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'Farage in disguise?' Brexiteer and Labour peer on small boats | LBC
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Jul 10, 2025
Lord Maurice Glasman has slammed the Conservatives as "irrelevant", as he told Nick Ferrari the political battle is now between Labour and Reform UK. Glasman, who is a Labour peer and architect of the Blue Labour campaign group, blamed Tory failure to "control the borders" and levelling up for the party's downfall. 0:25 | 'You’ve got to say it would be a C-minus' 0:57 | 'This is a government that hasn't found its identity' 1:16 | 'They’re still dancing like it’s 1999' 2:25 | 'He's torn between his childhood and his education' 3:13 | 'The world is not like that - Trump's election put the final nail in the coffin' 3:49 | 'Blue Labour's slogan? Be nice to your mum' 5:32 | 'The new era... it's Labour versus Reform' 7:54 | 'County Durham... the cradle became melting' 8:19 | 'They don't want this stuff anymore about diversity and mobility' 12:39 | 'The people have been clear since 2016 what they want' Listen to the full show on the all-new LBC App: https://app.af.lbc.co.uk/btnc/thenewlbcapp #nickferrari #ukpolitics #LBC LBC is the home of live debate around news and current affairs in the UK.
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0:00
Someone who is a political theorist and architect of the much-respected Blue Labour campaign group
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I speak of Maurice, now Lord Glassman, the Labour peer, who's in the studio with me
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Privileged to welcome you here, Lord Glassman. It occurs to me that our children, or in some instances our grandchildren, are getting their school reports
0:16
It's that sort of season at the moment, and we've just come through a year of this Labour administration
0:23
What sort of school report would you be writing, Lord Glassman? Morning to you. Good morning, and really a privilege for me to be with you
0:30
Not at all. You know, you've got to say, it would be a C-
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and could do a lot better. In what areas does it need to do better
0:39
Well, in the fundamental areas. I still think this is a government that hasn't found its identity
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that hasn't found its voice, that hasn't found its direction. But remember, with Margaret Thatcher
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I think you may be old enough. I'm afraid I am. I certainly am
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79 to 81 was a disaster I mean if you remember it was all over the place
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do you remember the wets and the this and the rebellions no one remembers that
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because come 1981 there was that budget the Geoffrey Howe budget then we had the sale of the council houses
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then we had the big bang then we had the taking on the unions and all people remember about Thatcher
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was a very firm sense of direction so I'm not without hope that it can find its voice
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but as it stands it's still stranded in the old era it's still thinking, they're still dancing like it's 1999
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What do you mean stranded in the old era? Well, we had a period from 1979 until roughly the Brexit vote
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I do think that the Brexit vote was the fundamental sea change in our politics
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And in that period, markets were good, globalization was good, technology was, you know, it was all about EU and multilateral agreements
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now people are demanding sovereignty the state to act they're looking for politicians
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to do things i mean earlier about the boats that's one thing but also we need this is a
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new era of industrial strategy we thought industry was able we could just outsource it to china now
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we realize that china's our biggest enemy and we've transferred all our assets to that
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So in this era, the working class are not the left behind
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they're deciding elections, and the British working class are furious. What have you learned about Sir Keir in his first 12 months in power, Lord Glassman
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I actually learned about him that he's torn between his childhood and his education
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I think that he had a childhood with an ill mother, with a sick brother
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that he knows what it's like to be a human being on this earth, in this country
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and he went to university and like so many of us he got stupid you know he learned about human
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rights law and how he went into a world which which is a world of words not a word world of
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action um so i've learned that he has to resolve the tension between a very strong gut instinct
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that there's something wrong in this country and it needs to be dealt with and a sense that he wants
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to preserve the old previous era which is all about you know legal order rules-based
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order it not the world is not like that and Trump election put the final nail in the coffin Well we talk about that because there was a very powerful piece in one of the newspapers The Times yesterday I understand to your shock you found yourself being invited to President Trump inauguration
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Yeah, I was there. It was a shock. What's your abiding memory of that? Fury at the lanyard class. I went to these MAGA rallies, and people were just throwing their lanyards in the bin
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They were sick of being told what to do by HR. Weirdly, Donald Trump, like Farage, is emerging
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is a tribune of working-class rage against the progressive elites. That's what I learned
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If you had to sell blue labour on a poster or an advertising campaign or a jingle
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what's it trying to do? Well, the slogan would be, be nice to your mum. You know, that's the first thing
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Family really matters, and how you treat your mum actually decides what kind of person you are in your life
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If you care for her, if you honour her, you're on the right track
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that all the things, you know, family and the obligations of family are really important and
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love of this country. I love parliament. I love the common law. I really supported leaving the
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EU so that we could restore our sense of national identity. Where are you on the boats? How do we
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stop the boats? Well, you put the Navy in. I mean, Keir Starmer said this is an example. He said it's
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a national security issue, but he hasn't brought in the army. This is crazy. The second one is
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yesterday I was in the Lords and you know I was blocked
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from going here and there, the French had invaded again, Macron was in the building
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how many times, but they did take him to this great room
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the Royal Room where on one side is an enormous portrait of the Battle of Trafalgar and on the
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other side is Waterloo so we did remind him that they are the big losers
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you know in this but if the French can't control their border we will have
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to, there is, we have to assert sovereignty and control of our borders. This is really out of order. So you want to
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assert control there, you want to bring in the Navy, you believed in Brexit, you believed in
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Britain. You're not Nigel Farage in disguise, are you? Oh, I'm the opposite. I am his greatest enemy
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So I'm... But a lot of what you've just said, as the Times pointed out, it would be like reading
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what some of Reform's ambitions are, no? Look, the new era, the era we're in, it's Labour versus
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reform. I'm just filling you in on what your next four years are going to be. The Conservatives
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are out of the game. And the reason the Conservatives are out of the game is they said they'd
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take back control and didn't. They said they'd control the borders and didn't
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Do you remember levelling up? Yes, levelling up, yeah. How they borrowed everyone's vote
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Yeah, and they just, let's just say politely, they urinated on their voters
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And now they're unforgiven. They're not being heard. I mean, you could bring
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on Robert Jenrick as often as you like, and no one's listening to what they say they're irrelevant do they know that i think it's
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slowly dawning on them that they're half dead and this is a great political party this this is
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they went to their worst defeat since 1832 yeah i mean this is cosmic and the reason is they didn't
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understand the brexit vote they still were on their knees to capital to the city so the difference
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Nigel Farage everybody is a Salim Barth that right and a Putin appeaser just get it into your your head that he is not the solution but on the border he the most significant politician of the last 20 years And I don argue with Nigel Farage about sovereignty
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But what I do argue with him about is that we support Ukraine and we need an industrial strategy
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More than anything, this is an era. I mean, do you remember in COVID, we couldn't even make face masks
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We have, without an industrial strategy, we will be a client state of the United States
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and the EU, but we've got a great future if we take this possibility. And that means trade unions
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that means private sector trade unions being much more important, working class jobs, factories
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building on the back of the defence spending, we can build an industrial strategy
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If, as polls are suggesting, Labour just about clings on in the Senate in Wales
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or possibly even loses it, how significant would that be, Lord Glasby? Hugely, but it's already happened. Let's talk about County Durham. I mean, County Durham
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I'm a Labour guy, I love Labour history. County Durham built the first maternity hospitals
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Workers put in. They put in the first schools. County Durham is really the cradle of the Labour movement
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and they've voted Labour for 100 years. May the 1st, May Day, our big day
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the working class in Durham have now got four seats on County Durham Council
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This is a shocking... You know, the phrase I used was, our cradle became our tomb
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We're heading for disaster unless we can address directly working-class dissatisfaction with the status quo
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They don't want this stuff anymore about diversity and mobility. Has reform stolen those votes or have Labour lost them
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Well, Labour's lost them. So there can be won back? Yeah, of course. I believe in the resurrection of the dead
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You know, that's fundamental. So how does that resurrection... How long have you got and how does the resurrection begin
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Well, let's just be brutal about that. there is four years left in this parliament
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And as I say, Thatcher didn't define herself. I think we've got six months to indicate to the people
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that we can move in the direct... This is a democracy. People want control of immigration
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They want decent jobs. They want a state that functions. I mean, the bigger the state gets, the worse it gets
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And people are aware of all this. This is reality. So what I'm saying, Nick, is I'm contesting reform
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reform. Absolutely. But in order to contest reform, you've got to acknowledge the scale of
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the disaffection. We're talking, of course, the French president is in town. If these talks come
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to nothing, you would send in the Navy? I would put the Navy. I mean, I've been saying this for
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about four years. But you know Sakhir will never do that. I don't know that. I don't know anything
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about that. If it is a national security issue, it's got to be dealt with as a national security
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We don't want these people coming in. They're not welcome. I mean, I've been to Ukraine 15 times since the war started
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They've got drones that could target each boat and just say, turn back
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There are ways of doing this now. And it just needs the political leadership
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Who's more likely to be Prime Minister in 2029, Sir Keir Starmer or Nigel Farage
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Right now, I would say Starmer just. Because reform has got a real dearth of quality in its ranks It got a charismatic leader But Labour is losing its credibility as a competent This is another area I mean what happened last week was
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a farce that's going to undermine people's confidence. As regards the which part? Yeah, a 2
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decrease in future in future welfare. And this is a matter of principle
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We've got to have a new beverage report. I mean, I'm a follower of Frank Field
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May his name be blessed. There's areas where we can bring in
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contribution. People want, we've got to, this is a wonderful country that takes care of the vulnerable
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but can it be true that 35% of 18 to 26-year-old have disabilities
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We've got to have a discussion, a real discussion about sanity. Feeling sad doesn't
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mean you're depressed. It's a blue labour. Being sad is kind of blue
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It's part of life. We've got a minute left. Does blue labour support a wealth tax? No, we don't support wealth tax. This whole thing that the solution is bigger taxation is wrong. The AI is coming. That can be a real reform of the administrative state. Writing an email to the state is 60% of the people who work there. We've got to absolutely reform the state, restore the integrity of Parliament, of our armed forces above all. We've got 70,000 troops
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There's more civil servants in the MOD than there are troops. This has got to change
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How likely is it that both Sir Keir Starmer and the Chancellor would even position at the end of the year
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Oh, very high, very, very high. Should they be? Look, I don't see any particular..
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As I say, Keir's got the childhood university tent. I mean, let's see how he goes
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And bear in mind that it was also true in 1945 that this government's got to find the next six months
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will be decisive. So what would you be looking for? Where would you see, if we use the idea
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the pupil comes back to class and he, she has listened and is starting to get on with their
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work? What would you want to see? Well, first of all, to absolutely consolidate the relationship
12:04
with Ukraine, their natural resources, their skilled labour, their industrial strategy, that we build factories, and we build factories on the back of the defence spending. I think we've
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got to begin a conversation about vocational training. I mean, I've always argued to close
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down half the universities and turn them into vocational colleges we've got a and then absolutely
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welfare reform these are the three industrial strategy defense police welfare reform and listen
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to the people the people are at the they've been clear since 2016 what they want lastly how much
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did it matter that the chancellor cried last week yeah it was distressing to to see i don't like that
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sort of thing. Is she competent? She's competent, but she's also I would argue that we've got
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a fundamental state reform. I think the Treasury should be abolished. There should be
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an economics ministry with industrial strategy in number 10. Move the Chancellor out of
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number 11, make that Downing Street the political hub. This is all part of state
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reform. Final question. How will Spurs do next season? Oh, I always believe
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some things don't change. It's the resurrection of the dead. Thanks for coming
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Come and see us again soon. It's been a fascinating talk. It's a pleasure, Nick, and God bless you
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Thank you
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