On this episode of Voternomics, former UK diplomat Tom Fletcher discusses how the Labour Party leader’s first 30 days could define his premiership. Plus, reporter Ellen Milligan discusses her story on Labour’s position on Brexit. Hosted by Allegra Stratton and reporters Alex Wickham and Ailbhe Rae.
Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, Radio News. Welcome to Voter Nomics, where politics and markets collide. This year, voters around the world have the ability to affect markets, countries, and economies like never before, so we've created this series to help me make sense of it all. I'm Aleca Stratton and this week we actually don't have the usual Voter Nomics crew Stephanie's in Barcelona and Adrian's in New York, but instead we've got two of Bloomberg's top UK reporters right here in the studio with us to join us for this episode, Alex Wickham, Westminster political editor and Alvarey, reporter and fellow read Out newsletter writer. We are a month in, guys to this election. How are you bearing up?
Probably better than most of our sources who seem to be on the last legs. I'm not sure how we're going to do another nine days but not long now?
Is that from?
Is that all parties or all parties? I think it's just so hard on a campaign, isn't it. It's one thing being journalists go on a bus, you know, late nights, but you know, if you're if you're an advisor or candidate. You're just absolutely constant, has no escape.
If I think back to the battle buses that I was on, I can think of the moment the morning after David Cameron TV debate where he was expected to wipe the floor with everybody else and he really didn't. It was the one where Nick Clegg came out on top six years and years ago, and the mood on the bus was horrendous, really low, and you could sense the team didn't know what they were going to do. And then my other favorite was Nick Klegg used to have these sneaky cigarettes around the back of the well, not round the back of the battle bus. He would go kind of one bus away and he didn't think that like twenty journos sussed him out on this, what's what's been your sort of impression from the buses?
So sadly, Alegra the buses are much less fun than the name of Cameron days. They've changed how much access you really get. So even though Labor publicizes its battlebus with Kirstarmer and Angela Rayner, the press is on a separate bus and he tends to travel around in I know I'm ruining the magic, and he tends to travel around in his land Rover with his special protection officers, and then we are allied on the bus for brief moments. So I think I've been on the on the bus with Kirstarma for a total of aboute and hor Some of that he was behind a little curtain. Some of that he came out and chatted to us. But I think Alex has had a bit more of an interesting time.
Have your bus has been better?
The Conservative Bus is Oxford United football team's former bus, so it's very i would say, pretty nice quality. It's journalists only and then you sort of get ten or fifteen minutes if you're lucky with the Prime Minister. Richie Sunek is very tigerish and he's very good at sort of geeing himself up for a chat with the media. In my highlights from Tory Bus the other day was they took us to a farm with David Cameron and Richie Sinak, and David Cameron and a farmer were trying to feed some sheep and as soon as they offered the food, the sheep all ran in the opposite direction extremely quickly, and Prime Minister sort of sunk to his haunches and just shook his head and and he sort of you almost started to feel a bit sorry for him at that point.
We were joking yesterday that we were trying to find interesting things that kir Starmer has done on the battle Bus, and we were really racking our brains for interesting color. And we've observed that whenever he gets to a new non league football ground, he just looks around and says, fantastic, fantastic, fantastic.
This is super disciplined. Basically.
Yeah, he comes up for a short visit with some supporters. They all have their placards. He gives the same stump speech, gives one interview to local TV, then he's back, travels for another two hours, Rinse, repeat, same message, same message. So the bus can get a bit monotonous.
Right Well.
In this week's episode, we're looking at Labour's foreign policy plans. Given the most likely outcome of the July fourth election is that it is a Labor government, it would be good, wouldn't it to know what the party has planned for the UK's relationship with Europe, the US and the rest.
Of the word.
So, in a word, is it clear what Labor's foreign policy will be?
I think continuity is probably the main thing. They don't want anything against the grain at the moment in Europe, particularly on things like Ukraine.
They have two words for it, bitgrand signing progressive realism, which in practice just sort of means that they will pay lip service to their progressive values while being actually quite pragmatic about dealing with some very difficult foreign states like India.
Okay, all right, well to talk through progressive realism and reality of how some of that will work in practice, we will shortly be turning to Tom Fletcher. He's a former foreign policy advisor to no less than three UK prime ministers. He's now principle of Hartford College at Oxford University. Also on the show, we have Ellen Milligan, who's a Bloomberg reporter hopefully probably familiar to lots of you, and she's just published some brilliant analysis on kids damer and what she believes is his silence when it comes to Brexit. So now we're going to go to our on the ground voice for the week, Bloomberg's reporter, Ellen Milligan, who you can't see, but she's sitting with her very virtuous What.
Is it, Ellen, It looks darker than just normal green juice.
It's a green juice mixed with kafir.
And is it your election? Is it your election coping strategy?
It's my it's getting me through the sleep deprivation and lack of vitamin d yes.
Ellen, you published a piece about Brexit and Starmer. Just talk us through the things that the sources were telling you.
Well, Labor has this what it describes as an ambitious plan to forge closer ties with the EU. They describe it as a new geopolitical partnership that they want to build with their closest trading partner. But the truth is that it's actually quite unambitious in the sense that it sets some very clear redlines. Labor will not rejoin the Customs Union, the Single Market will return to freedom of movement, which means it's very limited in what it can do. And essentially all it can do is kind of tinker around the edges of the training Cooperation Agreement that was agreed in twenty twenty, rather than fundamentally alter the trading relationship. So it's got a few plans. One is a veterinary agreement, which will ease that border friction, particularly on fresh food and plants. The other is a security pat which actually the EU had offered Boris Johnson and he rejected it. In the negotiation, which is to cooperate on defence R and D, joint procurement of weaponry for example for Ukraine, and then also mutual recognitions of professions and visas for musicians, all things that from my conversations with UK government officials in the Foreign Office, Labor and EU diplomats are durable but will involve concessions.
So it feels to me like there's two points there. One is that they'll have to do things that they might be criticized for. Do you think they'll be criticized for them or do you think that actually with the new government and you know many people saying the opinion polls are becoming more skeptical about Brexit, do you think they will have the kind of political now is to get away with them.
There's I think two reasons why they their ambition on the EU is limited. One is the political reason. They want to win back those particularly the Red Wall parts of the country that voted leave in twenty sixteen and they lost in twenty nineteen to the Conservatives, many for the first time those constituencies. But also it's a genuine desire for their first five year term not to be distracted by the same old debates about Brexit and you know which distracted the government Conservative government from public services and all these things for several years. I think when it comes to things like concessions like the ECJ, I don't think they'll have a lot of backlash internally in their Labor party, especially if they have a big majority. In fact, the labor base tends to be more pro kind of things like a youth mobility deal that we have reported in here that they actually are open to negotiating, even though they've dismissed it publicly. But I think whether their majority is big or not will defend whether they mind so much about that.
Ellen, there's a really interesting nugget in the piece that you used to lead with when you were promoting it, which is what labor advisors and senior figures are saying privately about the prospect of rejoining the EU or the kind of the benefit that would have to the economy. Do you want to just spell actually the thing that they're admitting, which makes everything else that you've just said so extraordinary.
I think the big overarching question for this whole five year term that Labour's likely to get is it's so reliant on economic growth being able to fund everything they want to do, pretty much on public services in particular, on defense spending, all these things. They want to get up to that kind of two percent growth that we saw under the Tony Blair euro that's stagnant for the last few years. And what Labor, some senior Labor advisors have conceded to me kind of privately, is that they know that one of the most impactful ways that they can achieve economic growth is to, for example, rejoin the Customs Union or the Single Market, and yet they have given insurances privately and publicly that they will not do that in a first five year term. Now that opens the question as to whether they could come under pressure if they don't achieve the highest growth in the G seven that they've promised, a very ambitious promise that maybe those red lines will change by the time and next selection comes along.
Being in those things would have an almost immediate impact on growth where it would come through in the first term of a parliament, But just extraordinary for them to be conceding it privately and still sticking to their political approach.
I wonder as well, you know, does the size of Labour's majority if it does win, and if it does win big, do you think that makes a difference on how they would think it. Obviously at the moment in the election, Labor doesn't want to say, oh, we could re join the tiger mark at the Customs Unit. It doesn't want to give any grounds and give any doubt to voters who did vote for Brexit, or at least Air not in the full sort of remain camp. Do you think that a big majority could shift things the sort of the window of conversation on EU relations further in that direction.
Kis Dama's shadow cabinet is full of remainers. I mean, David Lammy described Brexit as a national tragedy and a big speech you did in Parliament after twenty twenty. But this is the thing and this this is what actually Jonathan Reynolds had a very good line, which was that our foreign policy will not be dictated by the internal party politics of the Conservative Party. And so when you say, you know, it rows over the ECJ quite niche technical things that the voting public mostly don't understand has been dominating you know, Ehr. We've seen it over immigration policy recently. Those things aren't going to be so much a problem again if there's a big labor majority, So I think that's definitely the case. But I do think there is a bit of naivety to think, you know, just because we're kind of a pro remain, pro EU party, we can kind of get all these you know, deals done. The EU is incredibly hard to negotiate with. It's very distracted by its own politics and its political shift.
To the right.
I suppose the thing listening to you just then, yes, they don't want their foreign policy to be set by the internal wranglings of the Tory Party. But it's clear there'll be internal wranglings of the Labor party in that if you've got, as Alex says, two hundred seat majority, you will have siren voices whispering in your ear saying you can do it, you can do it, go for it. You may not have this opportunity again, this is the right thing to do, and we all know you can do the ming Var's strategy. Ahead of an election, then people will start say you don't have to grip onto that ming Vas at all tightly or even at all you can. You can not drop it, but you know, to extend the metaphor you can relax. And I suspect, but I don't know, and I don't think anybody knows. If you have farage and reform having done right in this in this poll, you will have that that will be your sort of will be a fairly forceful.
Check it, Alex.
I would have thought so by the time of the next election, looking looking at five years ahead, would he need a political mandate from the public to start making these big changes with the EU? I mean, could he do them sort of in all but name without that political mandate. You know he's going to He's going to face big sort of pressure from the from them, from the sort of liberal media and from his own party.
And just wanted to move on. But it's a similar territory, which is immigration. Kis Darma's got these these policies on immigration. He wants to negotiate with France on take backs, so taking back some of the asylums because.
That come over.
How do you think that will work? If we have on Sunday the beginning of the national rally doing very well in France's parliament.
This is really interesting because while there would be Foreign Secretary, David Lammy has done a lot of work with the Republicans in the US and has kind of, you know, taken this quite pragmatic approach that they could be in government in six months time. He hasn't done that, and Kiirs Damer hasn't done that with the EUS. So what I've been told by labor contacts is that while Kiirs Starmer and David Lammy have made really good relations with ol Schultz, for example, with Lemon in Germany, France's Emanuel mccran Salma has not established a relationship with Georgia Maloney a tour or her team. They've not done work with Marine le Penz party in France or the AfD in Germany. O Left Schultz has an election next year. He looks like he's going to lose it. Mccroon's going to stay on most likely til twenty twenty seven. But then you could see a shift. So you could see this position in a Kirs Starmer administration where suddenly you're already seeing the political wins shift in the EU, but actually the leadership changes are kind of halfway through or before that, which I think will really change the way that he has relations with.
I think that they do have big hopes of working quite closely with European center right parties on immigration. They have sort of plans that they wouldn't be able to do on their own basically, and they're already kind of they anticipate that illegal migration is going to be a massive issue. I mean, it's been a huge headache for She's sooner act stopping the votes, but I think they think it could get even worse into the first few years of a labor government. And they keep talking about like desperately hoping for the center right to win in various elections because they don't think that they can work with far right parties on immigration. They would just be closed out of that.
But that is what's looking like happening. Yeah, what do they do.
My impression is that they're still working. They still have plans that they are hoping Macron will be in place to help them deliver.
That's it for now, but I'm sure we will be returning to this subject in the next few months.
Ellen Milligan, thank you very much.
Thank you.
Now onto our guest Tom Fletcher joins us in our London studio. Tom was previously the foreign policy advisor to three UK Prime Ministers Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and David Cameron, and then he became British Ambassador to Lebanon. He's currently head of Hartford College, Oxford. Tom. I remember you being certainly in your role as foreign policy advisor to Gordon Brown, and that crazy trip was it to Gulf countries and then to Auschwitz within a day.
We did a lot of crazy trips together, I think, and normally I would be the person that had to come back on the plane and basically brate all the press corps for whatever story you'd written about us all. But I think that day, yeah, we were coming back out of Afghanistan. We had a very grueling trip to Afghanistan, see Karzai. Just got out in time, late at night. Otherwise the plane, the C one thirty was going to be grounded in Carbull and we'd all have stayed in carbell overnight. Got out I think by Oman, and then on to Auschwitzer the next day and then into big talks with Donald Tusk, who's now back of course in Poland. So that was just a normal day in Number ten in those days, I.
Don't think so.
I don't think they do trips were crying quite that much in now so Gordon.
You know, Gordon's shuttle diplomacy was lots of shuttle, and then I was to do the diplomacy.
You know.
They once mistranslated my job title in China, which was the Private Secretary for Foreign Affairs to the Prime Minister, and it got mistranslated as the intimate typist, but it was them the intimate typist for the Prime Minister's affairs overseas, which of course in English means something completely different. But in reality I didn't organize any prime minister's affairs overseas. It was just but I was a kind of bad carrier, policy maker, speech writer and all the rest.
Okay.
So just so, looking at the kind of strategic comparatives for possibly Prime Minister kissed Armer, what do you think are the three things he will be wanting to sort.
I mean, he faces the fullest diary of state craft of any prime minister I think for their first month in office since Churchill. That's quite a big claim. But that NATO summit within days of taking office and then that first meeting with Biden, they are enormously consequential for so many of these issues NATO, Ukraine, for what happens next on the Middle East, And of course in the background there you've got the specter of the Orange, specter of Donald Trump waiting in the wings as well. So I think that set of issues is a massive, massive challenge. What next for NATO? You know what next for UK defense? How are we going to reimagine the threats that actually are coming in our direction and prepare for those. Then I think you've got a really, really tough summer on the Middle East. We may be coming to the end of this phase in Gaza, and it's been a pretty sickening eight nine months to work through. I have great fears that the wall now move north to my old stomping ground of Lebanon, and that we may see a similar military action there, which would dominate the summer and present some massive challenges to an incoming government. But then, I mean, can I have four? I mean, because Europe is also massive, and I think this is redefining. Some of that will be about body language and tone of our relationship with Europe, particularly on the security side. And then the danger will be that, look, these first thirty days will be so defining but the danger will be taking tactical decisions that then influence long term strategy. And nowhere is that more the case than on China. If you could almost work back from the end of this term, maybe the end of two terms as Prime minister, and think what is the overall tone of that relationship with China and how do we get kind of early decisions right to reflect that overall strategy.
As you say, pretty early decision he's going to have to make is defense spending, and the Conservatives who've committed to two point five by twenty thirty, and Labor obviously hasn't committed to that yet, and he's got the NATO summit days after coming in. Do you think Labor's position can hold on in terms of two point five whenever we can, which is basically their current position, or will will they come under pressure from Biden or other allies to really firm up their policy on that.
I think there will be pressure there, but I also think they can hold off. A lot of expectations around that summit will be that they're talking to a grown up who's going to be there for eight years, and the body language and the tone will be as important as what they announce, it will be this sense that you have a prime minister there who is going to be engaged. He's going to build the relationships, he's going to work on these practical issues. So I think they'll give him some time. There won't be an expectation that everything happens immediately. You know, I mentioned how difficult the calendar is for those thirty days, but that's also an opportunity because you can do a lot of that stake craft, a lot of that relationship building, and try to hold off some of those big long term strategic decisions. That would be my advice to them.
And he'll be hosting, of course, all the European leaders at blenh And Palace was in a few weeks of becoming Prime minister as well. If you were advising him high should he approach that sort of initial speed to it with all these quick bilasterals with those European leaders.
Well, you've made it sound much more fun than it will really be. Speed dating is one way of putting it. It's pretty crueling. I mean, there's no room for error. And of course the media, as you know, we used to always talk about on the plane on the way back. Normally from these visits immediately waiting for any sign that you know of incompetence or failure or gap. The first few months when I worked for David Cameron, the media, we're just waiting, hanging on his every word for him to get something wrong. And these are kind of complex briefs, and in the midst of it all you're trying to build that relationship with these other leaders, and so much of that is it's actually about the theater of it. And in the midst of that, many of those European leaders are also in a state of flux as well. Macronlemal delay and you know the Germans that so all of that it's like a sort of multi dimensional game of chess. Now he'll have brilliant people around him who will have prepared those enormous stacks of briefing, but it would be somebody's job to basically say to him before every meeting, as I used to have to do with with with Gordon and then with David Cameron, well you know, here are the three things that you've got to remember in this meeting. That's three things to get right, and here are the three things that you're going to be hit by from the other side.
You've painted the opportunities for Starmer, but there are problems and there are sort of limits to his maneuverability. Let's just sort of chunk them up. We've heard from Ellen Melogan earlier about restrictions to his ability on Europe and what he might do to make Brexit work better for the UK. What's your analysis of where that ends up.
That will take time and shouldn't be rushed. My advice to them would be to try and get a sort of heavyweight character in there. You know, there are lots of these big figures from previous labor. I think they've got a great ambassador on the ground already. I'm I'm not suggesting, I'm not trying to fire task force. I mean having someone who really owns that dossier and is working at twenty four to seven to work out where the opportunities will be to rebuild that relationship in very practical, tangible ways. I think the low hanging fruit in all of that is on security and defense, where it's clearly in the interests of the Europeans that we're working more closely together. And I believe, and more importantly, our defense people believe that it's very much in our interests that we align more clearly in response to these threats from Russia inside Europe, from new weapons from cyber Ai. You know, there are lots and lots of reasons why we need that alignment, and so it feels like that's an early prize for an incoming Labor administration, but also for the Europeans as well.
Tom, do you have someone in mind when you're saying you need someone to really own that brief, because.
Definitely I've got my hands for.
We were talking about this earlier. David miller Band former of course Labor Foreign Secretary now in America leading a big NGO. He gave a very interesting speech at the Irish Embassy within the past couple of months on the UK's relationship with the EU and the US. It looked like he was sort of making a pitch for David Lammy's job or the US and sit a role, but we hit the real focus was on the UK and EU. Do you think that's that's something for him.
I wouldn't know. And we're never very good at using our kind of former big figures in the UK. And it's a cross party problem and it's a whitehall problem. As well. We tend to assume that once someone has left office, they're sort of no longer on the bench. For us. You've got great people cross party. David Cameron's one of them, for example. I don't know whether he'll be sat standing by the phone after the election waiting for a call, but you know, using that expertise and that heft and that those networks that he's built up. David Millervan is obviously a massive heavyweight. Knows the UN inside out, knows the Americans, particularly the Democrats, very well.
It's very surprising if you didn't have some kind of role, wouldn't it I'm not my observation.
Would seem a waste. It seem would seem a waste not to have. You know, some of your star strikers on the pitch. I'd add into the mix. Kathy Ashton, former EU High Rep. You know, real pro, amazing behind the scenes negotiator, massive credibility in Washington and in Europe, and really good networks. Valerie Amos who ran at the UN Coordinated Humanitarian Affairs, you know, another massive heavyweight in the UN system. So you've got always big names out there. I'm now going to get Ino trouble with all the people, haven't You haven't mentioned. But we should get better. We should be bigger as a government and better at bringing those voices into the conversation.
But one of the problems he will have is whatever the shape of the French Parliament is in the next couple of weeks, what do you think will be the impact of a move to the right in the French Parliament on a starmer policy platform.
I mean, I think it will make his europeanislckats very jumpy, very edgy. That you know, they're not talking about the UK election. When you go to Paris or Berlin or Brussels, the conversation is all about France at the moment, and and about that wider right wood shift in Europe. It's strange to think after the last you know, let's say decade or so, where the UK has often resembled this kind of circular firing squad and everyone's been looking in at us and saying, can you stop exporting problems and start exporting solutions again? It'd be strange to think that at the end of this year, depending on what happens in the States, the Brits could be one of the real grown ups in the room again one of the forces of stability and calm in that conversation. But it will definitely influence how much attention those Europeans are able to spend on the practical things, because they will be very jittery.
Let's move on to Gaza in the Middle East. You said at the beginning of the conversation you thought, actually the summer could bring things even more to a head, and it might bring in your old stomping ground of Lebanon, Alverat and alex report a lot on the balance within the Labor Party of opinion wanting Starma to be tougher on Israel and so on, possible even discussions of an arms embargo. How does that play for Starma? Is there a clear role for him to lead that in the international community or will he have to rein that in.
I think all these issues look very different the moment you're on the other side of the black door as well, that moment when you know you assume the role of Prime Minister and the phone calls start coming in. You know, as David Cameron walked through that door, I pretty much handed in the phone and said President at Arma's on the line. And here's what you need to say, so it will feel and look different to the team when they're in there. I think that they clearly have an early decision to make on whether to recognize the state of Palestine, and that will be one way of showing that they can do things slightly different. I think they'll have an early decision on whether to resume funding to UNRAH, the Refugee and Works Agency for the Palestinians, which will certainly be something the Foreign Office and other bits of government will be saying, you know, we've got to get back in there and start to rebuild, start to support civilians. So perhaps those decisions come sooner than decisions on in arms embargo, for example. They've got to basically think about how do we get the narrative back to the two states solution, how do we get it back onto the big prize here, which is normalization of relations between Israel and the wider region that includes a Palestine and state. You know, that's the big conversation if you're looking five ten years ahead. And so they've got to be careful not to make those sort of tactical misjudgments that might undermine that strategic objective and then as I say, you know this real fear I have that we could through the summer be into a different phase of conflict. You know, Israel and Hesbela already at war. More Hebela fighters have died since October the seventh than in the whole two thousand and six conflict. More rockets have been fired by Hisbellah on Israeli towns than in that whole conflict. It's not as bad as it can be, and I fear it will get much worse. But that will probably be the big issue that dominates the first summer of Labor foreign policy.
On the arms in bargo for Israel. Possibly David Lammy's scrutiny of David cameron over the last few months has left Labor in a position where they are essentially in favor of stopping arms to Israel in all but name. You know that everything that they say about why has the government not published legal advice going back months in terms of what Israel's been up to in cars? Is it possible for Labor to wrote back from that position.
When you look at the statements David Lammy has made a shadow Foreign secretary, but also look at Kirstarmer's background in international human rights law, it's very difficult for them not to be in a position where they're backing up the rule of law, and so I suspect, and you know, my advice to them would be that they should they should get in there and see what that legal advice is. And I think at that point that the decisions that they have to take will become very very clear. I don't know them well enough to know how they take decisions, but I suspect, having observed them from distance, that they're probably quite methodical, quite practical about it, and quite loyally in it all. So I imagine they they'll get in there with their own legal advisors and take their view, and that could lead to a different policy outcome in the end, But it depends what's in that advice.
Tom. It's so interesting from hearing you speak, it's as though you expect David Lammie and the Labor administration to sort of be a bit more muscular, to take a bit more of a lead on those kinds of questions and make up their own minds on it. When I've been speaking to them privately over the past few months, it has felt with a lot of the things on Gaza that they've just been very careful to track what the Americans are doing. So I'm wondering, how will those conversations with the US go about the UK potentially wanting to recognize Palestine and those kinds of things, How would that affect the US relationship.
It will be on that list of on that first agenda for that first contact with Biden in July, for that first phone call. Probably I imagine Biden would put down a marker on that call that he looks forward to discussing Ukraine, NATO, and the Middle East and probably China. Those will be the three things. I think the Americans will just want to register that level of interest and concern on early on to signal that when they actually do then sit down and you know, a few days later in Washington, that they'll be there serious pressure from the Americans or all three. Ukraine LATO is top of that list, actually above above the Middle East. I think the American administration at the moment is trying to exert a lot of pressure on Israel behind the scenes to restrain them from a full scale invasion of Lebanon and to try and try and get them to change the conduct of the war in Gaza. Now there may be a public line therefore with pressure on the UK not to be more creative and muscular as you describe then, but I wonder whether in private whether there will be so tough with the UK. Maybe they'll think it's in their interest to have the UK slightly outriding a bit to remind Israel that it's not as straightforward as they think it is.
Currently the US administration is when you can see the star mutee working very comfortably with If there's a change in November to Trump, we've heard of this David Lammy idea of progressive realism that's going to see them work we think very comfortably with Trump.
How credible is that?
I think Trump in his first term did a huge amount to prove his critics right. He vandalized the alliances on which we rely, He vandalized the institutions like NATO and the UN that are such a key part of UK strategic interests. And of course he vandalized the values that we share with the Americans, with the Europeans and with others. And I worry that the Trump two point zero would be even more erratic, would crash around even more and do even more damage to our interests. Now, let's see, maybe I'll be proven wrong, but I think most diplomats would share that fear as to what we might face after November if somehow the American people elect him. Now, what does that mean for Prime Minister Starmer and a Foreign Secretary Lammy. It will mean that they do have to kind of pull their punchers a bit in the next few months, that they do have to hold off in case Trump is elected, because if he is, they'll need to find a way to build a pragmatic relationship. You know, where can we exert influence, How can we build a relationship where we can actually limit the damage that he will do? And that will mean holding back on some of the temptation to go for strong rhetoric and to think fairly pessimistically about what the minimum we can come out of the next four or five years with is Perhaps.
The most immediate sort of danger for Trump presidency is to Ukraine. And you know, if Trump was to change America's position on Ukraine towards negotiations towards you know, seeding territory, do you think Starmer is he able to counter that? Is he able to lobby Trump against moving America's position or is that just a no Hoper stance. Can Britain have its own position or does it have to follow America's position on Ukraine?
It doesn't have to follow a Trump position on Ukraine. Particularly if Trump was basically fold in the cards and just saying pego putin, you win, which is what that would be. It would be a capitulation to putin. I think this is one of those areas where if progress is made at the European Political Council in July late July in Blenham and building up those relationships, in making that a more load bearing conversation with the Europeans on our security, then you could see a clearer European position in opposition to Trump on that. Now, whether that actually can exercise much influence on him, I'm not sure. We all overestimated the influence that we could have on Trump first time round, you know, sticking him in a gold carriage on the mall and so on. We all like to think that we are so persuasive, and I've seen some Prime ministers feel this way as well, that with such brilliant, influential, persuasive characters, that we can bring these hard liners around. There's no evidence from Trump in the first term that suggests that we can do that, just as there hasn't been much evidence that we could do it with bib nettin Nia who over the last nine months.
I mean, there's one hundred more questions, but I think in terms of time, we probably want to run a lot of that. So that's a great place to leave it for now. Tom, Will you come back and join us in the months ahead these events are real rather than in prospect.
Yeah, I feel we'll be talking about foreign policy a lot over the next three months.
Tom Fletcher, thank you very much.
Thank you.
It's interesting to hear him be unequivocally concerned about Trump ather.
Yees striking, isn't it? Because I suppose some people have maybe made their peace with it or just thinking even I think privately lots of labor people just sort of thinking that that's a bridge they may likely have to cross, and so they're just already thinking about it. It's interesting to just have another voice to spell it again, the mass of concerns around that.
I thought it was really interesting him sort of saying that there's almost a naivety among European politicians who think they can go over and diplomatically make their case to Trump world. Boris Johnson, we've s and make the argument to Donald Trump on in favor of continue to support for Ukraine. It is very unclear whether that has made any difference.
I was trying to imagine it. It's hard just with the personalities to imagine Starmer and Trump Gelling.
I think I think reporters, you guys are going to have a lot of fun at the first Trump Starmer press conference where you've got the former Director of Prosecutions up of the UK alongside someone who's been convicted of fifty four crimes.
You could barely imagine two more different people. Everything that Kirs Starmer sets is about public service and restoring priberty in public life and all of this stuff. I think we're pretty pretty clear on how much contempt to Kis Starma had for Boris Johnson. Well, Donald Trump's a different.
Level against all of that. I think the thing I have observed in recent years is that you can have unlikely alliances. They can be more powerful because of it, and if their agendas in any way coalesce or a line, then then we have seen.
It, Yeah, and it is important to say that we don't for certain know what Trump's going to do. One things like Ukraine optimists in the West clearly see a world where Trump thinks there's political opportunity for him to continue to support Ukraine militarily and to show America is stronger, and you show progress in the way that Biden has unable to be unable to on the on the battlefield. So you know, it's not it's not a complete no hoper, but certainly difficult.
I also thought that one of Tom's first comments that we need to get him back on to discuss in more detail maybe is saying about how Labour needs to work backwards in terms of where it wants its relationship with China to be at the end of one parliament or two parliaments. That's clearly the sort of big strategic difficulty. There are lots of sort of industrial and geopolitical questions that Labour's going to have to tackle that everyone's already talking about privately. So I think that's going to be really interesting.
Until we see you next.
Thank you very much, Alva Ray and Alex Wickham, thanks for listening to this week's vot Nomics from Bloomberg. This episode was hosted by me alegra Stratton with Alex Wickham and Alva Ray. It was produced by Somersadi with bookly support from Chris Martin, production support and sound design by Moses and am Brendan Francis Newnham is our executive producer. Sage Bauman is Head of Podcasts and special thanks to Tom Fletcher and Ellen Milligan. Please subscribe, rate, and review wherever you listen to podcasts