13/07/2016 Newsnight

THERESA MAY: We are living through an important moment

We face a time of great national change.

If you're just managing, I want to address you directly.

When we take the big calls, we'll think not of the

We'll listen not to the mighty but to you.

We'll prioritise not the wealthy, but you.

We won't entrench the advantages of the fortunate few.

And we will make Britain a country that works not for a privileged few,

# But I'll still reach out to the top

There was a changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace today.

The man who won an election a year ago met the Queen this afternoon,

Then as he was driven out, Theresa May was driven in to be

For those that have found the last three weeks

disconcertingly turbulent, the familiar routine

of the cars coming and going, that peaceful transfer of power,

We are surely in the early stages of a national adventure.

For a start, Boris Johnson is Foreign Secretary.

Plus, two other Brexiteers have the job of delivering Brexit.

And Theresa May made clear beyond that, there'll be

To kick us off I'm here with Newsnight's own cabinet -

our policy editor Chris Cook, diplomatic editor Mark Urban,

business editor Helen Thomas and political editor Nick Watt.

Nick, let's start with the new appointments.

Yes, if Margaret Thatcher was not returning, Theresa May was not for

waiting. Within one hour of arriving in Downing Street, she was launching

her new cabinet. She didn't want such a prominent face from the

failed side of the referendum, so George Osborne was out. There are

Brexiteer Limerick in charge of taking a side of the European Union,

Boris Johnson, big senior post for him, David Davis was a tough nut as

John Major's Europe minister and he will be in charge of the

nitty-gritty negotiations are getting is out, and Liam Fox, former

Defence Secretary is going to be in charge of international trade

negotiating new deals outside the EU. We can see pictures of them

tripping up Downing Street to hear their positions. We have seen the

three Brexiteers. Three men, all Brexiteers, but there was balance in

the Cabinet as well. Yes, another key theme is unity, seasonal to big

posts the two remainders, Amber Rudd as Home Secretary, Theresa May has a

high regard for her, and early job she had was aristocracy adviser for

the film Forwarding Is In A Funeral. Helen, the economics, Philip

Hammond, what do we know about him? We saw this huge change. He looks

like a choice designed to reassure. There is a hint of continuity, he

worked with George Osborne shadowing the Treasury in opposition, he is

known as a fiscal hawk so perhaps his inclination will be to keep a

tight grip on the purse strings, but he is taking over in very different

times. The economy and the fiscal position, Theresa May was describing

quite an ambitious agenda. The economy may not be working to her

favour for all of that. Absolutely, that is the big unknown. Nobody

really knows what the uncertainty around Brexit is going to mean the

economy, what damage is being done or maybe done. Philip Hammond has

this balancing act. On the one hand he has a weakening economy which

will make the target harder, but he has a boss who wants less austerity,

so how he manages that balancing act will be the question. A big question

for the rest of this Parliament. And foreign policy, Mark. Boris Johnson,

Foreign Secretary, who would have thought it? Clearly if you look at

Twitter, people find that rather gag-tastic. There could be some

dodgy missions going across the desk of MI6. Remember he had an

unsuccessful trip abroad to Israel and Palestine when he was the mayor.

The best he can do is to be an ambassador and go out and sell the

country. We need to talk about the Boris style of diplomacy, and he has

history. I can read you a couple of quotes, on the Queen and

Commonwealth, it supplies with regular clearing -- cheering crowds

of flag-waving piggy ninnies. Just a couple of months ago, his limerick

about the president of Turkey. There was a young fellow from Ankara... He

won a prize in the Spectator magazine for that poetry. Are people

outside of Britain,, will they take him seriously? They will have to.

The real thing to look for here is the way the Foreign Office itself is

being eclipsed now, for a long time Downing Street has taken on the

important stuff, and in this Brexit moment, we can look at this trio of

people Theresa May has put together. Boris will only be doing a small

part of it. David Davis, tough negotiator, Liam Fox, and if it is

proving really hard to disentangle freedom of movement from free trade

access, or other free trade deals are not rolling in, who better to

point that out than those three experts, Fox, Johnson and Davis?

Let's talk about Brexit, Chris. We know a little bit about what David

Davis' vision is. This week he published an article about his

vision, and I'm not a trade expert. I think whoever wrote that isn't a

trade expert either. There are some fairly fundamental problems with it,

his idea we could put together trade deals that give us something better

than they -- than the EU in one or to years, that is ambitious. He is

very dismissive of what economists call nontariff barriers, the admin

required to get stuff over a border can be more important than the

tariff. He is also very nonchalant about services. He talks a lot about

what would happen if Germany blocked our car exports, not a lot about law

or advertising or things where we make a lot of money. We have talked

about some of the themes. Let's get on with the rest of the programme.

Theresa May pitched herself as a continuity candidate,

but from the moment she arrived in Downing Street, it looked

In particular, some radical words on how Government is now

Here's Nick's take on this historic day.

Her Majesty is well versed in the rituals of the transfer of power in

her kingdom. After seven decades on the throne.

But rarely can the Queen have seen such a ruthless display of prime

ministerial authority so soon after her new First Minister took leave of

her in Buckingham Palace. We believe in a union not just between the

nations of the United Kingdom, but between all of our citizens,

everyone of us, whoever we are, and wherever we are from. That means

fighting against the burning injustice, that if you are born poor

you will die on average nine years earlier than others, if you are

black, you are treated more harshly by the Criminal Justice Act and the

nephew white, if you are white, working-class boy, you are less

likely than anybody else in to go to university,. In her first speech

outside her new home, she lavished praise on David Cameron, but left no

one in any doubt that the personal political credo of this grammar

school girl would be different to her Tony and predecessor. A decade

ago, David Cameron George Osborne said to themselves and private how

remarkable it was the speed with which they took over the

Conservative Party. But they also said to themselves that they could

lose that within a nanosecond. This evening they learned how true that

prediction was when the new Prime Minister marched into Downing Street

and said that the era of the privileged few running number ten

was over, and then she unceremoniously ended George

Osborne's Cabinet career. Few in Westminster were mourning the demise

of George Osborne as the Tory party woke up on this balmy summers

evening to the new regime. Politics is brutal, it really is, and not

just the senior cabinet ministers and ministers, but all of their

teams who have been working extraordinarily hard, suddenly

nothing. I am a select committee chair, and they are about the only

people who still have a job, because we were elected by parliament, but

it is a brutal business. The senior Cabinet appointments were the most

eye-catching. Theresa May's allies were keen to point to her message to

the nation on how she will govern in a different manner. Frankly, a

priority for Theresa May is always that of those who are disadvantaged.

She is the daughter of a vicar, I think her late father must have

instilled in her this issue of looking after those who are

disadvantaged, making sure the state supports those who need help, and I

see from that speech, my interpretation is going to be a

powerful agenda going forward. I was the future once!

LAUGHTER David Cameron left Parliament on a

warm note. He knows that his vision to keep Britain in a reformed EU has

failed. Theresa May would like her Premiership to be remembered for

great social reforms, but she knows it will be defined by her success or

failure in negotiating Britain's exit from the EU. Supporters who did

a different view to the new Prime Minister in the referendum say she

could deliver a deal. Theresa May was a Remain. I am an Out. But there

is no longer a difference between the camps. She has been clear that

we are not going back on that vote but we will make it work for

Britain. As Kennedy put it, we must not negotiate in fear but neither

must we fear to negotiate. I think Theresa has set out a stall that she

intends us to negotiate as a strong country in a positive spirit. Nigel

Farage doesn't represent this country. We will be a responsible

European neighbour and nation contributing to the Globe and to

Europe, but just not within that political structure. Theresa May is

a rare political beast, a senior figure who is barely known even

after a decade at the top. Friends say the country will soon warmed to

their new Prime Minister. Where on earth does this

leave the Conservatives? United around the slogan Brexit

means Brexit, but what does United around the vision

for the disadvantaged? United around the socially liberal

agenda, for same-sex Let's talk to two people

from different wings of the Conservative Party -

the MP Heidi Allen, and Peter Lilley, who was a Cabinet

minister in the Thatcher Good evening to you both. Heidi

Diallo, are you happy with what you heard? It feels like the

Conservatives reborn. I couldn't believe what I was hearing from

Theresa May. It feels like everything I said in my maiden

speech, and this is a new era, it is brilliant. You had been in the

referendum campaign, a bit rude about Boris Johnson. He is now

suddenly back. In a different role. I wasn't rude about him, I just felt

that his intentions were not actually around the country and

whether Brexit was the right thing, just about whether he wanted to be

leader, and I didn't feel he was the right man, so I am delighted. Are

you on board, Peter Lilley? I was confiding in your earlier that I am

unusually euphoric. I don't know euphoria normally, but I feel we are

heading in the right direction, we can get on with it, and I think she

has created a structure which will enable us to speed up the process

far more than people are expecting. Let's come to Brexit in a minute.

When she spoke about the nasty party, back in 2002, many would say

she was really talking about the tone and the policies, some of which

were associated with you as the welfare and social security in the

90s. Are you happy that the journey the party has taken, through David

Cameron to the tone she struck today, you are completely happy with

that? Yes, very much so. I think we ought

to be a party whose focus is on those who can least help themselves.

We obviously want to let everybody fulfil their potential because,

unless they do, we won't be able to help those who can least help

themselves. We have to enable people to fulfil their potential so we have

the wealth and the ability to help those who are at the bottom of the

pile who have least opportunities. Can I take it that social

liberalism, same-sex marriage, that debate is over. You were against it

when the vote came up. It's done. Everybody seems to be accepting that

now. I hope so. What about the economic liberalism? We think of the

Conservatives as being deregulators. Today we were hearing workers'

rights are back on the agenda. You are comfortable with that? Is that

the party you joined? Why can't we do both? It is about finding the

right amount for the right context, isn't it? Saying that you are the

party that wants to overregulate everything, or under... The world

isn't like that now. We have to be flexible. I was so pleased to hear

Theresa May talking about some of the more difficult things for a

Conservative Party to get a hold on, but we have to do it. The journey

you described to Peter, yes, we have come through it. What we need to do

is convince the people that we have come through it. And that will be

harder but it is doable. We are all social liberals now. Are you not

still an economic liberal? Do you not fear that National Living Wage

at ?9, some of the talk about other stuff... You either had to have a

Minimum Income Guarantee or a minimum wage. We had a mixture of

the two, which is rather silly. Now we have moved to having a living

wage. That should be the basic protection for people in work. And I

think that is very acceptable. I never believed you could have

neither. Right. You are sounding all in harmony with everything you have

heard... That is very disappointing for TV, but it happens to be true.

That's fine. I'm trying to get clear where everybody is. Doesn't it show

how we had to get the right leader? Somebody who had been so neutral

that could do what we are experiencing now, bring both sides

together. I don't want to intrude, I don't want to poop the party you are

having. Let's talk about Brexit. The three Brexit leaders, Liam Fox,

Boris Johnson and David Davis, I don't know if they have the same

vision of Brexit. What is the minimum Brexit that means Brexit?

Well, it was about taking back control of our laws, money and our

borders. We have to do those things. I hear lots of discussion about

negotiation. There will have to be some ne gogs Asians. --

negotiations. What I hope she's created a structure, she's got David

Davis there, I hope she will lead the process in the way Ted Heath led

the opposite process. I hope David Davis will have that delegated power

from her so we can get it done quicker because the one danger we

face is uncertainty. The sooner we can have it done, the less

uncertainty. Philip Hammond suggested it would take six years?

That is one reason why he will be a much better Chancellor than Foreign

Secretary. I wonder putting those three to look after the process, is

that a reward for what they did in the referendum? Or is it, OK, guys,

nothing to do with me, it is yours to sort out? I think it's probably

70% the former and a tiny bit the latter. If you want something to be

done well you have to appoint people that believe in it. Theresa May

recognises her strengths in leadership and it is all about

having the right team. I wonder, Peter, if they don't get remotely

what they have written they are going to get... What have they

written? David Davis has written a big piece on what he is going to

achieve. If he doesn't get close to that, and there are people that are

sceptical, do we have to have another referendum on the deal that

emerges? No, it wouldn't depend on David Davis achieving what he's

written in one article. Right. The referendum result was clear. We have

to deliver it. There isn't too much doubt about that delivery. We also

have to go into any negotiations on trade, which will take place after

we have left. We have to go there with a hard-headed realisation that

if it's trading on WTO tariff terms, so be it, we don't want that. That

is the backstop? Only if you go into negotiations knowing that you can

take what they think is the worst they can impose on you, that you can

succeed. And then we will get a good deal for us, for Europe and for the

world. So much to pan out over the next few years. Thank you both very

much. Now, we need to talk

about economic policy. Can I be the first to label it

Theresa-nomics? But call it whatever you want,

we know a little of what it consists of, and the most striking paradox

about the transfer of power today, is that having voted to leave

the EU, with many arguing that we can Britain could be

liberated to become a kind of deregulated offshore enterprise

hub like Singapore or Hong Kong, we've appointed as Prime Minister

who seems keen on regulation, particularly the stuff

that makes us more Here's our business

editor, Helen Thomas. We are told that Brexit means

Brexit, so what does that mean? The UK somehow needs to dismantle its

relationship with the European Union, piece by piece, the rules

governing everything from trade in the economy, Labour, immigration,

environmental protection are likely to change. But how? One Brexit

blueprint, a regular feature of the campaign, takes its inspiration from

the glinting skyscrapers of Hong Kong or Singapore.

An open free trade economy shorn of the red tape and stifling

bureaucracy of the EU single market and with lower taxes and lighter

regulation for business. Indeed, George Osborne seemed to nod to this

with his post-vote pledge to cut corporation tax below 15%. But not

so fast. Maybe Singapore isn't the place for us. Theresa May this week

laid out a very different vision for Britain's business future. She was

still in campaigning mode before all the twists and turns that handed her

the keys to Number Ten, but she spoke about an economy that works

for everyone, that could involve constraints on executive pay, it

could mean a stronger Government hand in areas like competition

policy, or in foreign takeovers. It could also, she said, mean putting

not just consumers on companies' boards, but employees as well.

An industrial strategy that takes a sceptical look at foreign takeovers

has a distinctly European flavour. And putting workers or their

representatives on to companies' boards is a page straight out of

German corporate governance 101. She's identified a real problem. I

don't think she's got the right solution, the right solution is to

put more responsibility on investment institutions. It doesn't

link in with what George Osborne has been saying about the economy, so we

don't have a joined up Government strategy towards the economy and

towards business. We don't know much about Theresa May's economic

thinking. She's never been in the Treasury. She's never been in the

Department of Business. So we are going to have to learn these things

over the next few weeks. I hope she gets on with it. The paradox is that

those who thought they knew what Brexit model they were signing up to

may find that the finished article looks rather different. We are

headed for Brexit. Destination unknown.

I'm joined now by the Brexit-supporting

economist Gerard Lyons, and by Remainer Mariana Mazzucato

whose book Rethinking Capitalism addresses many of the financial

issues that will confront the new Prime Minister.

And first, Rupert Harrison, who worked as George

How much of Osborne-nomics do you think survives the transition? Apart

from dealing with Brexit and the relationship with the EU, which is

going to overwhelm economic policy making for the next few years, other

than that, Theresa May, there is going to be a change of emphasis and

tone. It will be continuity, largely. It will be struggling still

with public finances that are not going to be ideal and if you think

about the big, some of the big themes of economic policy of the

last six years, that's included taxes on the low-paid, the National

Living Wage, binding shareholder votes on executive pay, tax

avoidance, tax evasion. It will be more continuity. Have you spoken to

George tonight? No. Do you think he will look back on his time at Number

11 with satisfaction? He wanted a different result in the referendum.

Overall, I think so. The judgment must be he inherited an economy at

one of the darkest moments in our economic history. I remember Mervyn

King before 2010 said, whoever inherited the situation at the

upcoming election would have to take such difficult decisions that they

would be out of power for a generation. Then we had unemployment

fall to 5%, the highest employment rate in our history, GDP growth has

been the same as the US over the last six years, so he could be

satisfied with that part of it. Mariana Mazzucato, how big a change,

if you take Theresa May at her word, at what she said in speeches, how

big a change is that? If you take her three big points, which are

productivity, lagging wages and the need to reform executive pay, and

the need for - she said industrial policy - Vince Cable did, the

current minister has not said that word. He is running the Ministry as

an enterprise zone, I think, which is about reducing different types of

impediments for business. If she goes ahead with those three things,

really tackling productivity, tackling executive pay and

reigniting a vision around industrial policy and innovation

policy, that will require a massive change, a change within the

Treasury, but especially she will need absolutely a new minister in

this because, currently, they are not, if you want, running a show

that is trying to get long-term investment in this country. Hammond,

I found very interesting, he continued to say that financial

services is one of our key industries. That depends on what you

finance to do. Finance is not serving the real economy. Nothing

has been done on that. If she wants to have proper innovation policy, we

will need proper kind of finance. Do you think what we heard today,

Gerard Lyons, a big shift or maybe it is just words? There will be a

significant shift. There is some continuity in the fact that the

Conservatives were elected on the manifesto last year, so they still

have to... What do you mean, they junked the fiscal stuff? On fiscal

stuff, they do need... There will be some continuity. I was going on to

say, there needs to be a significant shift. The previous Chancellor

became far too tactical. We need to see more investment, more

innovation, and more infrastructure spending. The UK Government can

borrow at the lowest rate ever. It's been lower now than it was in recent

years, so that creates a great opportunity. Monetary policy has in

the past and is still now a big shock absorber for the economy, so

that is still there. Fiscal policy needs to move on. We had Brexit

strategy. There are three pots we need to look at. Hold the Brexit one

for a minute. We have a fantastic opportunity to reposition the UK in

the changing growing global economy, despite the near term uncertainty,

there are lots of positives and it is about positioning ourselves with

India, China... I just want... I just want to put one of your points.

It sounds like that the gist of these two guys is, this is a

complete turnaround because there was too much austerity, he

underinvested, borrowing was cheap, this is ripping up George Osborne's

policies? Theresa May will be thrilled to hear this. Look, there

is going to be a change of tone. As I say, the elephant in the room is

Brexit renegotiating our trade relations with the rest of the room.

Outside that, it will be continuity. Puts curbs on executive pay... She

talked about tax avoidance, tax evasion. She is a new Prime

Minister. She wants to put a new tone, new emphasis. As I say,

outside of the core issues... Industrial strategy, it is true that

that phrase has not been used by Sajid Javid. If she was to do what

she said, that would require a revolution. I don't think it will be

possible. Brexit, as David Cameron has said, will occupy the Civil

Service for the next decade. It is a complete waste of time. The

investment you are talking about in research and development, the

investment in human capital formation, by the way, are not going

to happen. 80 billion euros of research money is what we no longer

have access to. Quite on the contrary. We often

overlook the fact that we gave Brussels most of the money in the

first place. Let's not have the Brexit argument yet. What Rupert was

saying was very important, it is about enabling the environment at

the past, and it is about creating an enabling environment again. But

don't you think there has been a shift in emphasis towards a more

continental model with more regulation, the exact opposite of

what you Brexiteers were selling to us, which was a kind of

deregulated... That is how you would like it to be. That is how you were

telling us it was going to be. The benefit is trying to pick Best

practice from around the world, but we need to do what suits the UK

economy, and it does come back to the Brexit issue. That was very much

about three pots, to need to be ticked, the sovereignty and having

an immigration policy, probably a points-based immigration system, and

we don't need to be in the single market. As Peter Lilley was saying,

it is about positioning the UK outside the single market with an

eye on the Kontinen and the global economy. The key change... For what

kind of investment? We continue to have lagging investment in this

country, we have very low business spending. What actually died

investment in the long-term, not the short term cheap investment that

just reducing taxes... It is not money, it is capacity in key things

like rail and road. And we will come back... What kind of infrastructure?

Green infrastructure, that is what we want. I'm so sorry, we will have

to come back. There is so much, we will have to disentangle this and

put it into ten discussions over the next five years!

One thing that is painfully obvious is how divided the country has

been over the last few months, not to mention

Suddenly, Theresa May has risen to the top,

powered by a remarkable sense of unity.

It's not just the goodwill that's shown to a new occupant

of Downing Street; she has not stabbed anyone, stamped

on their head or questioned their ability to govern on account

By universal acclaim, she was the grown-up

The Tory Party thought that, and most of those to the left

of the Tory Party thought that too, at least in comparison

But it is a thin crust of unity, atop a torrid overheated soup.

We'll talk more on that, but first, the issue of immigration proved one

of the most divisive in the referendum.

Katie Razzall went to Birmingham, Britain's second largest city,

to find out what people on all sides of the immigration divide feel

Political faces of the past are on show in Birmingham at a time when

modern politics has been in turmoil. It was Tony Blair who opened the

door to EU migration on a grand scale. As Home Secretary, our new

Prime Minister tried and failed to get the numbers down. She had a

tough line on immigration before, and I think that will continue now.

She was the Home Secretary that introduced vans that offered illegal

immigrant is an easy pass home, so I think it is fair to say with some of

her tough rules, some of them being controversial, we are only going to

continue to go down that road, and coming from a migrant background, it

does make you wonder whether we are as welcome here in the country as we

have been previously. I don't think she is somebody who from her own

personal Per Spett of values immigration, and whether we like it

or not, we are of immigrants. That is how some perceived Theresa May's

immigration stance. Her limits on non-EU migrants divided opinion, as

did her speech at last year's Conservative conference. When

immigration is too high, when the pace of change is too fast, it is

impossible to build a cohesive society. There is no doubt

immigration played a key role in the referendum. Almost all of the West

Midlands region voted leave, including multicultural Birmingham.

I met a restaurant and leave voter. So quickly it happened, it is

unbelievable. Mr Haque wants immigration restrictions cut to

allow more immigration Chip Kelly for chefs -- particularly the chess.

She has made it corrugated for us, and now she is the Prime Minister.

She will have to change. Across the West Midlands and beyond, hate

crimes rose after Brexit, like at this halal shop, firebombed in

Walsall. Theresa May has touted herself as a unifier of the country.

On a more local level, others are attempting unity. At Birmingham

social enterprise, they are creating a hate crimes toolkit. Theresa May

will have to do a lot more to persuade them of her unifying

credentials. I categorically don't believe that we can get behind a

leader that has not been democratically elected, she doesn't

have the mandate from the people. Some of the language we are hearing,

the statistics we see from her past policies and how she wants to move

forward well add to the divides and divisions, and the pain we are

feeling as a country, particularly around immigration, equality and

justice. I am not happy that this is the person who is supposed to

represent us in our time of need and bring us together, and unite us and

hope. But of course there are plenty who believe that our country will

stay divided if Me doesn't deliver on Brexit. In West Bromwich I met

activists determined to keep pushing the new PM forward, someone they

believed failed on immigration as Home Secretary. She says she is

tough on immigration, but her time in the Home Office hasn't proved

that. As a country, we should be able to choose who comes in and who

doesn't. So if she doesn't deliver that? I think it will be massive

around here. Definitely. I think everybody is jittery about it, she

is an unknown quantity, but that is the same with any Prime Minister.

Delivering Brexit will be Theresa May's most pressing concern, but she

will need to do it whilst uniting communities, not driving them apart.

Joining me in the studio now is the Times columnist

Matthew Parris, Guardian columnist Polly Toynbee, senior editor

of the Economist, Anne McElvoy, and down the line from East Sussex,

the former editor of the Telegraph and Thatcher

Good evening to you all. Let's start with the positives. What has been

good for the Tory party and about Theresa May? The good thing is she

is therein a relatively short time, and the blood-letting stopped quite

quickly, and it was considerable blood-letting. We have seen the

divisions intensified since the vote, and the fact that they were

able to stop this feud between the Brexiteers and gone over a kind of

middle ground leader who will deliver most of what the Brexiteers

want, but was Remain and has kept some prominent new remain as in the

Cabinet, that is the main thing. Are you happy today, Polly? You would

prefer Theresa May to Andrea Leadsom? Absolutely. I am impressed

with the ruthless speed with which they have affected this. The removal

van was there, he is gone, the next one in. The contrast with Labour is

so excruciating, it really is. I think what we always see is the

Tories know about power. They know what they are there for and how to

do it. But tanks on the Labour lawn, all of this blue collar Conservatism

that is the pitch, I don't know if you believe it will happen, but...

They are terribly good at that. Saint Francis of Assisi from

Margaret Thatcher, and think of Cameron's greenest government ever

and hugging would and huskies. We are on the positives! She did it

very well, I will say that for her, and we wait to see if it is real.

Are you feeling euphoric? She is excellent, she is the best leader

the Conservative Party could have on the circumstances, call her Theresa

May jar or Teresa Millburn. But it isn't really a very easy question,

the question is, can anyone do the job. That brings us to Charles. Can

any one do this job? It certainly has a decent chance of working, but

there are tensions in there. They can't yet be resolved. What it

essentially is is that Theresa May is a Remain leading a Brexit policy,

and while that can bring some sort of unity, it also makes you wonder

what is going on, because you can't really be a remain any more because

we are not going to remain, so we have to hear from Theresa day we

Brexit is a good thing, and she has to have a vision of why it is an

enormous thing, and I think there is a slight tendon set to see it as a

compartment. You put it all in one compartment and get on with the rest

of what is happening, but this is about becoming a free country again,

with massive consequences for what Parliament does, foreign policy,

trade, the environment, for the union possibly, so all of this has

to be expressed positively. So she has to pretend to be keen on it? I

think she has to be keen on it. If she is pretending, she will be found

out. Matthew, it is hard to see how decades of Tory divisions on our

relationship with Europe could be resolved by this. If anyone can do

it, she can. I agree with Charles, she has to be keen on it, she will

be. She has been given a job by the party, and that is to deliver the

best possible deal she can. The question is, how good a deal can she

deliver? I am a Marxist in this respect, there are terrible

underlying forces in history and economics, and she will face in 34

years in which the domestic economy, she will run out of money, and she

is running out of friends, Britain is running out of friends abroad. If

anybody can square this circle, she can do it, but can anybody? No Prime

Minister has ever arrived in office with us knowing so little about her.

No hustings, no electioneering, we know nothing about her economics.

She is a much better known quality than anyone else, we know the cut of

her jib, and in terms of wanting to remain, she was marginal. All awful

lot of people were on the margins of remain Brexit, and we talk about

this as if it were some kind of religious tribe who went to

extremes. That is what this Cabinet reshuffle is that she has done is

trying to reflect. I'm sure as Matthew and Charles were both

saying, feud tensions underlie this, and they are now rocketing through

both main parties. You describe Brexit as if it were a thing, a

known quantity. Nobody knows what it is, it is what anybody wants it to

be. Charles, do you trust Theresa May to deliver what the voters said

they wanted back on June the 23rd? And do we know what that is? I think

she will certainly try to do that, but I think she does have a big Rob.

What happened in the vote was that it was enormous popular rejection of

the view of almost everybody in charge of everything. And Mrs May

comes in as a representative of that defeated establishment. She is doing

a good job of trying to bring it all in together, and she is saying the

right sort of thing, but it is a fundamental problem that she is not

what people were asking for when they voted in the largest vote in

British history for anything. And Mrs May was against it, and she is

part of what they were rebelling against, so she has a lot of work to

do. Matthew? We know what people were asking for, they were asking

for things no one can deliver, and Mrs May can't deliver them. She will

do her best... Will the party falls apart again when she delivers, let's

say, Brexit -lite. She has gone about it in a canny way, she has

appointed the geldings rather than the stallions of Brexit, Boris and

Liam Fox and David Davis. They will do their best, but she will never

satisfy Charles Moore, she will never satisfy the ultra-in the

Conservative Party who would always believe that some marvellous deal

could have been done if only we had had the right leader. Boris wants to

have his cake and eat it. This is a pragmatic country, and the people

who concede the best, as Blair did and as Cameron did for a while,

people who somehow come through the middle, or they create the new

middle, that is what she has to do. I hope she can. I'm sure it is

difficult, but I don't believe the country is so polarised that there

isn't a way through. Labour could find it if they wanted to, and if

they don't, the Conservatives will. This country is in the midst of its

deepest, most serious crisis that Cameron has left us with that she

has to pick up the pieces from. She may be the best person on offer to

do that, but don't underestimate the Herculean task. Charles Moore? Polly

is right. One reason Cameron ultimately failed is like all the

politicians in the Western world at present who have failed to

understand how the world is changing in the light of the effect of the

credit crunch, we still haven't had a change politician coming to the

top, we haven't had a sat in this generation, we have had a crisis,

but we haven't had the response to the crisis, and Mrs May, very able

and sensible, she represents that establishment view rather than the

change. So I am not saying it can't happen, but it is a very big task,

but it has hardly yet been imagined. The analysis of what is wrong with

the world, really, and therefore the conference about how to put it

right. We have ten seconds. We can all make an analysis of what is

wrong with the world and what people want, but the question is is it

possible that a generation of British politicians can deliver what

people want? I don't think it is. But what if they analyse it right

rather than analysing it wrong? We will hit those constraints if

Michael is right, and Theresa May can pull us all together if he is

wrong. Well, that's enough historic

days for this month. No one died, but the biggest beast

in the department seems to have gone to the backbenches following his

colleague. It does seem to flash in front of your eyes. Good night.

TICKING. Hello. It has been another day of

sunshine and showers, the showers continuing through this evening and

overnight before dying away, and Thursday looks like the driest day

of the week for many of us.