1
00:00:00,160 --> 00:00:02,120
Speaker 1: So they're wrapping it up. Just hours to go until

2
00:00:02,160 --> 00:00:05,600
Speaker 1: the polls open in Britain. The final words from Kiyostama.

3
00:00:06,280 --> 00:00:09,960
Speaker 2: If people don't go out and vote, people who want change,

4
00:00:10,000 --> 00:00:13,880
Speaker 2: who need change, or entitled change, don't go out and vote,

5
00:00:15,200 --> 00:00:18,960
Speaker 2: we'll wake up. Imagine it on Friday morning with five

6
00:00:19,040 --> 00:00:26,040
Speaker 2: more years of a Tory government feeling entitled, emboldened that

7
00:00:26,120 --> 00:00:30,720
Speaker 2: they can get away with anything. Imagine that and fight

8
00:00:30,840 --> 00:00:35,120
Speaker 2: against that all the way through to ten o'clock tomorrow evening.

9
00:00:35,280 --> 00:00:37,040
Speaker 1: The final words from Rushi Sunek.

10
00:00:37,240 --> 00:00:41,520
Speaker 3: It is only US Conservatives that ultimately can stand up

11
00:00:41,680 --> 00:00:44,199
Speaker 3: to the Labor Party. So I say it again, we

12
00:00:44,280 --> 00:00:48,040
Speaker 3: have twenty four hours left. We do not surrender to Labor.

13
00:00:48,280 --> 00:00:51,120
Speaker 3: We will fight for every vote, we will fight for

14
00:00:51,200 --> 00:00:54,680
Speaker 3: our values, and we will fight for our vision of Britain.

15
00:00:56,960 --> 00:01:00,120
Speaker 1: Now Professional of Modern History, University of Mister Richard toys back. Well,

16
00:01:00,120 --> 00:01:03,160
Speaker 1: there's Richard. Very good morning to you and to you

17
00:01:03,440 --> 00:01:06,720
Speaker 1: the snap election aspect of this. How unusual is a

18
00:01:06,720 --> 00:01:07,839
Speaker 1: snap election in Britain?

19
00:01:10,200 --> 00:01:14,040
Speaker 4: Well, they come along every so often, so we famously

20
00:01:14,120 --> 00:01:19,240
Speaker 4: had one in twenty seventeen when Theresa May thought she

21
00:01:19,360 --> 00:01:20,920
Speaker 4: was going to get a big majority and then lost

22
00:01:20,920 --> 00:01:25,480
Speaker 4: a majority. There's been previous examples going back to in

23
00:01:25,560 --> 00:01:30,880
Speaker 4: nineteen twenty three February nineteen seventy four, so you know,

24
00:01:31,720 --> 00:01:34,360
Speaker 4: it is the case that prime ministers always trying to

25
00:01:34,840 --> 00:01:38,600
Speaker 4: time elections if they can to sort of gain maximum advantage.

26
00:01:38,680 --> 00:01:42,039
Speaker 4: I think that in a sense Ritchie Seine probably did

27
00:01:42,040 --> 00:01:45,560
Speaker 4: it this time, where people speculate but perhaps he wanted

28
00:01:45,560 --> 00:01:49,880
Speaker 4: to keep the right wing Reform Party put them on

29
00:01:49,920 --> 00:01:52,880
Speaker 4: the back foot. There's speculation that he wanted to do

30
00:01:52,960 --> 00:01:55,280
Speaker 4: it because otherwise he would face a change to his

31
00:01:55,320 --> 00:01:56,720
Speaker 4: own leadership within the party.

32
00:01:57,440 --> 00:01:59,640
Speaker 1: Is there any evidence any of that's happened. I've looked

33
00:01:59,640 --> 00:02:01,360
Speaker 1: at the Pole the whole time. They seem to have

34
00:02:01,400 --> 00:02:05,320
Speaker 1: been broadly speaking unchanged. The Tories we're going to lose,

35
00:02:05,600 --> 00:02:07,720
Speaker 1: are going to lose, Labour is going to be swept

36
00:02:07,720 --> 00:02:08,120
Speaker 1: to power.

37
00:02:09,360 --> 00:02:13,400
Speaker 4: I think that's almost certainly the case. I think that

38
00:02:13,800 --> 00:02:17,560
Speaker 4: Nigel Farage deciding that he would come back essentially enclose

39
00:02:17,680 --> 00:02:20,680
Speaker 4: himself as leader of the Reformed Party, which is actually

40
00:02:20,720 --> 00:02:22,520
Speaker 4: really a kind of a private company rather than a

41
00:02:22,520 --> 00:02:27,399
Speaker 4: normal political party, sort of prevented Sunak from gaining any

42
00:02:27,440 --> 00:02:31,679
Speaker 4: advantage from a snap election. He's also made various missteps.

43
00:02:31,760 --> 00:02:35,200
Speaker 4: I would say there's not a huge amount of enthusiasm

44
00:02:35,480 --> 00:02:38,360
Speaker 4: for labor. I mean, the irony is perhaps that at

45
00:02:38,360 --> 00:02:40,959
Speaker 4: the moment, if the pols Is believe, be believed, they'll

46
00:02:40,960 --> 00:02:43,760
Speaker 4: get about forty percent of the vote, possibly slightly less,

47
00:02:43,800 --> 00:02:48,520
Speaker 4: possibly slightly more, but nevertheless come out with an absolutely

48
00:02:48,639 --> 00:02:53,040
Speaker 4: enormous majority, very probably the largest majority that they've ever had.

49
00:02:53,680 --> 00:02:56,920
Speaker 1: Is history instructive on that matter. In other words, if

50
00:02:56,960 --> 00:02:59,320
Speaker 1: you hand too much power to too few people, you're

51
00:02:59,360 --> 00:03:00,160
Speaker 1: asking for true.

52
00:03:02,400 --> 00:03:05,520
Speaker 4: Well. I mean, this is certainly a general problem with

53
00:03:05,760 --> 00:03:11,800
Speaker 4: the British first past the post system. That does create majorities,

54
00:03:11,880 --> 00:03:14,800
Speaker 4: which can be whether they're the left or right, they

55
00:03:14,880 --> 00:03:18,560
Speaker 4: can be problematic. Of course, it becomes problematic for the

56
00:03:18,600 --> 00:03:22,960
Speaker 4: prime minister to control that majority. In some ways. They

57
00:03:23,040 --> 00:03:25,520
Speaker 4: obviously get a lot of legislation troot they want, but

58
00:03:25,560 --> 00:03:28,840
Speaker 4: also people then feel well, it doesn't really matter too

59
00:03:28,919 --> 00:03:30,919
Speaker 4: much if I rebel, so I might as well, which

60
00:03:30,960 --> 00:03:34,080
Speaker 4: can create sort of longer term problems for part of unity.

61
00:03:35,320 --> 00:03:38,080
Speaker 1: Do you believe what's going to one for the legiservation poll?

62
00:03:38,160 --> 00:03:40,320
Speaker 1: I looked at a couple of hours ago, suggesting the

63
00:03:40,320 --> 00:03:42,320
Speaker 1: Tories are going to end up with sixty four seats,

64
00:03:42,640 --> 00:03:44,720
Speaker 1: They're going to blow blairs lead out of the water.

65
00:03:44,880 --> 00:03:47,520
Speaker 1: And with the libdim's sixty one sixty four to sixty one,

66
00:03:47,560 --> 00:03:51,040
Speaker 1: the Tories will barely be the opposition. Is history about

67
00:03:51,040 --> 00:03:51,720
Speaker 1: to unfold?

68
00:03:53,080 --> 00:03:57,000
Speaker 4: Well? I mean, it certainly is, irrespective of the precise

69
00:03:57,120 --> 00:04:00,640
Speaker 4: number of results. I mean, on the assumption that the

70
00:04:00,720 --> 00:04:04,040
Speaker 4: Conservatives get at the minute, they're about twenty two percent

71
00:04:04,120 --> 00:04:07,400
Speaker 4: in the polls, if they get less than thirty, I mean,

72
00:04:07,400 --> 00:04:11,000
Speaker 4: to get thirty in itself would be a complete catastroph

73
00:04:11,480 --> 00:04:15,839
Speaker 4: catastrophe for them. How things fold out unfold in terms

74
00:04:15,840 --> 00:04:19,640
Speaker 4: of seats is of course, really quite unpredictable. I think

75
00:04:19,640 --> 00:04:24,160
Speaker 4: that I would probably be, if I were a Conservative,

76
00:04:24,200 --> 00:04:26,680
Speaker 4: a bit more optimistic. I wouldn't quite think that it

77
00:04:26,760 --> 00:04:30,360
Speaker 4: was going to go down to them only getting sixty seats.

78
00:04:30,400 --> 00:04:32,520
Speaker 4: I think they might get somewhere in the region of

79
00:04:32,520 --> 00:04:35,400
Speaker 4: one hundred. The Lib Dams probably will do much better

80
00:04:35,440 --> 00:04:38,080
Speaker 4: than in the last few elections, but I'd be amazed.

81
00:04:38,120 --> 00:04:41,000
Speaker 4: I mean, if they became got so many seats that

82
00:04:41,000 --> 00:04:46,560
Speaker 4: they became the official opposition, that would be everything that

83
00:04:46,560 --> 00:04:48,599
Speaker 4: happened is going to be historic, but that would be

84
00:04:50,160 --> 00:04:52,400
Speaker 4: It would kind of a once in a century type event.

85
00:04:52,800 --> 00:04:55,480
Speaker 1: What's your sense of turnout? Is the complacency at play?

86
00:04:55,520 --> 00:04:57,200
Speaker 1: He had given it's a foregone conclusion.

87
00:04:58,560 --> 00:05:01,240
Speaker 4: Well, I don't think the Labor Party itself is complacent.

88
00:05:01,360 --> 00:05:04,040
Speaker 4: I think that they realize that there's dangers to that

89
00:05:04,160 --> 00:05:07,080
Speaker 4: if their voters don't turn out. They also think that

90
00:05:07,120 --> 00:05:12,240
Speaker 4: they might lose some votes to the Reform Party, and

91
00:05:12,520 --> 00:05:16,560
Speaker 4: so I think that they know it is a slightly

92
00:05:16,680 --> 00:05:21,960
Speaker 4: odd situation where the Conservatives have been kind of really saying,

93
00:05:22,000 --> 00:05:24,359
Speaker 4: well that the Labor Party is bound to get an

94
00:05:24,480 --> 00:05:28,159
Speaker 4: enormous majority, so as the Scottish National Party for example.

95
00:05:28,240 --> 00:05:32,200
Speaker 4: So the Conservatives is saying that Labor is bound to

96
00:05:32,200 --> 00:05:35,560
Speaker 4: get an enormous majority, you ought to vote conservative ort

97
00:05:35,600 --> 00:05:39,400
Speaker 4: to keep that majority down and Labor and sort of saying, oh,

98
00:05:39,400 --> 00:05:41,919
Speaker 4: it's definitely not in the bag yet. I would be

99
00:05:42,279 --> 00:05:47,200
Speaker 4: not surprised if if turnout was low, maybe voters may

100
00:05:47,240 --> 00:05:50,320
Speaker 4: assume that he's all done and dusted. I don't think,

101
00:05:50,320 --> 00:05:52,799
Speaker 4: at least on the Labor side, that they are thinking that.

102
00:05:53,120 --> 00:05:56,440
Speaker 1: Richard Joy your expertise very much. Richard Toy, professor of

103
00:05:56,480 --> 00:05:59,560
Speaker 1: modern history at the University of Exeter with us this morning.

104
00:06:00,120 --> 00:06:03,000
Speaker 2: Or from The mic Asking Breakfast. Listen live to News

105
00:06:03,040 --> 00:06:05,960
Speaker 2: Talk Set B from six am weekdays, or follow the

106
00:06:06,000 --> 00:06:07,440
Speaker 2: podcast on iHeartRadio