make Brexit work? With Armando Iannucci \| Westminster Reimagined The writer, satirist and broadcaster Armando Iannucci returns to the New Statesman Podcast to co-host our third series of Westminster Reimagined. In six special episodes, Iannucci explores the parts of British public life he believes are broken and works out ...
12.01.2022 Redrawing the UK’s electoral map: who’s set to win and lose? For the first time since 2010, constituency boundaries are set to be redrawn. The Boundary Commission for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland has published its final proposals, to be followed by final recommendations in 2023 that are likely to ...
11.28.2022 Why are so many Conservative MPs standing down? With Charlotte Ivers As the Conservative Party deadline approaches for MPs to say whether they want to run in the next election, many young Tory MPs have already announced that they’ve had enough, including the Bishop Auckland MP Dehanna Davison. Charlotte Ivers, the ...
11.25.2022 Can politics survive a post-truth world? with Armando Iannucci \| Westminster Reimagined The writer, satirist and broadcaster Armando Iannucci returns to the New Statesman Podcast to co-host our third series of Westminster Reimagined. In six special episodes Iannucci explores parts of British public life he believes to be broken, and is joined ...
11.24.2022 Why is Brexit back to haunt the Tory party? Rishi Sunak has denied reports that the government is preparing to seek a “Swiss-style” deal with the EU over the next decade to rebuild economic ties with the trading bloc. Rachel Cunliffe, Rachel Wearmouth and Freddie Hayward discuss why the ...
11.23.2022 Bonus: Anti-microbial resistance: the crisis that could spell the end of medicine - with Pfizer In 2014, the then prime minister David Cameron commissioned a review into a worrying global phenomenon: an increase in drug-resistant infections. “If we fail to act,” he warned, “we are looking at an almost unthinkable scenario where antibiotics no longer ...
11.21.2022 Rishi Sunak four weeks on In a special episode of the New Statesman podcast, recorded live at the Cambridge Literary Festival, Rachel Wearmouth, Freddie Hayward and Ben Walker look back at the last few weeks in politics, including the fall out from the Autumn Statement, ...
11.18.2022 Is Britain falling apart? With Armando Iannucci \| Westminster Reimagined The writer, satirist and broadcaster Armando Iannucci returns to the New Statesman Podcast to co-host our third series of Westminster Reimagined. In six special episodes Iannucci explores parts of British public life he believes to be broken, and is joined ...
11.17.2022 Jeremy Hunt’s doom-filled Autumn Statement Rachel Cunliffe, Freddie Hayward and Rachel Wearmouth dissect the Autumn Statement, which will leave Britain with highest tax burden since the Second World War. They discuss what to make of the Office for Budget Responsibility’s bleak forecast that living standards ...
11.14.2022 Is the Conservative Party doomed? With John Oxley As Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt prepare for a Budget that will likely mean years of austerity, Rachel Cunliffe talks to the Conservative commentator John Oxley about the mess the party finds itself in. They discuss whether the damage done ...
11.11.2022 Jon Stewart & Armando Iannucci: has the special relationship become a kiss of death? \| Westminster Reimagined The legendary writer, satirist and broadcaster Armando Iannucci returns to the New Statesman Podcast to co-host our third series of Westminster Reimagined. Across six special episodes, Iannucci explores parts of British public life he believes to be broken, and is ...
11.10.2022 The Gavs and Gav-nots: how the Tories are still divided Gavin Williamson has resigned from the cabinet as minister without portfolio after a string of bullying allegations, including expletive-laden texts to a female colleague. It’s not the first time he has lost a government job: he was sacked twice before, ...
11.07.2022 Why Rishi Sunak flip-flopped on Cop As Cop27, the UN climate conference, starts in Egypt, Anoosh Chakelian is joined by India Bourke, our environment correspondent, to discuss why Rishi Sunak U-turned and is now attending, what might be announced and why it’s disappointing that the leaders ...
11.04.2022 “It’s inequality, stupid.” With Armando Iannucci \| Westminster Reimagined The writer, satirist and broadcaster Armando Iannucci, returns to the New Statesman Podcast to co-host our third series of Westminster Reimagined. In six special episodes Iannucci explores parts of British public life he believes to be broken, and is joined ...
11.03.2022 Rishi Sunak’s first ten days – with Andrew Marr Anoosh Chakelian, the New Statesman’s Britain editor, is joined by Andrew Marr, political editor, and Rachel Wearmouth, deputy political editor, to assess Rishi Sunak’s first ten days in Downing Street, from the damaging re-appointment of Suella Braverman as Home Secretary ...
10.31.2022 How to get better leaders – with Brian Klaas With the Conservatives on to their fifth prime minister in just six years, we talk to the political scientist and author Brian Klaas about the leadership problem in politics: why the top jobs attract the worst people; why it was ...
10.27.2022 Which version of Rishi Sunak will Britain get? Rishi Sunak attended his first PMQs on Wednesday 26 October, and seemed to buoy up his divided party with Johnsonite attack lines on Labour – but can he hold on to unity and win back the country’s trust? Anoosh Chakelian ...
10.24.2022 Rishi Sunak wins – what now? The UK is to have a new prime minister whose policies are unknown and no one but Tory MPs voted for. Public appetite for a general election is high. What will Rishi Sunak, the former chancellor, do when he officially ...
10.21.2022 BONUS: How the lettuce became Liz Truss’s nemesis, with Jon Livesey In this bonus episode of the New Statesman Podcast, Rachel Cunliffe interviews the Daily Star deputy editor-in-chief Jon Livesey about how a lettuce livestream helped chronicle the downfall of Liz Truss’s calamitous time in office. They talk about why it ...
10.20.2022 Prime Minister Liz Truss resigns after just 44 days in office Liz Truss has announced she will stand down as prime minister after her government was plunged into chaos yesterday. The Home Secretary was forced to resign, the chief whip attempted to resign, and Tory MPs were allegedly manhandled and reduced ...
10.17.2022 Will Liz Truss last the week? In a desperate attempt to stabilise the financial markets Jeremy Hunt, the newly appointed Chancellor, has reversed “almost all” of the tax cuts announced in the government’s mini-Budget just three weeks ago. Anoosh Chakelian and Harry Lambert discuss the measures ...
10.16.2022 Horror in the City at the Tories' mini-Budget, with the economist and former trader Gary Stevenson Emma Haslett, The New Statesman’s associate business editor, speaks to Gary Stevenson, an economist and former trader for Citibank, a job he initially won in a card game. In 2011 he became the bank’s most profitable trader globally by correctly ...
10.14.2022 Will Liz Truss sack Kwasi Kwarteng to save herself? What was left of Liz Truss’s authority visibly dissipated in Prime Minister’s Questions this week. As Freddie Hayward reports, the atmosphere was “funereal”, with the Prime Minister repeating “I’m genuinely unclear” and refusing to talk about market turmoil or tax ...
10.11.2022 How Liz Truss is fuelling the energy crisis, with Dale Vince Anoosh Chakelian is joined by Dale Vince, a green energy industrialist and founder of Ecotricity, a renewable energy company. Vince’s book Manifesto: How a Maverick Entrepreneur Took On British Energy and Won was published in 2020, charting his journey from ...
10.06.2022 Are the Conservatives preparing for opposition? With Andrew Marr As conference season ends, our Political Editor, Andrew Marr, discusses the Conservative and Labour conferences with Freddie Hayward and Anoosh Chakelian. They reflect on the mood at the Conservative Party conference, whether Liz Truss will get any policy through parliament ...
10.04.2022 Rebellious Tory MPs look for Liz Truss’s successor Anoosh Chakelian is joined by Freddie Hayward, Rachel Wearmouth and Harry Lambert, who are reporting from the Conservative Party conference in Birmingham. They describe a sense of discord and dissent, with Liz Truss’s U-turn on abolishing the top rate of ...
10.03.2022 Labour is in an anti-London "Tory trap": Sadiq Khan vs Andy Burnham This is a special episode recorded live at the New Statesman’s fringe event at this year’s Labour Party conference in Liverpool. Anoosh Chakelian sits down with Andy Burnham and Sadiq Khan to discuss what levelling up should look like under ...
09.29.2022 Inside Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng’s economic meltdown, with David Gauke and Duncan Weldon With the cost of debt rising and the pound still falling, just how much damage has the Conservatives’ mini-Budget done to the economy? To unpick what’s going on, Anoosh Chakelian is joined by David Gauke, who was work and pensions ...
09.27.2022 Is Keir Starmer’s vision enough? With Ed Miliband Anoosh Chakelian and Freddie Hayward are joined by Ed Miliband, the shadow climate change and net zero secretary and former Labour leader, to discuss Keir Starmer’s speech from the Labour Party conference in Liverpool. They discuss the pledge to create ...

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