WATCH - “Labour HATES the Working Class!” William Clouston UNLOADS on Starmer

Added: 2026-05-19

[00:00:00]Yeah, >> let's have a look actually at what he said because there was one thing he came out with yesterday which again clearly he thought was going to be this revelatory kind of move towards the rescuing of British steel. I don't know if you if you if you looked into that but have a look at what he said about British steel >> starting with British steel >> because what we did in scumthorp last year is one of the proudest things we have done in government. That plant was hours away from closure and that is thousands of jobs gone. An entire region decimated. Britain's security exposed.

[00:00:36]And so we acted. Parliament was in recess, but it didn't matter. As a United Labor Party, we passed emergency legislation and we took control.

[00:00:55]And we must bring that same urgency to everything now. Starting appropriately enough with Stunthorp because steel is the ultimate sovereign capability.

[00:01:08]Strong nations in a world like this need to make steel. That's why we're backing steel in Portal and across the UK.

[00:01:17]But in Skull Thorp, we've been negotiating with the current owner and a commercial sale has not been possible.

[00:01:26]And now a public interest test could be met. So I can announce that legislation will be brought forward this week to give the government powers subject to that public interest test to take full national ownership of British steel.

[00:02:02]And the other thing that was so weird about that, apart from the fact that as Richard Ty pointed out later, you know, the whole point of saving British steel for for star is to make a sort of a point at a at a press conference where people are whooping and shouting and you just know that that's all rehearsed and fake, right? And people were actually holding up cards going clap, cheer, you know, you know, go whoop whoop whoop. Um >> but they want to do away with um what is called um you know hard steel because they don't want to use blast furnaces.

[00:02:32]They want to use electric furnaces which mean that they can't make steel which is any good for for ships. They can't make steel that's any good for uh for anything military or industrial. Um that all they can do is make soft steel effectively. which is of no use to man or beast.

[00:02:45]>> It's just a recycling thing now. Yeah.

[00:02:46]So, yeah, you've got specialist steel in in Sheffield actually with forge masters. But no, this is this is what what Stalmer has done in this press conference is throw a little bit of what he thinks is red meat to the left will nationalize something. It's a sort of reflex. In fact, actually, this is just the end product of a total indifference from all the political class. I mean, they they've let we've let foreign competitors buy these key industrial assets for years. Same in Port Tolbert.

[00:03:12]Same in Skorp. We've let them buy it and usually what happens is okay well it doesn't matter who owns it because it doesn't matter who produces anything. So the Chinese buy it would the Chinese let us buy their steel industry anyway. No.

[00:03:23]So so they they buy it and and the last thing is then it then it gets closed as a branch plant.

[00:03:28]>> Uh and the government said what do we do now? Well they should never have let these things go into foreign ownership in the first place if they cared about the country.

[00:03:34]>> And of course he doesn't mention Port Tolbert because Port Tolbert is not a success story and therefore we try and pretend it doesn't exist.

[00:03:40]>> Disaster. But you know, so today it looks as though he's going to be told by several senior members of a cabinet.

[00:03:47]Yeah. That he needs to go.

[00:03:48]>> Shibban Mammud has already told.

[00:03:50]>> Yeah. And so is a vet Cooper, we understand. Um the problem I suppose now is physically shifting him because it's almost like he's he's just going to occupy number 10. We've got the king speech on Wednesday tomorrow. Um so he may not go obviously before that happens. But surely do you think today?

[00:04:07]I think today he will have to come out and say something about his departure whether whether it when it's going to happen as opposed to whether it's going to happen.

[00:04:14]>> He has to and all parties have rules detailed rules about how you can get a new leader in and there are lots of hurdles there. You can't just get rid of the rules. You can't appoint someone.

[00:04:23]It's not like the Tories in the early you know the 50s and the 60s where Lord Holm emerges. Remember that they used to just emerge. Not like that. There are proper rules and the and the major hurdle for some of the you know possibly the key contender Burnham is that he's got to get into the commons.

[00:04:37]>> I don't think he's gonna make it.

[00:04:38]>> I don't Well, can you find a seat that Labour would win?

[00:04:41]>> No, >> I don't think so.

[00:04:42]>> Well, somebody mentioned yesterday when I was watching and listening to various different programs um there's a seat in Scotland coming up because I think one of the Scottish Labor MPs has gone into the Scottish Parliament. Um so he will that so his seat will be >> win this >> but he wouldn't you can't you can't just parachute him into >> No, I think the public would give it two fingers. I mean, honestly, I think they'd say, "No, we're not having this.

[00:05:01]They're not being manipulated." You'd have to find on the on the >> I mean, it would have to be a man Man Manchester scenario, wouldn't it?

[00:05:08]>> Yeah, I think I think it would be. He might win a seat in Manchester and and there are there are rumors of uh of of an MP or two MPs thinking about stepping aside if you you know what would happen is they'd step aside and they go into the Lords, whatever, >> which is also kind of corrupt in its own.

[00:05:22]>> It is pretty corrupt. I think the public is sick of it. Um I So, we don't know, but it won't be quick, Mike. It won't be.

[00:05:27]>> Yeah. buttering their own toast I think has come to an end and so it should.

[00:05:30]>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But it's but it so anyway all of these things it's not ideal. Far from ideal from the Labour party's point of view. They have rules.

[00:05:37]I think it'll take some time. So you he'll be sitting there for some time I would imagine.

[00:05:41]>> Yeah. I mean did you see for example yesterday's uh leaked Harriet Harmon tweet in which she sent a tweet to a guy I think one of the outgoing heads of council somewhere where she more or less said how do you fancy getting a place in the House of Lords?

[00:05:53]>> Yeah. Do you fancy that?

[00:05:54]>> I mean it's just ridiculous.

[00:05:55]>> Yeah. It's corrupt.

[00:05:56]>> It is corrupt. And I think again people have just had enough. And while reform might not be perfect, they are certainly different enough I think to to to wet people's appetite. And I know that that there are many the place there are many many miles to go and all of that before a general election. If there was a general election soon, which I would quite like for aren't ready.

[00:06:16]>> Well, they they're not ready. And and you know, you're just into a political crisis. The the Labour Party, I've said for some time actually, is in much much more vulnerable position than the Tories. If you see, you know, as I say, I was in Leeds last luckily the three the Middleton part the bit we have we held off reform and actually kept our our our seat there. So that was that was important but you see it Labor in that seat. This is shows you the magnitude few years ago Mike before we got involved swept them out.

[00:06:43]>> Labour were polling 3,700 votes in that division. Do you know how many they got?

[00:06:47]>> 700.

[00:06:48]>> Wow.

[00:06:48]>> It's collapsed. It's just gone.

[00:06:50]>> It's scary. I mean from their point of view even places like Wigan where they lost every seat. Sunderland where they lost every sep. It's not coming back by the way.

[00:06:57]>> It's not coming back. Well, people know if you hate them, right? And I think the Labour Party hates the working class. I think they that's the root of it. People have had enough of it.

[00:07:05]>> Yeah.

[00:07:06]>> Paul Embry's talked about it, written about it. You you don't People aren't mugged.

[00:07:09]>> Well, you know, when it began, and I think this was also a massive sort of own goal, I suppose, at the weekend when Gordon Brown was suddenly dragged out of the the coffin and and put back into power as if he was some kind of political and and financial genius. odd socks, >> which he isn't. And then all these Labour people came out and said, "Oh, he's very well respected in the party."

[00:07:28]Well, not in the country, he's not. And then everybody started playing the old bigoted woman clip.

[00:07:33]>> Yeah.

[00:07:33]>> And that was the beginning of the end, I think, for Labor because that was the true nature of how these sort of so-called left-wing intellectuals saw the working class. They just think they're bigoted, horrible, nasty individuals.

[00:07:45]>> But he said that. But this this is the thing, Mike. This is this is a politician meant to be a What is politics about? You've got to persuade people that you're on earth. You've got to persuade people of your arguments.

[00:07:54]That's what it's about. Starmer, his best idea has basically the last few press conferences has been anyone that's concerned about a migrant hotel in their in their village or town is a racist.

[00:08:04]It's far right. Great way to win.

[00:08:06]>> And he also started slagging off everybody who voted reform yesterday in this press conference. Uh and everybody that voted green. And that the reason they did that is because you slagged them off.

[00:08:15]>> Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Yeah.

[00:08:16]>> How stupid do you have to be?

[00:08:17]>> No, he's really inept. Completely inept.

[00:08:19]But it I'm I there is a broad I mean sad thing is I don't think the the fundamental problems in in the country economic stagnation the debts building up the welfare binge we have that no one is dealing with Mike you know welfare bill just goes up and up and up entitlement spending goes up and up and up it's in our new paper investment state none of these fundamentals are going to be sorted so you can change you can change the the leader if you like burn won't be able to sort it is sad for the country because what what happened to the tries is now happen to the Labor party you probably what might help and I'm you know I I support proportional representation because I think it allows competitors to come in. What we've had is this awful situation the two parties denying competitor parties coming in under the system >> but if you open it up it may be a sort of safety valve at least people would get people in at least and at least parliament might finally look a bit like the country.

[00:09:12]>> Yeah it's going to take a while to take a while. It is going to take a while because I mean reform come from a different place as well. Yeah. Um where they're not all consuming, are they?

[00:09:20]They're not they don't have it's not a broad church particularly. I don't I don't say that with with with any degree of negativity. It just isn't.

[00:09:27]>> Well, they the thing is reforms I mean, you know, I want I want the system to change, right? So, I have some sympathy with them as you know, I did an electoral pack with them last election, but the but reform agree the reform members agree on on one thing, which is they want to cut immigration. They don't agree on much else. Actually, if you're if you're a Southeast Reform, you might not actually be aligned to what people want in Barnes. A little bit different.

[00:09:48]So, they they have they've got to sort that out. I'm I'm afraid we're in for a rough ride.

[00:09:52]>> Yeah, it's not going to be easy. Let's have a look at a couple of other clips as well. Uh because I think we should watch Beth Rigby talking of why the uh the politicians in this country are not properly held to account. Here's Beth Riby asking him a question yesterday.

[00:10:06]Back in 2021 when Labour lost hundreds of council seats and the heartly pulled bi-election you thought about resigning as Labour leader explaining this is quoting you I didn't feel I should be bigger than the party but these results this moment is so so much worse than you've lost nearly 1500 counselors 40 councils you've lost Wales haven't you for one moment thought you should step aside in the interest of the party and country and if you haven't why haven't you? Thank you.

[00:10:41]>> Well, thank you very much Beth. Um I think what we witnessed uh with the last government was the chaos of constantly changing leaders and it cost this country a huge amount. A huge amount.

[00:11:03]And I'll tell you who paid the price. It was working people. They paid the price of this. They are still paying the price of this.

[00:11:10]>> Yes.

[00:11:12]>> A Labor government will not inflict that on our country again. We were elected with a mandate to change this country because of what had gone before. And that is what we will do. Yes, I acknowledge the frustration. Yes, I acknowledge the results are tough. Yes, I acknowledge that we've lost brilliant representatives across the United Kingdom and I have a responsibility for that, but I also have a responsibility to deliver the change that we were elected and that we promised this country and I'll deliver on that. Thank you very much.

[00:11:44]I mean, he says he's going to deliver on the change that we promised the country.

[00:11:47]Well, they didn't really promise change, did they? They said that they were going to get rid of cronyism, which lasted about 24 hours before we found out about Lord Ali in the spectacles and the knickers and the coats and the and the suits and the and the pen houses.

[00:12:00]>> Uh he said they were going to bring transparency to government, >> which of course they didn't because they lied about so much.

[00:12:06]>> Um they said they were going to have an orderly transition uh because they were ready for the first 100 days of government. And poor old uh what's her name? Um who was it? Sue >> uh Sue Gray.

[00:12:17]>> Sue Gray didn't even last 100 days. 93 days later, she's gone.

[00:12:21]>> They're all gone.

[00:12:21]>> Morgan Mweeny, the genius of the election campaign, turns out to be a complete dud. And when we saw him in front of that committee the other week, I mean, what a weird guy.

[00:12:30]>> Really poor.

[00:12:31]>> Very poor. I mean, everyone's they're meant to have these sort of puppeteers, you know, behind the scenes that really clever. I was very unimpressed >> and terribly unimpressed. And I mean, even if you go back to the the Blair years and you go, you know, Alistister Cav was a bit of a bully. He was a nasty character, but you know, he was if he sat in front of of a committee like that, he would have been quite impressive and he wouldn't have taken any crap, you know. Um, and the same as you said about Tony Tony Blair, you know, he wasn't everybody's cup of tea, but he was at least statesmanlike. This guy just doesn't have anything.

[00:12:59]>> No, no, it's it's hopeless. What what I've what I've sort of discovered again uh since 2018 and and getting involved in politics actively again is actually it is far worse. I say this to people, it's actually far worse than you imagine.

[00:13:11]um your the average sort of intelligence and insight on a parish council is can be better than this.

[00:13:17]>> Well, you know, I noticed that when I first started working at talk radio um and we and it was summer of I guess it would have been the summer of 20 >> 2019 was it the stalemate summer where we were down in Westminster every single day. That's probably when we first met I think in the tent of shame as I called it. Um, and I'd have one MP after another who we'd managed to somehow get into this into into our on their way to the BBC or Sky.

[00:13:41]>> And I thought to myself, these are not very clever people.

[00:13:43]>> No, but it's not just some, well, some of them may be technically clever, but the problem is they have no life experience. And if you look, it's particularly a problem in the Labor Party. So, if you look, if you want things built, you know, I want things built. I want, you know, nuclear power stations built. I want some housing built, infrastructure. I want these things done.

[00:13:58]>> The Labor Party are about the worst uh bunch of people to try and achieve that.

[00:14:02]None of them have any polit any commercial experience. None of them have actually built anything. None of them have have run a business. It's actually shocking. How can they how can they manage the economy if none of them their backgrounds are spads, special advisers, PR, comms, and charity work?

[00:14:21]>> That's it. I mean, charity work is is valuable, right, Mike? But but it's not >> you need that. You need some some some people have experience, right? All she's ever done before she came into to to parliament was work for her mom's charity, which is, I'm sure, you know, a very worthwhile organization dealing with women's refugees and all that sort of thing. Although there are apparently some financial questions that need to be answered, >> but that doesn't prepare you to be the education secretary of the great country that is Great Britain.

[00:14:48]>> But remember that all the Dom Cummings criticisms of how the how the civil service doesn't function properly and how the state is incompetent and all this thing.

[00:14:56]>> Yeah. Well, state competence is important. We talk about it a lot. You know, we want a a state that can actually deliver a few things. Cummings talked about it a lot. And all these Labour people, oh, we're not really interested in him. He's he's he's probably far right, you know, whatever.

[00:15:09]They don't like him. And then they get into power and they start pulling levers and nothing's happening. And these are this is the the metaphor that their ideas on economics, Mike. It's like children playing at shops. Yes. That's actually what they're like. They got into government and thought, "Oh, well, women government will just do this and we'll pull the lever." And they've pulled the lever and nothing happens.

[00:15:28]They don't know why, but they've never >> They think they're going to tax all these people over here and then they all these people over here go, "Actually, no, I'm not going to do that. We're going to leave.

[00:15:35]>> I'll leave." Yeah.

[00:15:35]>> We're not going to pay the tax.

[00:15:36]>> Or or you'll put a you'll put VAT on independent schools and wonder why they're closed. 65,000 kids left the schools >> and and wonder why those kids are now on the state and why all of these things anyone in with a modicum of intelligence or really experience would say that might happen but they're useless.

[00:15:53]>> So what about this paper you you mentioned?

[00:15:55]>> Yeah. So we we've put we've published a new uh green paper uh it's called the investment state and what it does is it it asks some of these important questions. Why can't we get anything done? What's happening to the public investment side which the private sector is better at building making normal goods and and normal normal most of the things we need obviously than the state >> and reacting to demand >> demand yeah and it's dynamic and proper market yeah proper markets are are that but what we found is since 1975 since up to 1975 investment spending which is bridges power stations infrastructure the things we need um that was at about five or 6% of GDP Yeah.

[00:16:34]>> And entitlement spending was about that.

[00:16:36]That was what we spent on disability benefit or or unemployment benefit. But what happened is after that entitlement spending just gradually went up and up and up and up and up and investment spending went down and down and down.

[00:16:47]It's the the gap in the chart four in that paper which just tells the story of what's happened. So public investment now is down at 1.7% of GDP. Entitlement spending is up way over 10% and getting bigger. And we can't afford that. And unfortunately, so what we what we say is just >> what did we see last week? 600,000 families who are now making more money on benefits than the average working family on the minimum wage. On the minimum wage, well, no, the average wage, I think.

[00:17:16]>> I know. Okay. Well, that's even worse.

[00:17:17]But but but no one should be better off on benefits than someone that's working full-time on the minimum wage. And yet thousands are if you get all all of them. But neither party know what to do with this rising uh tide. You know, the number of people, Mike, in their 20s that are out of work on invalidity benefit or disability benefit because of mental health issues is rising and rising and rising. The state's attitude is okay, we'll just sign you up and we'll just give you money to sit in your room in activity. Inactivity, Mike, is the worst thing you could do is up there.

[00:17:50]>> Yeah, there you go. That is the graph.

[00:17:51]That is the graph that tells the story.

[00:17:53]Look at it. Look at it. It's devastating. If you don't invest in in the future, you won't have a future.

[00:17:58]Look at that red line. It's going up and up and up and they have no idea. I'm afraid what the the paper is very blunt about the need to cut welfare and and entitlement spending. I'm afraid I if you want delusion and if you want to pretend that these figures can be afforded and we do nothing about then I'm afraid the STP has nothing for you.

[00:18:18]No.

[00:18:18]>> If you want that, look elsewhere. But you can't pretend anymore. You've got to actually face it and cut back.

[00:18:24]>> And one of the things that they boast about Bridget Filson did it at the weekend. did it yesterday. Um, you know, breakfast clubs, lifting children out of poverty. Um, you know, you're not lifting children out of poverty by using other people's money uh to tax them so that they can pay for other people's children because those people shouldn't have had the children that they can't afford.

[00:18:43]>> Well, look at this. I think the priorities are wrong. Look, look, I'm quite oldfashioned. I think the family uh does have the prime role. It must have the prime role in looking after kids. I I don't this is why I don't I mean I I think you know the SCP supports uh school meals free school meals for all people that turn up to school. I think you could they'd be better fed but the state shouldn't get into the business. I don't agree with that. No, but they shouldn't. No, but if they're at school, Mike, we think they're at school uh you know, forget forget about your crisps and give them a decent school breakfast.

[00:19:12]>> No, not breakfast. That's the breakfast is the families time. It's not for the state to start. And it's the same people that start saying, "Well, we should feed people." It's like the Marcus Rashford thing. We should start feeding people in the holidays. No, it's the family's job to look after kids in the holiday. It's not the state's job to do that. So, not all their priorities wrong. Um, anyway, check check this investment state paper.

[00:19:35]It's pretty hard-hitting. I mean, the people, the authors, I said, "Look, >> diagnose the problem. Give me some honest solutions about the maths on this." And I read it and I thought, "Wow, okay, this is going to be tough."

[00:19:45]But if you want a party that will tell the truth about this, we will do it.

[00:19:49]>> We will do it.

[00:19:49]>> And it's called the investment state.

[00:19:51]Yeah, there's a link there.