00:00:00: The day after we left the European Union, or we voted to leave the European Union,

00:00:05: the most googled question in the United Kingdom was, "What is the European Union?"

00:00:09: "You're joking."

00:00:10: "I'm not. I'm not. So that's a failure of politics, it's a failure of media,

00:00:14: and it's a failure of education."

00:00:15: Welcome to the special English edition of Degorsa Neustadt, a German podcast series by

00:00:23: Zabilla Bar, in which she talks to pioneering leaders who, inspired by the World Economic

00:00:28: Forum's great reset initiative, create revolutionary projects that actually do make our world smarter,

00:00:35: greener and fairer.

00:00:37: I'm delighted to welcome Alastair Campbell as my guest today. Throughout his remarkable career,

00:00:47: he has redefined the art of communication. From his tenure as the political editor of the Daily

00:00:54: Mirror to his pivotal role as Tony Blair's director of communications and strategy,

00:01:00: he has pushed Labour with vigorous campaigns to three victories. With 19 books under his belt,

00:01:08: most of them bestsellers, covering diverse topics from politics to mental health,

00:01:15: Alastair continues to make a profound impact. His latest book, But What Can I Do?

00:01:22: A Sunday Times bestseller right from the start, is an analysis of what has gone wrong with politics

00:01:29: and ideas about how to put it right. In the spring of 2022, he launched a podcast,

00:01:37: The Rest Is Politics, with former Tory cabinet minister Rory Stewart, and the two talked themselves

00:01:44: into people's heads and hearts with pure politics. Today, each episode resonates with a

00:01:52: million listeners worldwide. On top of the UK shards, Alastair and Rory managed to regain

00:02:00: control of the political debate in the UK. So much so that when I googled The Rest Is Politics,

00:02:08: it showed 1 billion and 660 million results. Well, Alastair, a very warm welcome to you,

00:02:17: and let's dive straight into it. Thank you.

00:02:22: It takes you today, in the age of 66, a couple of hours to sell out prestigious venues like

00:02:32: The Royal Albert Hall or the O2 Arena. How aware are you that you set the political tone in your

00:02:41: country? Well, I think there are two separate things there. One is that clearly the podcast

00:02:51: has become very, very popular, with, as you say, lots of listeners and lots of people who don't

00:02:58: necessarily follow politics very closely outside the podcast. So that's interesting and new, I

00:03:04: guess. I know you're interested in pioneers, and I think that's been quite pioneering.

00:03:10: I hope it's changing the political debate more profoundly, but I think it's too early to tell.

00:03:16: I mean, it's true that we have a lot of listeners, it's true that we have a lot of interest inside

00:03:21: the political debate, but there is still a lot of cynicism, there is still a lot of negative

00:03:28: negativity about politics. So I think it's too early to tell whether we're actually moving the

00:03:33: dial in a sustained way. I think that remains to be seen. And what do you think you are doing

00:03:41: differently today from mainstream media? I think the reason why it's been successful

00:03:52: is because we're both of politics, but we're not necessarily in politics in the same way as most

00:04:01: politicians are. Neither of us are standing for election, neither of us are actually at the moment

00:04:06: members of parties. We are able to give accounts of our experience, very different experiences

00:04:15: in politics, but also give a slightly outside perspective. And then I think the second thing

00:04:21: is that we're both of the media, but not in the media. And I think that one of the reasons the

00:04:28: podcast is getting so many listeners is because people are fascinated by politics, but they don't

00:04:34: like what the current generation of politicians offers them, or the current generation of media.

00:04:40: So they're looking for something different, and I think they think we're a bit different.

00:04:44: Hmm. And when I look into your profile, I see it takes me 10 seconds, and I realize that you got

00:04:53: one million listeners, clearly, but you also got one million followers on X. And I was thinking,

00:04:59: in, you're there in your own right, so you're not there as for Downing Street or for Tony Blair

00:05:10: or for Labour Party, it is you. So they tune in to listen to you. Yeah, but that's based,

00:05:20: I mean, you've got to remember, I've been around as a journalist for a long time, and then in a

00:05:26: fairly high profile position. So I think it's a combination and a continuation, but it's also

00:05:34: with different and new layers. I remember when I left, so it's 21 years since I left Downing

00:05:42: Street full time. But I've always been in and out of the Labour scene ever since. I went back to help

00:05:50: Tony Blair win again in 2005. I've helped several Labour leaders. I've worked on campaigns in

00:05:57: different parts of the world, but I've done it in a completely different way. And I think the other

00:06:02: thing is that I've done other things. You mentioned a lot of the books and you mentioned

00:06:06: mental health. I think I was probably one of the first high profile people in the UK to talk about

00:06:13: mental health in a way that I think did move the dial on the debate. I think also I've made films.

00:06:20: I've done things differently, but I've never lost the sense of that past political profile.

00:06:28: I think I've built on it and developed on it. I'm very conscious of the fact that if I drop dead

00:06:36: today, the obituaries will have the words Tony Blair in the introductions. I mean, they will,

00:06:42: because that's how I've... So even though I'm not... That's not what I do. It's part of who I am.

00:06:48: And I think therefore that was quite a solid foundation. But also I think people have seen

00:06:55: that it's possible to go through a very tough experience, which I did, go through a lot of

00:07:06: attack, a lot of abuse, a lot of hatred, and come out smiling. And I think that people have a certain

00:07:14: regard for that. I know you've read the book and thank you for your very kind comments that you

00:07:19: wrote to me. You may remember the word that I invented, per civilliance. That I think people

00:07:27: respect that quality in people, that you just keep going, you learn from mistakes, you learn from set

00:07:33: backs, and you keep going. And that's kind of what I try to do. We have a lot of programs. I mean,

00:07:39: especially in Britain from Channel 4 to the BBC, they all do their bit. But certainly what I was

00:07:49: missing for a very, very long time, probably even before Brexit, was that somebody takes on a broader

00:07:58: context, a more holistic approach to the world's problems. Was that your aim or was it something

00:08:09: you developed with Tori? Sorry. Tori Rory. Yeah. It's interesting how... I'd say

00:08:18: developed, because when the podcast started, we really were just almost thrown together,

00:08:27: because what happened was the people who produced the Restless History, which is another very

00:08:32: successful podcast, they asked me if I would do a podcast called The Restless Politics, but with

00:08:36: somebody of different politics to mind, preferably a Tori. Now, I've spent most of my career trying to

00:08:45: demolish the Tori Party, so I can't pretend that I don't have many Tori friends.

00:08:50: But I sort of thought about it, and then I actually did an Instagram post and a Twitter video,

00:09:00: and I said to my followers, "If I did a podcast with a Tori, who do you think you should be?"

00:09:06: And a lot of people said Rory Stewart, so I phoned him up. I didn't know him very well. I think we'd

00:09:11: only have had one conversation before, and I said, "What do you think?" And he was up for it.

00:09:15: So, but we basically decided just to give it a go and see if the concept worked and see if the

00:09:22: chemistry worked. And then the motto of disagreeing agreeably, that became a very important part of

00:09:30: it. And then I think we realized that whilst most of our listeners will be in the UK,

00:09:38: we started to develop quite a lot of listeners abroad, and also we started to realize that a

00:09:43: lot of our listeners in the UK enjoyed the fact that we didn't just talk about UK politics, which

00:09:50: a lot of our media, yes, they'll talk about Trump, Biden, and they'll occasionally talk like today,

00:09:55: they're full of Putin election. But generally, we have a very insular, inward-looking media,

00:10:01: and they like the fact that last week we had a long discussion about the war in Sudan, which

00:10:08: we had so many people say, "My God, we didn't even know there was a war in Sudan."

00:10:11: Because they, and likewise, even though we've left the European Union, which as you know,

00:10:18: I think is an absolute disaster, but we still talk about Europe, we still talk about politics in

00:10:22: Europe, we still talk about Asia, we talk about Africa. And I think that people like that sense

00:10:29: of us trying to see beyond the UK, and also to give people a sense of how Britain's role in

00:10:37: the world is changing, and how other countries are having to compete and adapt to a lot of the

00:10:44: same pressures that are putting our politics under pressure. I find it because you mentioned that

00:10:49: a lot of people didn't know there was even a war in Sudan. Same with Yemen, probably. Absolutely.

00:10:57: I mean, you know, we've talked a lot, for example, about these, the succession of military coups

00:11:04: across Africa. And every time we talk about them, we get people saying, "Oh, we never

00:11:09: had anything about that." Now, I think European media, particularly French, obviously, with the

00:11:16: Francophone links to Africa, but I, you know, whenever I'm in Germany and I'm reading German

00:11:22: media, I do think you still have a more internationalist view of the world, not uniform and not universal.

00:11:31: But I think that we do tend to be very, very inward looking. And also, I think the other thing,

00:11:37: I think this is a problem with a lot of media around the world, is that when there's one major

00:11:44: international event, it's almost like that's all they can cope with. So, like, you know, when it was

00:11:50: Ukraine, the start of the Ukraine war, everybody talked about Ukraine, Israel Gaza, everybody

00:11:55: talked about Israel Gaza, you know, Russian elections, everybody talks about that, Trump,

00:12:00: everybody talks about that. It's almost like there's a hierarchy and you can't really do

00:12:05: more than one or two. And we try to say to each other every week, let's focus on something that

00:12:11: we think is important, but which isn't getting much attention. We don't do it as reporters.

00:12:17: We're not reporters. I mean, we don't, we often talk about places that we go to, but we often

00:12:22: talk about places that we don't. And I'm not pretending that if we talk about the Russian

00:12:27: elections, for example, that you're going to get as much depth as you would listening to say,

00:12:33: Steve Rosenberg from the BBC or the correspondent of Der Spiegel, whatever it might be, who are there.

00:12:41: But I think what you are getting is something that's able to go in whichever direction we decide.

00:12:48: There's no formula that says what we have to talk about.

00:12:51: And that is exactly the point. Yes, I agree with you that media and politics jump on the

00:12:58: particular event. But at the same time, for the full 24 hours a day,

00:13:06: their approach is extremely narrow and narrow-minded.

00:13:17: Well, you know what? We've mentioned several times in recent weeks, because when you're sitting,

00:13:23: watching television, for example, so I don't watch much TV. I watch a lot of sport.

00:13:28: And then sometimes I'll just go into the news channels and I'll kind of channel hop. And

00:13:34: occasionally you come across something really interesting. But I have found in recent months

00:13:40: that some of the most interesting stuff I've come across has been on Al Jazeera.

00:13:46: And I think it's because, yes, they've got a worldview for sure. You know, you know,

00:13:53: you're watching it from a certain perspective. But at the same time, they're covering

00:13:58: international stories and situations, which you don't necessarily... Well, for example,

00:14:06: I mentioned Sudan. Yesterday when I checked in on Al Jazeera, there was a huge report

00:14:11: about people who were fleeing Sudan for South Sudan. They were following families and they were

00:14:18: interviewing families as they were on the move. And I could be wrong, but I just haven't seen that

00:14:26: on the BBC. I just haven't seen it. And that's not to criticise the BBC, and that they get enough

00:14:34: flak as it is. But my point is, I think they think they're playing to an agenda and also to a formula.

00:14:43: I find that so much of when I'm doing that channel hopping, I kind of know as soon as I can see the

00:14:49: headline, I know what they're going to say, I know how they're going to report it. And it's just not

00:14:53: very fresh. And I think the other thing that we do that is people often ask, you know, well,

00:15:00: how much do you plan it? How much do you prepare it? We never talk about what we're going to say.

00:15:04: We never say, well, let's talk about Israel Gaza. And you focus on this and I focus on that. We

00:15:12: never, ever do that. We basically just say, right, we haven't done Israel Gaza for a few weeks. Let's

00:15:17: talk about that. Maybe use as the peg the fact that Biden said X about Netanyahu or Schumer said

00:15:25: X about Israel, whatever it might be, or a particular incident, that becomes the starting

00:15:29: point. But then we genuinely try to have a conversation. At the moment, when I listen

00:15:38: to the rest's politics and leading, of course, especially when Roy and you talk about Gaza,

00:15:45: I would love you to give me an even bigger picture and add another layer, meaning

00:15:54: to hear the perspective of major players of the Middle East, or Asia as well and South America.

00:16:02: Because at the moment, I feel I really lack information outside the European and US. And

00:16:13: I'm saying that because I listened to a speech given by Queen Rania of Jordan that gave me

00:16:25: actually another picture of the whole situation. So how careful do you look at an issue like Gaza

00:16:39: or the Ukraine? Well, as I said earlier, we're not the BBC, we're not ARD, we're not a

00:16:49: broadcast station. We're just two people who talk about politics every week. But so, for example,

00:16:58: with Israel Gaza, when it happened, we did a sort of immediate podcast where we kind of just

00:17:05: said what we're thinking and reacting and so forth. But even as that discussion took place,

00:17:09: we were developing the idea that we saw our role within it, and so far as we felt we had one,

00:17:16: was to try to give a broader context, try to explain a bit of the history, try to explain a bit

00:17:23: of the background, try to explain specifically to younger people, some of the stuff of the

00:17:31: even recent past. I was amazed recently, Rory Stewart, who teaches at American universities,

00:17:38: you know, and he sent me a message, you know the famous picture of Bill Clinton with Arafat

00:17:44: and Rabin at the White House. He said that when he was with his students, and these are students

00:17:51: who are studying this stuff, everybody recognised Clinton, about 10% recognised Arafat and about

00:17:58: hardly anybody could name Rabin. Now that's students. So let alone the general public who

00:18:04: can be forgiven for thinking, well, I don't know any, so we tried to do that a bit of the history.

00:18:09: We then did invite some guests, we had, we invited the Palestinian ambassador to give his

00:18:16: personal story, but also his assessment. But in doing so, I had a long chat with him beforehand

00:18:23: and said, look, this will not work if it just becomes you propagandising on behalf of

00:18:30: one side of the argument. And I actually think if you listen to that interview,

00:18:34: he understood that he understood this was a broader opportunity. Of course, he was expressing

00:18:40: his views, his assessment, his opinions, his history, if you like, but he but I think we

00:18:45: fitted it within that broader sense. We then we did a very long interview with Yuval Noah Harari,

00:18:52: who's somebody who's, I think, well informed, well respected. And he was able again, I think,

00:18:59: to feed that sense of an educative piece. Well, we've not done. So for example, we've,

00:19:06: as you know, we do the main podcast and a Q&A and we also do an interview, one interview per week.

00:19:11: We've basically said to, because we interviewed the Palestinian ambassador, the Israeli

00:19:17: government have said, well, would you like to interview in Israel? And we said, yes,

00:19:23: definitely. And obviously, if it was somebody very senior like Netanyahu, or a member of the

00:19:29: war cabinet, absolutely. But what we wouldn't do was just take somebody who we know is, if you like,

00:19:35: a professional communicator. And so we are night wise on on Russia, Ukraine, I heard a guy on the

00:19:45: radio on the BBC this morning, who was there to put the Russian perspective on the Putin election

00:19:52: win. I don't think we would take something like that because it was so clearly just, you know,

00:19:59: I'm not criticizing the BBC for this, they had to get somebody on who was a sort of pro-putin voice.

00:20:04: But it was just a straightforward piece of propaganda. So I think we'd be would be, would we,

00:20:12: we interviewed Marina Litvinenko a while back. Now, obviously, very, very critical of the

00:20:21: Putin regime, but I think a legitimate voice, would we interview Navalny's widow? Definitely.

00:20:25: But it would, it would, it would have to be anything that we do by way of interviews.

00:20:31: So this, this morning, we've released an interview with Albin Korti, the Prime Minister of Kosovo.

00:20:38: Now, he says some very, very critical things about the Serbs. Would we welcome a response from the

00:20:47: Serbs? Yes, but it would have to be somebody very, very senior. And it would have to be somebody who

00:20:51: was not just going to come on and read outlines to take. By the way, I must tell you, my two,

00:20:57: my two top, the two names I really, really, really want onto this podcast are both German.

00:21:04: Yeah. And I'm not in agreement here with you. I know at least one. And I think I cannot believe

00:21:12: it that he, anyway, yes. Jürgen Klopp. One is Merkel, right? Yeah. And the other, yeah, Klopp,

00:21:20: Klopp is right. Yes. Was Klopp, I agree. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah. But I want, yeah. Okay. Since you

00:21:26: mentioned it, why Angela Merkel? Because I think she, I think she's just been such a

00:21:32: significant figure in European history in recent years. I think, and I think she's complicated.

00:21:40: And I think even though she's been incredibly high profile for a long time, I think there's,

00:21:44: I think she's still very, quite enigmatic. And I think there's quite a lot to unpick. And I think

00:21:50: that the format that we have would hopefully lend itself to that. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we'll see.

00:21:58: You will be successful because I don't think she, she's doing anything.

00:22:04: No, but she's writing a book. Who knows when the book comes out, she might decide, you know,

00:22:09: that could be quite interesting. Also, I think because she's always, as a German chancellor,

00:22:15: always felt that she should express herself in German. I think people will be surprised about

00:22:19: how, how well she speaks English and so forth. I accompanied her a couple of times to Downing

00:22:28: Street when I was in London because I worked for the embassy. Yeah. Yeah. Well, different times.

00:22:36: Yes. But let's go back to, to Britain. And let's go back to what we can do there and your book. But

00:22:46: what can I do? Because you analyze Britain's problems and provide readers with basically a

00:22:52: manual on how not to feel powerless. Can you elaborate on it a bit?

00:22:57: Yeah. I mean, the book's really in, in three parts. First is the analysis of where it's all gone

00:23:04: wrong, which I think is a lot to do with populism and polarization and the, the spread of post-truth

00:23:10: in politics, of which Trump is part of which Putin is a part of which Johnson and Brexit are part.

00:23:18: And so that's a very bleak picture of where we've got to and just how dangerous and bad it is. I

00:23:25: think Trump coming, the possibility of Trump returning to office in America is a sign of just

00:23:31: how bad it is. The second part really is about how the pressures of politics and how you need to look

00:23:38: after yourself. And then essentially, the third part is saying, okay, if you're still with me,

00:23:44: if you, you're fine with how bad it is, you find how tough it is, but you still want to do it,

00:23:50: here's how. And of course, it depends on the person, it depends on how much time they have,

00:23:54: it depends on the level of their commitment. But essentially, I'm saying the answer to the

00:23:59: question, but what can I do? You do what you can. And that can go from anything to being,

00:24:05: you know, a volunteer on a campaign to actually deciding, you know, I'm going to run for office

00:24:10: and I'm going to try and get to the very top. And I try to give people a guide as to how that is

00:24:17: possible. Obviously, it depends again upon where you live, what sort of party you support,

00:24:22: whether actually you want to do what Macron did, you start your own. And so there's no simple,

00:24:30: there's no simple way of describing how to do politics, but essentially saying that if we don't

00:24:36: persuade the next generation to get properly engaged in politics, then I think democratic

00:24:42: politics itself is under threat. So essentially, it's alerting people to the danger, so as that

00:24:48: hopefully they can then get involved. And I must tell you, I had a wonderful email last week,

00:24:53: I've just written about this in my column in the New European, I got an email from a woman called

00:24:59: Janet, who said that she brought the book for her husband, a guy called Bob, who, and then of course,

00:25:07: this often happens when people buy books for somebody else, she read it first. And she said to

00:25:13: him, you've got to read this book, what he was through the he was he finished the book, at which

00:25:20: point in the area where he lives, a the Conservative Party councillor, you know, the local representative

00:25:28: of that area, resigned and discussed at what the Conservative Party has become, which meant

00:25:35: which meant there was a by election. And on the basis of reading the book, Bob decided to put his

00:25:40: hand up to stand for Labour. And he is now the first ever Labour councillor in that ward. How's

00:25:50: about that? That is really fantastic. It was really fantastic. I was very happy about that.

00:25:55: Because, A, he not only felt animated, but he probably also had an idea of what to do, what are

00:26:03: the first steps? Yeah, yeah. And it was obviously and I've had lots of, you know, when the book came

00:26:08: out, I went to talk in lots of schools. And in fact, my next two books are similar books, but much

00:26:16: shorter aimed at schoolchildren. And, you know, when you go into schools, I regularly go into schools

00:26:22: and the first thing I say, sometimes I will say something like, you know, right, hands up anybody

00:26:27: who thinks they might ever be a politician, and nobody ever puts their hand up. Okay. And then,

00:26:33: if you spend a couple of hours with them explaining what it is, how interesting it can be, how much

00:26:38: fun it can be, how important it is, the amazing characters that you meet within it,

00:26:43: by the and most importantly, the change that you can make. And I give them examples of people who've

00:26:49: made change. And then by the end of it, you know, you get and you say the same question, anybody

00:26:54: here think they might be a politician and you'll get quite a lot will say, yeah, I might do that,

00:26:58: I might do that. So I think that's, I think the, you know, giving people the confidence to think

00:27:03: they can make a difference, I think it's half the battle. Yeah. Alistair, you say in your book,

00:27:09: because talking confidence, you say in your book, confidence goes hand in hand with public speaking.

00:27:18: I saw it very long about it. And is that the very British approach?

00:27:27: No, I think it's, I think it I think, what does confidence mean? Confidence to me

00:27:38: is a feeling that you have that you can, you can achieve the things that you set out to achieve.

00:27:47: And you can you can inspire yourself in a way to motivate yourself to, to think there's something

00:27:54: there that I think needs to be fixed and I'm going to go and fix it. Or there's something there that

00:27:58: needs to be achieved and I'm going to go and achieve it. And I think I mean, I think what I

00:28:03: think is particularly British, because we have this awful 7% private education, where people are,

00:28:12: in a sense, they're taught confidence, they're taught to believe that they're better, they're

00:28:17: taught to believe superiority. That's not the sort of confidence I'm talking about.

00:28:21: But what I am talking about is that when I go into a lot of these, the schools in less privileged

00:28:28: areas, I think the one, the big difference between the kids that you meet who are at the rich people

00:28:34: schools and the kids you meet who are the poor people schools is actually confidence. It's

00:28:39: and it's a belief that their voice matters. And the reason why public speaking is so important,

00:28:44: by the way, I don't when I say public speaking, I don't just mean standing on a platform,

00:28:49: public speaking, I mean, out and about public speaking, I mean, how you engage with the

00:28:53: authorities, I mean, how you, how you communicate to people that you're trying to persuade to your

00:28:58: point of view. I guess maybe public speaking gives it a slightly misleading sense. I guess public

00:29:06: communication is what I mean. How do you communicate when you're out out of the house as it were?

00:29:14: Yeah, because I was, as you did probably as well, I watched Oppenheimer. And I saw it.

00:29:21: He is not the public speaker full stop. So but I would call him very confident in

00:29:29: confident in his area of expertise. Yeah, yeah, but I'm talking. I'm talking here,

00:29:38: I suppose in the context of politics about I think to be an effective politician,

00:29:45: I think part of the armory is that you have to have an ability to, to promote and build and

00:29:53: put forward an argument in public. I think something like I think expertise is slightly

00:30:00: different thing. So somebody like Oppenheimer, or you, or I look at some of the, some of the people

00:30:08: in the tech world now, I mean, I would argue that somebody like Musk or Zuckerberg, they're not,

00:30:14: technically they're terrible communicators. Okay, they're terrible public speakers. But

00:30:23: their power as speakers comes from a bit like Oppenheimer, Oppenheimer comes from their

00:30:29: very, very special expertise in the field that they're engaged in. But I don't think,

00:30:34: I don't think either of them would be effective politicians. No, I agree with you. I agree with

00:30:40: you. And, and I was while you were talking, I was reminded of that you just said you write another

00:30:47: two books, right? And just going through your profile alone is, I mean, writing 19 books in 16

00:30:58: years, really? I mean, and, and, and most of them are bestsellers. So you write, and this is almost,

00:31:06: doesn't matter what you write, you write about depression. And it's a bestseller, you write

00:31:12: about the player years, it's a bestseller. What can I do is a bestseller. What do you do differently?

00:31:19: From let's say somebody like me, who writes three books in 10 years.

00:31:24: Yeah, but I read one of them, the honey can saga, and I really enjoyed it. So I don't, I think,

00:31:35: I think, what do I do differently? I do work quite fast. I'm quite, so I am quite prolific.

00:31:42: I think when I, when I publish a book, I really put the work in to make it a success. I mean,

00:31:51: I don't sort of flog myself to death, but I do make sure that people know that it's happening.

00:31:57: You know, I guess I use my profile, I use my access to different media, to different events.

00:32:05: And I think hopefully, I mean, they haven't all been bestsellers, some of them, I mean,

00:32:12: I've written four novels, one of them, I think two of them, I think got in the top 10 list.

00:32:16: None of them were number one bestsellers, one of them didn't sell very well at all.

00:32:21: But I think when I have a good idea, when I know I have a good idea, I know how to push it.

00:32:31: So for example, you know, I wrote a book about winning mindsets called Winners of How They Succeed.

00:32:37: And I just knew when I was working on that there's a lot in this book and I know it'll do well,

00:32:42: and I know I'll be able to promote it and sell it. And I think likewise with the two kids books

00:32:46: that I'm doing, I think, you know, I think I'll be able to, they're very different, they're not

00:32:52: going to be in the bestseller list of the same because they're children, essentially, you know,

00:32:56: one of them is for primary schools, it's like a children's book. But I know that there's something

00:33:03: interesting, I know that people will find it interesting. And I'll then just work out how best

00:33:09: to make sure that people are aware of it. Once they're aware of it, then, you know, that's half

00:33:14: the battle. So writing for children, the idea came when you toured through the schools, that

00:33:23: right? Yeah, partly. It was, so when, but what can I do? It's aimed at everybody, it's aimed at

00:33:32: everybody saying unless we get involved in politics, you know, we're in a bad way. But it's

00:33:36: obviously particularly aimed at a young generation. So actually, it was a publisher who came to me

00:33:40: and said, look, I think this is great. But, you know, is there a way of doing this for the younger

00:33:45: people, specifically for younger people? And so that's what the next one is. It's really just an

00:33:53: explanation of what politics it is aimed at, like, very small children, you know, children in primary

00:33:59: school. And that I think that my background as a tabloid journalist probably came in quite handy

00:34:05: because you had situations, I had one point where the editor actually said, look, you've got to

00:34:10: remember the readers of this book are very, very young, you probably have to explain who Barack

00:34:14: Obama was. So, you know, and that sense of having to say, explain something like the voting system

00:34:25: in one sentence or one paragraph, you know, you really have to think about every word. So,

00:34:29: yeah, I've enjoyed doing it and hopefully it'll go well. Yeah. And of course, education and especially

00:34:38: political education starts, yeah, around that age, doesn't it? And we don't have it. We don't

00:34:44: have any political education in schools. No, it's crazy. You know, unless you do

00:34:48: A level politics, which is like 16 to 18, you don't do politics in school.

00:34:54: That's right. Yeah, exactly. So where do they get their information? They get it from

00:34:59: social media. They get it from the newspapers, most of which are biased. They get it from their

00:35:03: parents. They, you know, they get it from, I don't know, wherever. And whereas actually, I think

00:35:08: that learning about how I think one of the problems with politics is people don't know how it works.

00:35:14: Yeah, yeah, don't understand the political process. And, and of course, in the, in a sense,

00:35:21: why should they if they're not taught it? So, you know, they learn about kings and queens and all

00:35:26: the stuff of history. Fine, I'm not saying that's not important. But actually, how politics works

00:35:31: today. And just remember the day after we left the European Union, or we voted to leave the

00:35:37: European Union, the most googled question in the United Kingdom was, what is the European Union?

00:35:43: You're joking. I'm not. I'm not. So that's, that's a, that's a failure of politics. It's a failure

00:35:51: of media and it's a failure of education. But Alastair, actually, when, when did that really

00:35:59: happen? Because that is very briefly not my experience whatsoever. I lived during the Blair

00:36:07: and Brown years in Britain, very happily, very proud. And I left when Campbell came into power.

00:36:17: Cameron. Sorry. When Cameron came into power. Can you imagine you would have come into power?

00:36:26: Yeah, absolutely. Go ahead, go ahead. Cameron came into power. And so from then on, it's just

00:36:33: downwards. How come? Oh, I don't know. I think, I think, excuse me, I think on the European

00:36:45: front, I think we underestimated the impact of several decades of relentlessly anti-European

00:36:54: propaganda in, in several of our main newspapers and in sections of the Tory party. And then I

00:37:01: think David Cameron came in. He came in at a time when on the back of the global financial crisis,

00:37:09: which they successfully pinned on Labour, even though actually Gordon Brown had done an amazing

00:37:13: job during the crisis. Yeah, I agree. Then I think what happened was that the Labour party that

00:37:21: followed new Labour didn't really defend our record. And I think the next thing that happened was that

00:37:30: the Tory party divisions over Europe, which had been around for a long time, Cameron felt he had

00:37:37: to have the referendum. I think he felt he was never going to lose. I think Johnson thought

00:37:42: they were never going to win. That went wrong. And I think, as you say, I think the decline has

00:37:48: stemmed from that. So I think it's a combination of the financial crisis feeding populism.

00:37:53: And then the populism, the peak populism for us being the Brexit referendum and then the

00:38:00: politics that's followed. And then we've just had this succession of really, really bad

00:38:07: Conservative leaders. I think Theresa May tried her best to make sense of the position,

00:38:12: but she was put in an impossible position by people like Johnson. Johnson came in and was a

00:38:17: total disaster. Trust came in was a total disaster. And Sunak's now there and he's just not up to the

00:38:22: job. So we're in a complete mess and I think it's going to take at least a change of government

00:38:27: and probably more than a change of government to get us out of the mess. And if I come back

00:38:33: and practically now to you, what can I do? Should we focus more on the do or should we focus more

00:38:40: on the I? Well, I think you have to do both. What can I do? As I said earlier, people have

00:38:49: to do what they can. First of all, they have to decide whether they care. I think one of the big

00:38:54: problems in politics in the UK, but us, you know, to some extent, all over the world is people

00:39:00: thinking they can't make a difference. And I'm trying to persuade people that they can.

00:39:04: It doesn't mean that everybody gets what they want. That's impossible, but you can make a

00:39:08: difference. And I I quote lots of examples of individuals who've decided to make either general

00:39:15: change or specific change. And I think that the so it is about doing is no doubt it's about doing

00:39:22: a doing can take many, many different forms. You know, writing can be doing, campaigning can be

00:39:29: doing, establishing things can be doing, joining teams that already exist can be doing, starting

00:39:37: new teams for things that don't exist can be doing. So there's lots and lots of different

00:39:40: ways of doing it. But ultimately, my point is that for all that we tend to look at politics and think

00:39:47: now not for me, I'm trying to build the bridge between people seeing things that are wrong with

00:39:53: their lives and the places that they live, or, you know, the world that they live in and saying that

00:40:00: if you really want to try to fix it, you have to get involved in the political process,

00:40:04: whether you like it or not, is how. So it's a combination of the eye and the do, but the do

00:40:09: is very, very important. I think I think part of the problem with them with the the modern world is

00:40:15: that people think that doing is tweeting or signing a petition or, you know, that is part of doing,

00:40:23: but it's quite a small part of doing. Alastair, you also speak French and German.

00:40:32: Yeah. My French is better than my German.

00:40:36: Always, it's a nicer language, isn't it?

00:40:40: I like German. I love French, but I don't think German is as ugly a language as people like to

00:40:50: say. I think spoken nicely is a beautiful language. Yeah, yeah. Particularly if you go back, my

00:40:58: husband is British, so we go through German and English and I keep on telling him that there are

00:41:03: so many writers from the last century, which he had never heard of, like Stefan Zweig and so on.

00:41:12: Yeah, yeah. They have the beautiful language, which is just simply not there anymore. But

00:41:17: that is not my question. Having two more languages you can switch to,

00:41:28: does it influence your perspective, your political perspective?

00:41:33: Oh, definitely, definitely. Yeah. I think it just makes you have a broader view. I think if you're

00:41:40: able to engage with other people, to pick up on their culture, to pick up on their music, to pick

00:41:47: up on their history, in a way, in their language, I think it gives you a broader perspective.

00:41:54: So for example, we are on the podcast this week, we're going to be talking about the Franco-German

00:42:00: relationship and Macron and Schultz. And it's interesting and I could certainly,

00:42:08: I could listen to the English language, I could read the Financial Times, I can do all that,

00:42:16: but actually there's no substitute in a way for reading the French and German analysis and for

00:42:25: reading and listening and speaking to people who really know and doing it in their own language.

00:42:34: I think that so I'll spend part of today calling a couple of people that I know in French or German

00:42:40: politics and just saying, you know, what do you think and what should I emphasize? And I think

00:42:46: getting a sense of it in somebody else's language, I just think it broadens and deepens your

00:42:54: perspective. It doesn't necessarily change your perspective, but it definitely broadens and deepens

00:42:58: it. And it's also, we have to admit it, it's quite rare that in Britain that you find people who speak

00:43:07: two other European languages. Well, it's very, it's quite rare and it's sad. And one of the things

00:43:15: I was not happy about that the government I worked for did was we downgraded the importance of language

00:43:21: and education. I think it's always good to learn other languages and try to understand other languages.

00:43:28: I think if I was back at school now, I think I'd probably learn Chinese and Arabic, maybe as opposed

00:43:36: to French and German, but I love French and German. It's one of the best things I ever did was to,

00:43:43: and I lost my German in, because I did French and German up to university level. And then

00:43:48: I've always kept my French because I traveled to France a lot. We've got a house in France,

00:43:52: I've worked in France, whereas I haven't had so many connections with Germany. And during,

00:43:58: and of course, in working in politics, you know, although Schroeder didn't speak that great English,

00:44:08: but most of the time you were speaking English. And certainly that was the sort of working language

00:44:15: in the European context. Whereas, so I lost a lot of my German. And then during COVID, I did a couple

00:44:20: of courses with the Goethe Institute online. And I've since, yeah, ich habe die Liebe der

00:44:27: deutschen Sprache wieder gefunden, kann ich sagen. Oh, wie schön, na gut, dass wir das wissen.

00:44:34: Good, das wird es hier wissen in Deutschland. It is really a pity that I have not heard of that

00:44:43: before that you speak German, because I joined the German Embassy in 2002. And one of my main task

00:44:50: was together with the French and the Italians to promote our languages. And at the time, I think

00:44:59: 4%, maybe 3% of the population spoke German, even less Italian, more French. And we were always

00:45:08: looking for an angle to find somebody in a government who speaks either of the language.

00:45:18: Ben Bradshaw, he did. Ben Bradshaw, he was at the European Embassy. That's true.

00:45:21: Yeah, but that's about it. Nick Clegg speaks several European languages.

00:45:29: Okay, yeah, of course, he's also married to Spanish. He's an interviewer. Yeah, he speaks

00:45:35: Dutch. He speaks, I think he speaks German with a Dutch accent. He speaks French, Spanish,

00:45:45: and I think he's got another language. I can't remember, it might be Italian, I can't remember.

00:45:48: So yeah, but it's true, it's very, very rare. And it's quite embarrassing actually in Germany.

00:45:54: I did a speech and I started it in German and people go, wow, that's amazing. And I'm thinking,

00:45:59: every single one of you can speak English. And yet you're going, wow, he can speak German.

00:46:04: Well, my German is not as good as my French.

00:46:10: So that means the French is very good then. I was thinking,

00:46:20: if we don't know about other cultures, we tap into all those, what's it called?

00:46:29: Cases. Yeah. Or traps. That's about traps. Yeah, for example, if I don't know anything else about

00:46:41: Russia, for example, then we have Vladimir Putin. If I don't know anything about the culture and

00:46:48: the literature and whatsoever, then it is just not mirroring the right idea, is it?

00:46:57: And it's much easier than to become a victim of propaganda.

00:47:04: Yeah. Yeah. And that's again why it's very, I think it is important to at least try to understand why

00:47:17: people act differently. So just to go back to the Franco-German thing,

00:47:21: if you think that Macron is his main threat politically at the moment is from the far right

00:47:31: and Marine Le Pen. And it gives you a better understanding of why he's more likely to have

00:47:38: got himself into this position where he's now seen as very hawkish on Ukraine, because she's

00:47:44: kind of pro-Putin. And that's politically, he thinks that's politically damaging to her.

00:47:49: And therefore, he's going to emphasize that side of things. Then you look a little bit at the

00:47:54: history of Germany and say, you think about how Willy Brandt handled the whole

00:48:01: Ostpolitik and the Cold War. And it maybe gives you a better understanding of why

00:48:07: Schultz wants to be seen as somebody more interested in peace than war. So I think these

00:48:14: things are, if you don't have that, at least that very basic perspective, there's a danger that

00:48:20: you sit there thinking, why can't they all just be like us? Which they're not.

00:48:24: Yeah. And I, yeah. And many here in Germany are probably like me, my grandfather fought in

00:48:35: Stalingrad. So the last thing I want to see is tanks at the Russian border.

00:48:40: Yeah. Or the last thing you want to see is a war between Russia and Germany.

00:48:44: Yeah. No, that's, yeah. Whereas, you know, I think in, look, I don't think that I'm not

00:48:50: sure the French want a war either, but you have a, you know, so people are saying, well, the Brits

00:48:56: have given them their cruise missiles. The French have given the Ukrainians their cruise missiles.

00:49:00: Why weren't Germany? As you say, if you think that virtually every German family will know somebody

00:49:07: who was, who would say, give exactly the same story as you've done, then it becomes a little bit

00:49:12: more, perhaps a little bit more understandable. Yeah. Which takes us back to the broader view.

00:49:22: Looking at the year of 2024, we will see elections in 64 countries plus the EU.

00:49:30: What are your expectations, both for Britain and the world?

00:49:38: I mean, if, you know, I think, I think there's a really interesting paradox at the moment. We're

00:49:46: having more elections. We're having more people voting this year around the world than ever in

00:49:51: any year in history, but I'm not sure that the world is that much more democratic. If anything,

00:49:55: it's less democratic than it was. I'm hoping that our election will be a big win for Labour.

00:50:01: My worry is complacency and apathy and the feeling of people thinking, oh, I can't be bothered.

00:50:08: They're all the same, all the, and that stuff that I address in the book. It's not true that

00:50:13: they're all the same, and it's not true that it doesn't matter who's in power. It matters a lot

00:50:16: who's in power. So I'm hoping, I think this has been the worst government of my lifetime,

00:50:23: but I can't, it'd be very hard to find a worse one. They deserve to be annihilated,

00:50:31: and I hope they are, but, you know, we'll have to wait and see.

00:50:34: And on your tour through the country, where do you go to?

00:50:42: Well, I go a lot to the places near where my footballer team are playing at the weekend.

00:50:48: So I do tend to build, I tend to build weekends around where Burnley are playing. So I go all

00:50:55: over the country. I mean, I've been to most parts of the country. I've got a backlog of hundreds

00:51:02: of schools that have asked me to go to. I try to get, I try to do a couple a week,

00:51:08: and they can be anywhere. And I tend to go to, you know, obviously I live in London, so quite

00:51:14: often London and the Southeast, but I try to get to the north of England, to Scotland, to Wales.

00:51:19: I was in Northern Ireland not long ago. So just try, you know, I think it's just good to get around

00:51:25: the country and try and get a proper taste of the place. And then the country comes to you,

00:51:32: doesn't it, when they, for example? Yeah, these events, well, we're doing a tour,

00:51:37: Rory Stewart and I are doing a tour, assuming the election's in autumn, we've got a few dates in

00:51:42: October where we're doing some pretty big venues. I mean, you filled the O2 arena.

00:51:48: I don't know if it's been filled yet, but I know it's well on its way.

00:51:51: Yeah, I mean, this is really, really remarkable. Yeah, it's pretty.

00:51:55: How does it feel? How does it feel for you? It's a bit odd, to be honest. It's a bit odd.

00:52:02: I think it's good. I'm happy about it. I'd rather there were lots of people there than,

00:52:07: you know, 25 people. It's an opportunity. It shows that people are interested and engaged in politics.

00:52:14: I mean, you've got to remember, I've been doing the kind of talking, writing

00:52:20: stuff for about 20 years now. So it's kind of, it feels like an extension of what I've done before

00:52:27: for many, many years, but it's on a different scale when you're talking about the O2.

00:52:31: If you'd have said to me, I mean, I did, it's true. I did do the

00:52:35: festival hall, the Royal Festival Hall, not long after I left Downing Street.

00:52:41: But that was when there was a lot of interest in me based on having just left.

00:52:45: I think what is, I think now the combination and the podcast and the books and this sort of motto

00:52:53: of disagreeing agreeably and the profile that the podcast has got is just,

00:53:00: it's on a different level. And yeah, I'm enjoying it. It's good.

00:53:04: And of course, when you left, there were also different reasons for interest in Alastair Campbell,

00:53:13: wasn't it? A lot of people were frightened of you. Others accused you of all sorts of things.

00:53:21: There was the Iraq war. There were also troubles. So the Alastair Campbell now is more somebody who

00:53:29: unites the country. Is that more accurate? I think that might be overstating it. I think I've got,

00:53:36: look, I've still got a lot of enemies and I've still got a lot of, it makes me laugh

00:53:41: how some of the right-wing newspapers still try to do me in the whole time, which is,

00:53:47: genuinely makes me laugh. But look, there was definitely a period in my life when

00:53:56: it was quite hard to be out and about without feeling that there was quite a lot of aggravation

00:54:02: around the corner. You still get a little bit of that. But generally, I think that people

00:54:08: understand that I'm somebody who really believes what I say and fights for what I believe and

00:54:16: genuinely wants politics to be better, thinks that it can be better, but thinks that it involves

00:54:23: inspiring and motivating the next generation to get involved. And that's what I'm trying to do.

00:54:27: And I think that people do, I think it's the same with Tony Blair. Tony was,

00:54:37: he's still hated by some people, but I think even the ones who hate him have a grudging respect that

00:54:43: he just keeps going. He's doing public service in a different way. He's built up this huge

00:54:48: institute which is doing all sorts of work around the world. And I think that we've all just kept

00:54:54: going in our different ways. And I think that's, because to think about politics today, you look

00:54:59: at somebody like, we mentioned David Cameron, there's David Cameron. I mean, he stopped being

00:55:04: Prime Minister at an age well shorter when most people end their careers, let alone when they

00:55:10: start it. And now, okay, he's back as Foreign Secretary and it's different, but you look at Obama

00:55:16: and how many years Clinton has been out of power. This is a new phenomenon where people go into

00:55:24: public service early, they leave public service relatively early because there's a kind of sell

00:55:29: by date for everybody. And then they have to decide, well, what do you do with the rest of your life?

00:55:33: And what I decided to do the rest of my life was to write, to broadcast, to campaign,

00:55:40: to believe in certain causes and try to promote them and hopefully carry on having a nice life,

00:55:47: making a good living, but doing it in a way that was kind of productive.

00:55:50: I'm looking here at the question. I wanted to ask you about whether we can explore a better

00:55:59: political model. But I was just reminded of Kirsty Young called you recently in a Radio4 interview,

00:56:08: you are the epitome of reason. And which is basically the perfect example of rationality,

00:56:17: right? Logic, sound judgment, which I saw the BBC then when you left Downing Street and the BBC

00:56:27: now calling you that shows you something has moved on, moved away, moved up, I don't know.

00:56:37: I'm not sure that ever being the BBC would concur with her view. Look, I can still flare up and I

00:56:45: can still get very, very agitated about different arguments. But I certainly think that the podcast

00:56:54: has probably made me a bit more reflective. And I think it's down to, again, I think it's to do with

00:57:02: time. So like you and I are talking now, we've been talking for an hour. When you know you have

00:57:08: time to speak and to say things, you know, back to the point we made earlier about the formulae,

00:57:14: nature of a lot of our media. If you've got, you know, even something like Newsnight or the

00:57:20: Today program, you know, if you're lucky, you'll get five minutes. And if you're in a discussion,

00:57:24: you're going to get two or three to sort of, you know, make all the points you want to try to make

00:57:30: when it's impossible. Whereas I think what the podcast form does, it gives people the confidence

00:57:36: to know that they can, they can speak at length, they can think aloud. They can, they can say,

00:57:44: oh, I haven't thought of that. You know, it's a very, it's a very different format to the,

00:57:50: to the one that you and I have grown up with, which has been very much, you know,

00:57:53: here's the question, here's the answer, here's the question that rebuts the answer.

00:57:58: And here's the argument, let's get going. And, you know, it's just sort of often,

00:58:02: at least in more, more heat than light. Yeah, yeah. And of course, especially when

00:58:08: has a tabloid background, where you have just not much space for much to say. And it's reduced to

00:58:20: headlines, which I think people today, I can't read that anymore. I just, yeah, yeah.

00:58:27: Alastair, you reminded me that we talk for an hour. Can I ask you two more questions?

00:58:32: Yeah. Okay. One would be, how does a better political model look like?

00:58:42: Just for, for maybe for Britain?

00:58:49: Well, I think we need to restore, we need to restore basic standards.

00:58:55: I think that politicians who, who lie should be essentially expelled from public life.

00:59:05: I think that if you really fail, like Liz Truss did, likewise, you shouldn't really

00:59:15: be, you shouldn't really have a platform. I think so restoration of standard basic standards in

00:59:21: public life. I think that the political parties should become far more outward looking than they are.

00:59:27: I, I, I, I for one would, would favor compulsory voting, lowering the voting age and proper

00:59:35: political education in schools. I think that would give us the basics from those things would

00:59:41: give us the basis for a new framework. I think I'd love it if Keir Starmer, if he becomes

00:59:46: prime minister, if he actually did review the whole political system, voting system, House of

00:59:52: Lords, devolution, I think there's so much more that we could do to make Britain feel the more

00:59:58: modern democracy. I think we feel quite tired as a democracy right now.

01:00:02: I got you another 15 questions and I have to pick one. And it's really difficult.

01:00:10: So I, I think I go with language because you are the master communicator. And

01:00:20: how do we transition from an currently overwhelming language of conflict to

01:00:29: a more powerful language of respect?

01:00:39: I think by doing it, so again, one of the hopes I have for Keir Starmer, if there is a change of

01:00:48: government, I think he's more serious than what we've had before. I think it's about

01:00:52: reestablishing the sense that government is really serious and quite difficult and quite

01:00:58: challenging. I was in Australia a couple of weeks ago and I was saying to the Australians there,

01:01:05: I think they they're very often very down on their politics and their politicians, but actually

01:01:09: I think the quality of politics there is higher in many regards. And I think one of the reasons

01:01:16: is that particularly within state governments, I think there is a, I have a sense of a greater

01:01:23: depth and seriousness. So I think it's about restoring politics as a serious and noble calling.

01:01:33: And that's very difficult when you've had characters like Johnson and Truss around.

01:01:37: It's very difficult when you've had all the corruption that there's been. It's very difficult

01:01:41: when you see some of the characters that succeed, particularly somebody like Trump.

01:01:46: But I think politics is a serious, I think we have to transition from this sense that politics is

01:01:54: all about the three word slogan or the abuse and actually just something, I think we need a generation

01:02:01: of political leaders to come along and say, you know what, this is really hard. I'm going to do

01:02:04: my best. I'm going to provide leadership. I'm going to explain what the challenges are. Yes,

01:02:09: I'm going to make difficult decisions, but I'm not going to treat you like idiots and just pretend

01:02:13: that everything can be solved with a three word slogan because it can't. And I think the rest

01:02:19: of politics is probably doing good work in that direction. Well, that's very, very kind of you.

01:02:26: So to say, thank you very much. Alistair, that was a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful hour.

01:02:33: I know I did a lot and I'm not at least surprised about your success. And I wish you even more and

01:02:40: that more Bob's who actually take the action and do what they learned. And hopefully you keep on

01:02:54: communicating in all kinds of ways to make country and society a bit better.

01:03:04: Well, that's very kind of you to say so. And I hope you keep on writing your books as well.

01:03:08: Thank you very much. Okay, see you soon.

01:03:12: You've been listening to a special English edition of the Gorsa Neustadt, a German podcast series

01:03:18: by Zabilla Barton, in which she talks to pioneering leaders who are committed to making our world

01:03:25: smarter, greener and fairer. For more information, please visit www.zabillabardon.com

01:03:33: and the official site of the World Economic Forum.