Key revelations in the book led to the resignation of a senior aide to the Prime Minister and raised serious allegations about a lack of transparency and accountability in Starmer’s administration.

Here he talks to Byline Times’ reporter Olly Haynes about how he believes McSweeney and his allies helped take control of the Labour party from Jeremy Corbyn, why he thinks Starmer misled Labour party members in order to win the leadership, and what this has all meant for the Government that has since followed.

Paul Holden with Olly Haynes
Shot and Edited by Sean Byrne-Roberts

Edition #80 of Byline Times available now.

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Written and Produced by James Bloodworth
Shot and Edited by Sean Byrne-Roberts

Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0.

Contains European Commission information licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC-BY 4.0) licence.

To find out even more harrowing details and secrets about Tech Billionaire Peter Thiel and the idiosyncratic figures surrounding him, you can find the full investigations in our monthly print edition - filled with some of the most daring and diligent journalism of our time

Byline Times - What The Media Won’t Say.

Written and Produced by Nafeez Ahmed. Shot and Edited by Sean Byrne-Roberts. Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0.

We spoke for an hour about increasingly grandiose predictions issued by Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Sam Altman, Peter Thiel and others. From the AI singularity to space-faring empires to human-machine interfacing, tech barons speak of the future with unwavering certainty. These billionaire-soothsayers and their prognostications continue to shape our policies and societal priorities.

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Becker smashes Silicon Valley’s myths with hard-edged facts. He explains how the tech bros’ worldview is largely based on an egregious misinterpretation of science fiction literature, tied with convenient business incentives – and how the powerful are not necessarily the messianic geniuses they purport to be.

We talked about Starmer’s U-Turns, the shifting political strategy of his Government and how social media is radicalising the right in dangerous ways.

We also take a look at our new print edition, which you can now buy in shops or access online on our new subscription site.

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In a piece in the Observer by Tom Baldwin, Starmer has explained he ‘regrets’ making those remarks, and certainly didn’t intend any echo or reference to Enoch Powell’s ‘rivers of blood’ speech in 1968.

Since I wrote an editorial about his remarks at the time (‘The Kindness of Strangers’), and our new July edition of Byline Times is devoted to the various other ways in which we have often made us feel like ‘strangers in a strange land’, we welcome this apology and clarification.

People make mistakes. We learn by failure. And after 15 years of Conservative rule in which the blustering Johnsonian position was ‘never apologise, never explain’, it’s refreshing to move towards a political culture in which we can share our mistakes and learn from them.

Our Editor in Chief, Hardeep Matharu, wrote about this in our March edition, looking back to a dramatic reconstruction of a debate between Margaret Thatcher and LWT interviewer Brian Walden when the then Prime Minister admitted “I don’t know” when asked whether she could have stopped then Chancellor, Nigel Lawson, from resigning.

So this afternoon on Byline Live, I’ll be talking with Hardeep and Adam Bienkov about the role of U-turns and apologies.

Is there anything wrong with the Labour Government amending their planned benefit cuts, just as they have partially reversed their policy on winter fuel payments? Why is intransigence praised and flexibility condemned?

Surely, in order to navigate the increasingly bumpy and complex terrain of modern politics, U-turns (as any driver knows) are necessary and functional. What is it about our political media culture that turns our complex world into binary positions, and turns leadership into a ‘lose/lose’: damned if you do, damned if you don’t?

We’ll also be discussing the fate of Blue Labour and the apparent pushback against Starmer’s key advisor, Morgan McSweeney, after Adam Bienkov’s exclusive new investigation in the current print edition.

Join me, Hardeep and Adam at 5pm to find out more

Join us Live at 5pm

They hear that despite what you may have read elsewhere, this deal is a significant step forward in undoing much of the damage Britain has suffered from leaving the EU.

You can watch the whole discussion above and if you would like to support our work, do please take out a paid subscription below.

And if you would like to take part in future discussions, and put your questions to our team and guests, then do download the Substack app and follow the Byline Supplement.

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His rhetoric caused anger from many Labour MPs, due to its echoing of the language used by the likes of Enoch Powell and Nigel Farage, while raising fears of the impact his proposals will have on the struggling social care sector, local authorities and the wider economy.

Watch our Political Editor discuss what this all means with Byline Podcast host by clicking the video above.

And if you would like to take part in future discussions, and put your questions to our team and guests, then do download the Substack app below and follow the Byline Supplement.

Get more from Byline Supplement in the Substack app

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The theme of this year’s festival at Keele University from 11-13 July is ‘What is Truth’? To book tickets and find out more click the button below

What is Truth

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