Pod Save the UK12 Jun 2025

Is Labour finally being Labour?

Rachel Reeves has delivered her very first spending review, promising to ‘renew Britain’ with big cash boosts for the NHS, housing and defence. It’s a marked change of tone but the Tories are calling her approach “spend now, tax later”.

Nish and Coco dig into the details and are left with some questions. Are tax rises in the Autumn inevitable? Are high-stakes promises, like vowing to end spending on controversial asylum hotels, ill-thought-out? Will all this be enough to change the public mood?

And as we’ve seen across the pond in LA this week, face masks have been critical to protect the identity of protestors demonstrating against immigration raids and deportations. But the UK government plans to ban them. Nish and Coco speak to Akiko Hart, director of human rights organisation, Liberty, about how we can uphold the right to protest and the latest on challenging the Supreme Court ruling on the definition of a woman.

And finally - it gives us great joy to announce - Reform UK is in meltdown with (now former) party chairman Zia Yusuf performing the political equivalent of the hokey-cokey… is he in or out?

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Guests:

Akiko Hart

Audio Credits

BBC

Parliament TV

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Episoder(175)

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27 Aug 1h 23min

The Nuance Drought: False Binaries and Critical Friends w/ Natasha Devon

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20 Aug 1h 7min

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30 Jul 1h 30min

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23 Jul 1h 3min

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16 Jul 1h 19min

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2 Jul 1h 19min