You may not agree with Hitchens on everything, he may even irritate you at times...but you cannot deny the mans intellectual heft, insight and forthright communication style.
Peter's been subjected to some rather awkward and unsympathetic interviews recently. Thank goodness for this one, which gives him a chance to air his views more fully and reasonably. More like this please.
If you mean 2024, no they couldn't. Even the most optmisitic poll for the next strongest right party showed they couldn't be the 2nd largest party let alone the majority. What he was saying was, keep Labour from a majority. And now, given the Labour vote wasn't any higher than it has been in previous elections, they're still the majority.
@@ciarangallagher2729 No you're quite wrong. Had the Conservatives received fewer votes, it's very likely that the Lib-Dems would have become the official opposition. This scenario would have resulted in two significant outcomes. Firstly, the reduction in Conservative status would have greatly increased the perception that they were a party in decline. Secondly, it would have led to a vast reduction in business donations due to their diminished prospects of forming a government again. This would have accelerated the inevitable decline of the party, leaving them supported mainly by baby boomers.
What's more important right now... replacing the conservatives (which you failed to do in 2010 when Hitchens first advised under better circumstances) or stopping the Labour Party from enacting constitutional reforms that will ensure their rule regardless of government? The problem with the right is they're tactically dumb and run on emotion.
@RichardPhillips1066 Well when the fix is Farage who can blame him ? He offered a fix in 2010 when it could of made a difference, people ignored him. Now we live with the consequences of that
“…people TRYING to fix the problems”. Well said! But I’ll make it more true to life: “people PRETENDING to be trying to fix the problem, while doing their own things which aggravate the problem”. This is what Hitch is on about. Please, do not be naïve!
@@holdfast453Well said? What problems have you fixed? Where are the fruits of your labor? At present, I can easily point to 3-5 things Htichens advised that you should have done that would've had better outcomes than what you did, but you refused at the time because you were gung-ho about getting something you didn't get anyway. The Norway Model would have been better, but no! We'd still have freedom of movement! Okay, so how's the lack of freedom of movement working for you now? Silly the lot of you are.
Thank you Peter Hitchens - delusions of grandeur, great point. I long for countries to stand on their own two feet and stop grovelling at a once great power’s footstool. Have a leader who truly honour’s God and looks after its own country’s best interests.
We want a referendum. This referendum should address the following questions: 1. Should Britain remain part of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR)? 2. Should the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, established by the United Nations, be revised? 3. Should it be a legal obligation for any British government to pursue this revision until it is adopted globally? It’s crucial to recognise that all Western nations face similar challenges, and in some cases, these issues may be even more severe than those experienced by Britain.
@@kil93’zero seats’ was never achievable. It was an emotional response to incompetence and betrayal. Nothing more. The Con party still had a hard core.
This assumes the circumstances of 2010 and 2024 are exactly the same which they are not. Get this through your heads: The most important thing in 2024 was stopping the constitutional reforms of a Labour government, not replacing the Tories especially when you don't have anything serious to replace them with (no Reform is serious with its bickering egomaniacs & ignorance of the British bill of rights). In 2010, stopping the conservatives would have had better effect in that Gordon Brown is more conservative than Corbyn or Starmer, and Labour was burnt out after 4 terms.
@@kil93 Lol... no these right-wing fools are responsible for that. Labour got less votes in 2024 than in 2019. The fragmentation of the right brought the leading opposition to Labour under the line resulting in a Labour landslide. This is why I don't let them complain about Labour. I laugh and say, "It's your fault fool."
He's totally wrong about the Hamas Israel conflict. The Jews are given sympathy for only a matter of hours. The world would blame the Jews whether they responded or not.
Plato said the penalty of good men involved in politics was to be ruled by the worse… the problem is if the good people believe the chance they will succeed is less than 1% and the chance they will be pilloried is 99% it’s no shock they don’t get involved.
Great interview! Peter Hitchens may be generally right that the UK Conservative government didn’t seem to be following a coherent policy over the last 14 years, just reacting to things. On the slightly esoteric issue of measuring consumer price inflation though, they did show a steady policy path. They started from a consensus they inherited from the Blair-Brown government that the UK CPI would be the macroeconomic measure of consumer price inflation, eventually reformed to include an owner-occupied housing component based on a net acquisitions approach. The UK RPI would remain the household-oriented measure of consumer price inflation, subject to various reforms, e.g. the inclusion of a stamp duty component. It ruthlessly undermined that consensus, and seems to be heading towards imposing that duckbilled platypus of a consumer price measure, the CPIH, as the one index to rule them all, used everywhere, including as the target inflation indicator of the Bank of England. Here in Canada, we live in such a one-index world. Trust me, it isn’t a model to emulate and I really hope Keir Starmer’s government takes a fresh look at things and follows a different path.
22:00 Council tax increases are immediately transferred to tenants who are obliged to pay them by law. Nothing is more Working class than a tenant. I don’t know about landlords, but if you have to pay rent you have to work. Enough said for New Labour’s detachment from their working class roots.
Round and round we go. When we had the opportunity for zero Tory seats he scuppered it. Now he's back on the anti Tory train. It's looking like an academic exercise rather than concern for the country and Brits left within it.
In his defence, he was ahead of this curve. He was campaign for ‘zero seats’ in 2010. He wrote and book and made a documentary attacking David Cameron. His stance in 2024 is simply that there are two options- Tory vs Labour. And he would prefer the Tories
@@michaelmccomb2594 You're right but it's not just Tories and Labour. Nature abhors a vacuum and the Tories can be replaced. So can Labour after they fail this term. The two party system is a block to change.
@douglasfielder Maybe it’s you and everyone else who cannot see what Peter can see. He’s under no illusions about the way in which the Conservatives have “…let the whole country go to rack and ruin except for their mates who made a lot of money” He’s also under no illusions about how the Labour government are about to make things far worse.
Douglas Fielder doesn't see what everyone else sees, the labour party you replaced them with are letting violent criminals out of prison to make room for anyone who opposes them politically. Great Job 👍
I don't believe faith can be or should be 'private'. Why not be ready to give others an explanation for the hope that you have, or the grace you've received?
@@Stafford674 Never imposed, but I see no reason why faith should not be freely expressed... It doesn't seem possible to me to 'impose' my faith on anyone else anyway. It would have to be freely received, or not at all...
@@gordonicus4637 I don't mean this unkindly, or snippily but if you really think that faith can't be imposed you have not read enough, or perhaps any, history. It is replete with examples of religious people imposing their values on others. From the Roman Emperor Theordosius banning all religions but Christianity, the Moslem conquests, the Inquisition, the Elizabethan Act of Settlement to Sunday Trading Laws in England to modern day Islamist terrorists forcing people to pretend to believe, or follow the rituals of belief. . They may not have been successfulin inculcating real faith, but they have imposed their values. Express your faith. Worship openly, bring your children up in your faith, proselytize persuade people that your religion is true; but don't force people to do things they don't want to do, or prevent them from doing things they do want to do.
What Hitchens fails to mention is that reform came second in many constituencies by a very small margin, meaning it would only take a small change to turn those 5 seats into 95.
Always good to hear Hitchens take on the dismal state of UK politics and whatever else. He has taken a lot of flak lately from young commentators (Lotus Eaters etc) re his position for defeating Labour in the recent election but he will be proved right.
I suspect Hitchens would not promote Reform, even if he agrees with their policies as he considered Farage to be anti-intellectual and not a deep thinker, he could not bring himself to promote such a man...
@@FFS704 I said it kind of in jest - as we know that Hitchens is "the forever contrarian". I think actually, Hitchens main objection to Reform is its Thatcherite economy policy, and especially his love of "the railways" and the wish to see them renationalised.
@@ciarangallagher2729 No - I am not. I just see through Hitchens' act nowadays, the "forever contrarian" - it does help sell his book, keep his column going and very funny how he was complaining about not getting on to Question Time any more - and after the debates with Mike Graham on Talk TV, he now does.
Gday John love these high sounding conversations but I would like to see you have a wonderful conversation with a very low states person because we could all learn from you
In a Westminster style electoral system with more than 2 parties, it's quite common for the winning party to NOT have a plurality of the votes much less 50%+1. In Canada Justin Trudeau has won one majority, two minorities - and BOTH minority governments the Conservatives got more votes - SUBSTANTIALLY more than Trudeau. Essentially Trudeau won 90+% of the Toronto seats often in very close races while the Conservatives were winning huge majorities in Western Canada (which for various sketchy historical + constitutional reasons are 20-25 under-represented in terms of seats compared to what they would get by strict "rep by pop". The ONLY unusual thing about Canada amongst "Westminster" countries is that that under-representation is in the constitution with an amending formula that ensures they will NEVER get the support of Quebec and the Maritime provinces to change things to something more equitable. The electoral balance in the Canadian Senate is even worse than the Commons where BC gets 6 seats, NS/NB/PEI/NL get 30 - with BC having more than double the population of all 4 combined.
Hitchens' position on Israel/Gaza is wrong. Israel would have received only superficial sympathy and the world *certainly* would never acknowledge that there's a religious component to the conflict. They've spent 75 years denying this. They aren't going to suddenly wake up and admit they were were lying the whole time.
The issue is the ideology of Jewish supremacism, enabled by the literal supremacy of Jewry in the United States: it's now their country, and it's run for them.
I admire all you who listened and commented because I can't. I didn't finish it because i could only catch every second word, i shall not listen to an interview with Peter Hitchens again unless he learns to open his mouth when speaking. It really is disrespectful to to his listeners to mumble the way he does. I have so enjoyed all John's other interviews but this has left me very grumpy ☹
Isn't it odd that so many others *did* get to the end (likewise with the complaints of whistling, inaudible to me and others I have checked with). Have some of you not updated your hearing-aids lately? Could the problem be yours, like the way number plates on modern cars are blurrier than they should be?
Victor David Hansen, a US history professor, has made similar claims comparing the far left to Jacobins and the French revolution. Disturbing on so many levels. Philosophy major and Latin / classics studies at a state university in the late 1990s in the US. Shaking my head. Destruction on both sides of the pond
@@michaelmccomb2594 Indeed. They were both like this --- but of course only Peter gets flac for it. Everyone worshiped Christopher even when he was proved wrong (which was actually quite often). I love both and view them as actually temperamentally very similar. But.... the 'left' can only 'pick one side' as it were. Especially if it's the wrong one for 'the right reasons'.
The thing is is that Labour now needs to be more Labour that the 'Conservatives' were. Moving that goalpost yet further away from normalcy & balance. And because that other post has never moved its appearance of being further away than ever leads to yet more demonisation.
Peter is an intelligent man. But right now, all I see is Denethor telling the defenders of the city to abandon hope and flee for their lives. Endlessly complains, offers no solutions and when people do try to make things better he moans at them for not doing it the right way.
no british politition honestly believes we have a special relationship with the u.s it's a useful thing for them to say on specific occasions, and peter knows this as well as anyone .he's saying this in a fit of pique because his country is straying from his beliefs , correctly in my view as his views are mainly out of date . strangely the places he's not out of date are parts of britains foregn policy.
Keep the Nuclear deterrent, scrap overseas aid and halve the public sector, use that cash to tidy up the crumbling towns and then encourage private enterprise to maintain them, there is way too much state involved in the UK
They did not say to put societal pressure on people, but that government should do more to facilitate families rather than attempt to replace the father.
@@grannyannie2948 reread my comment and tell me where I say they even mentioned societal pressure. What they suggest is male female relationships should be favoured in some way and that is just one of those ways I ment when I said hitchens views are outdated .
@@andrewmcewan8081 Apologies you did not attribute it to Peter or John. As for families being out dated all the statistics show that a traditional family has the best outcome for children. And I know zillions of Australian parents in their 30s who would like governments to provide more support.
The possible truth is that Netanyhu only cares about not ending up in jail within Israel, not about the country existing in the near future. (He is like Zelunskyj in this regard, all the soldiers and people can be severely mutilated or killed for their wealth & power). Netanyahu's son is in the US, probably a dual citizen, and is not fighting with other Israelis, in the military. He should be hubg, drawn & quatered for how he has manipulated his country and his people for about 25:years for the benefit of Netanyhu and his family.
England is in fact moving to the right.... it's just that, in no small part due to the utter dereliction of duty of the "Conservative" party, we have accidentally found ourselves ruled by a far let government.
Actually he said to vote against Labour, if that meant voting Tory despite the fact they don't deserve the vote or voting Reform despite the fact they won't win, then do it so long as you DONT VOTE LABOUR and make sure they don't get a majority, pity more people didn't take his advice.
Hitchens does not understand serious insecurity living in safe London and Washington DC. He certainly does not understand International politics , (Iran wanting regional hegemony sponsoring Hamas) though he does understand domestic left versus right economic politics(now becoming less important). Read the classics. Middle East balance of power is partly identity and democrats, versus barbarian despots. and partly it is in US/UK , Europes interests to prevent Iran's want to be regional hegemon.
Blair started the decline and all the governments since then have really only been other versions of New Labour. I always enjoy listening to John Anderson's interviews. Peter Hitchens is often interesting. In the UK election the turnout was around 60% of the 48 million electorate. Of those, Labour's vote share was 33.7%, less than Corbyn received in 2017 against May. So only 2 in 10 people voted Labour and half of those only did so to get the useless Conservatives out. Many people never received their postal ballots. It is going to be a rough ride over the next few years. Peter Hitchens is wrong to be rather dismissive towards Jordan Peterson, who is a force for good in the world, someone who looks for solutions. The two 12 Rules For Life books are outstanding.
I understand that he is very disappointed by how the new right shived the tories given that keer starmer has got free reign now. But I believe that was a necessary step. the tories are either indifferent to the suffering of britain, too incompetent to do anything about it, in line with the blairites of the labour party or too cowardly to stand up to the voices in the tory party that have caused the rise of this blairite dogmatism to begin with. In my opinion the labour crazies could've been stopped dead in their tracks by the tories showing even a modicum of backbone. they have failed to develop a backbone for almost 30 years now. what do you do with incompetent employees? you fire them and replace them with new ones.
Interviewer: Hey Peter is there any tie or place or person in relation to politics, economics or any field of human endeavour which was to your satisfaction? Hitchens: Of course not. There's never been anybody who understands anything except me. Everything was always as bad as it's ever been at every moment in history and it can only ever get worse and only I understand why. There's no hope for any situation because every decision that's ever been made by anyone who wasn't me is always wrong and I've always predicted the right thing to do and am correct about everything in hindsight. Every problem is always unfixable 5 minutes after everyone ignores my opinion on it.
Peter Hitchens is the perennial "Voice in the wilderness." Sadly, he can't tolerate actually being popular. Stage one. Shout "Destroy the Tories" for a decade. Stage two. Actually gain popularity. Stage three. Change your mind Instantly and start shitting on all the people you've actually convinced.
The Conservatives became new Labour. But what was "new" Labour? It was Labour that basically accepted and embraced Thatcherism except with higher immigration, maybe. So it's all very circular.
Liz Truss was what the conservative party members wanted. It failed because the Bank of England chose not to support the bond market. Hurrah you might say but do you want technocrats or democrats in control? What happens when the markets don't like Labour party policies?
I like Peter but I think he concentrates too much on the details of the problems of the past to be useful for the future. In my view the brightest future looks very little like the past. It's direct democracy with decentralised technologies replacing trusted institutions.
Peter has an annoying habit of ending his sentence, waits for a time to pass when the interviewer thinks he has completed what he wanted to say and then starts again, cutting off the other person in mid flow. He has a lot of interesting and useful knowledge things to pass on but seems to be a total nightmare to interview.
If your mind cannot fashion a better voting system to determine what is the national will then it's time to stop thinking about it. Hint: Vision Representation. YT deletes any comment that refers to my website on that issue.
Why would you look for the special relationship between the UK and US in Washington DC? Perhaps he looked in the wrong location. Maybe he should have went to Church.
If course there is a necessity for Christianity. No other religion has raised the morality & ethics of people like Christianity. The others basically tear down the mieality &:ethics!
every tory has this arguement about the bbc and none of them can actually point out anywhere the bbc have shown bias as an organisation . they keep putting there own people in positions of power within the bbc yet they still complain at the result .at the start of this peter complained about advertising in politics yet doesn't mention the fact thatcher is responsable in large part for it .
5 seats but 96 second places in Labour held seats and they are definitely going to lose a few next time around l. So not just 5 seats really it's a party on the up.
Experience and knowledge of the British millenial political class, like the special relationship with the USA I find it difficult to see or beleive it.
Israel's only error so far is to not have a program to deport every single palestinian from gaza and the west bank to Somalia or some other weak failed African state, while drawing upon Jewish history to give a name to each phase of the operation.
His talk at the end about the US and Christianity is not true at all in many places. Did he ever leave Washington DC? It appears not. He should do what he did that changed his mind about his revolutionary position of his youth. Speak with ordinary Americans away from the big money and academia. He would changed is mind again.
When I lived in the USA between 1993 and 1995 I travelled to most parts of the country and did indeed 'speak with ordinary Americans'. I was seldom in DC and had nothing to do with big money or acadmeia when I was there, living as I did in a fairly modest Maryland suburb with an interesting mix of neighbours who qelcomed me and my family into their homes. I don't quite know how you explain my late brother's unquestionable popularity among the college generation of the early 21st century, if my theory is wrong.
@@peterhitchens4240 I grew up in the 80's and 90's. Pretty much everyone I met were Christian unless they recently immigrated here and those were of different religions but still theist as far as I am aware. I am a fair bit younger than you in my mid 40's now. I live in northern Illinois and Wisconsin. I am a very active Catholic who previously went through many different protestant churches before coming home to the Church. I can tell you in the Midwest Christianity is very strong. I hardly know any atheists at all. I have never read your brothers writing and its highly unlikely anyone I know did excluding some who went to college and had to read into the subject or people deeper into their faith. Perhaps, other area this isn't the case, but the Midwest is still strongly Christian though some or more than some may be practical atheists especially in the more left leaning side. There is a small group called Catholic Unscripted who in the last few years visited the US from the UK. They attest to how much stronger Christianity is in the US compared to in Europe. The have a YT channel and website you can check out. The few atheist friends I do have do not read anything at all outside sports, entertainment, and/or work-related topics. The few things they have to say are something like science says and when pressed they really know very little on the topic at all. They seem to think science proves things. They are unaware that proofs are in logic and math but not science. Most of the people I know in hard sciences have views closer to the most recent Uncommon Knowledge video. While most atheists I know are unread even if they went to college, which they did so just for careers not to learn. It is nice chatting with you, and I appreciate you. Maranatha
Lol, RUclips automatically removes/hides/disappears a lot of comments for seemingly no reason. It's not "John without his moral conscience" with his finger on the button.
I usually find interviews with Peter Hitchens entertaining. They are like a Monty Python sketch on Sanctimony.I don't disagree with everything but yes it's generally expressed in very sanctimonious terms.
You may not agree with Hitchens on everything, he may even irritate you at times...but you cannot deny the mans intellectual heft, insight and forthright communication style.
If only the right had any intellectual heft, or insight. Everything is a content-less slogan from Matthew Goodwin, Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson.
@@teriekwilliams2828 Yup, there is absolutely no substance to Conservatism - just BS. But then politics in general is just BS.
It's a mistake to assume the ability to win arguments means one is always right.
Absolutely, a significant part of politics is people digging rabbit holes and encouraging people down them. It’s full of contradictions and fallacies.
He has the intellectual heft if a stale peanut. He’s an irrelevant shadow.
18:41 - interviewer somehow makes Peter Hitchens say "BRUH".
😂😂😂😂😂 Hitchens is a legend 😂😂😂😂
Don't be silly. Wash your ears out.
I think that was a classic Hitchensian "Bwreuuugh."
Sign of the apocalypse!
Peter's been subjected to some rather awkward and unsympathetic interviews recently. Thank goodness for this one, which gives him a chance to air his views more fully and reasonably.
More like this please.
This is because Peter is being exposed as a contrarian who quickly abandons any views if they have any popular support.
Thank you for this comment. I was just about to say I've given up on Hitchens since he's become so incredibly grumpy and angry.
Agree and this was better than most recently but he has only got himself to blame.
Yet another fascinating and deeply thought-provoking conversation, gentlemen.
Thank you very much indeed... ☝️😎
Agreed.
You know nothing
Yet Hitchens told eveyone to keep the Conservatives alive when they could have been replaced.
If you mean 2024, no they couldn't. Even the most optmisitic poll for the next strongest right party showed they couldn't be the 2nd largest party let alone the majority. What he was saying was, keep Labour from a majority. And now, given the Labour vote wasn't any higher than it has been in previous elections, they're still the majority.
Hitchens’ argument was that you should vote for whoever is most likely to beat Labour in your constituency.
@@ciarangallagher2729 No you're quite wrong. Had the Conservatives received fewer votes, it's very likely that the Lib-Dems would have become the official opposition. This scenario would have resulted in two significant outcomes. Firstly, the reduction in Conservative status would have greatly increased the perception that they were a party in decline. Secondly, it would have led to a vast reduction in business donations due to their diminished prospects of forming a government again. This would have accelerated the inevitable decline of the party, leaving them supported mainly by baby boomers.
@@dertery8724 No one is listening to him.
What's more important right now... replacing the conservatives (which you failed to do in 2010 when Hitchens first advised under better circumstances) or stopping the Labour Party from enacting constitutional reforms that will ensure their rule regardless of government? The problem with the right is they're tactically dumb and run on emotion.
Pete is that guy who constantly complians but also pours scorn on people trying to fix the problems
Quite. And profits making a profession out of it.
@RichardPhillips1066 Well when the fix is Farage who can blame him ?
He offered a fix in 2010 when it could of made a difference, people ignored him. Now we live with the consequences of that
“…people TRYING to fix the problems”. Well said! But I’ll make it more true to life: “people PRETENDING to be trying to fix the problem, while doing their own things which aggravate the problem”. This is what Hitch is on about. Please, do not be naïve!
Precisely, he’s a containment agent.
@@holdfast453Well said? What problems have you fixed? Where are the fruits of your labor? At present, I can easily point to 3-5 things Htichens advised that you should have done that would've had better outcomes than what you did, but you refused at the time because you were gung-ho about getting something you didn't get anyway. The Norway Model would have been better, but no! We'd still have freedom of movement! Okay, so how's the lack of freedom of movement working for you now? Silly the lot of you are.
Thank you Peter Hitchens - delusions of grandeur, great point.
I long for countries to stand on their own two feet and stop grovelling at a once great power’s footstool.
Have a leader who truly honour’s God and looks after its own country’s best interests.
We want a referendum. This referendum should address the following questions:
1. Should Britain remain part of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR)?
2. Should the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, established by the United Nations, be revised?
3. Should it be a legal obligation for any British government to pursue this revision until it is adopted globally?
It’s crucial to recognise that all Western nations face similar challenges, and in some cases, these issues may be even more severe than those experienced by Britain.
Always the most brutally honest man in the country, take heed!
Thanks Peter for ploughing the lonely furrow and sharing your insights and wisdom
Peter counter-signaling zero seats helped put any solution to this to this back at least 10 years, possibly forever.
@@Kaptime Yes, because Peter was responsible for the Tories retaining 120+ seats 😄
@@kil93’zero seats’ was never achievable. It was an emotional response to incompetence and betrayal. Nothing more. The Con party still had a hard core.
This assumes the circumstances of 2010 and 2024 are exactly the same which they are not. Get this through your heads: The most important thing in 2024 was stopping the constitutional reforms of a Labour government, not replacing the Tories especially when you don't have anything serious to replace them with (no Reform is serious with its bickering egomaniacs & ignorance of the British bill of rights). In 2010, stopping the conservatives would have had better effect in that Gordon Brown is more conservative than Corbyn or Starmer, and Labour was burnt out after 4 terms.
@@kil93 Lol... no these right-wing fools are responsible for that. Labour got less votes in 2024 than in 2019. The fragmentation of the right brought the leading opposition to Labour under the line resulting in a Labour landslide. This is why I don't let them complain about Labour. I laugh and say, "It's your fault fool."
Zero seats was comedy meme not an achievable proposition.
He's totally wrong about the Hamas Israel conflict. The Jews are given sympathy for only a matter of hours. The world would blame the Jews whether they responded or not.
Plato said the penalty of good men involved in politics was to be ruled by the worse… the problem is if the good people believe the chance they will succeed is less than 1% and the chance they will be pilloried is 99% it’s no shock they don’t get involved.
Great interview! Peter Hitchens may be generally right that the UK Conservative government didn’t seem to be following a coherent policy over the last 14 years, just reacting to things. On the slightly esoteric issue of measuring consumer price inflation though, they did show a steady policy path. They started from a consensus they inherited from the Blair-Brown government that the UK CPI would be the macroeconomic measure of consumer price inflation, eventually reformed to include an owner-occupied housing component based on a net acquisitions approach. The UK RPI would remain the household-oriented measure of consumer price inflation, subject to various reforms, e.g. the inclusion of a stamp duty component. It ruthlessly undermined that consensus, and seems to be heading towards imposing that duckbilled platypus of a consumer price measure, the CPIH, as the one index to rule them all, used everywhere, including as the target inflation indicator of the Bank of England. Here in Canada, we live in such a one-index world. Trust me, it isn’t a model to emulate and I really hope Keir Starmer’s government takes a fresh look at things and follows a different path.
The point on its impossible get anything done because the malformed public views on many things is very spot on.
22:00 Council tax increases are immediately transferred to tenants who are obliged to pay them by law. Nothing is more Working class than a tenant. I don’t know about landlords, but if you have to pay rent you have to work. Enough said for New Labour’s detachment from their working class roots.
Round and round we go. When we had the opportunity for zero Tory seats he scuppered it. Now he's back on the anti Tory train. It's looking like an academic exercise rather than concern for the country and Brits left within it.
In his defence, he was ahead of this curve. He was campaign for ‘zero seats’ in 2010. He wrote and book and made a documentary attacking David Cameron.
His stance in 2024 is simply that there are two options- Tory vs Labour. And he would prefer the Tories
@@michaelmccomb2594 You're right but it's not just Tories and Labour. Nature abhors a vacuum and the Tories can be replaced. So can Labour after they fail this term. The two party system is a block to change.
@@annette2653 he’s certainly not convinced of that. Both parties have been incredibly resilient these last 100 years.
@@michaelmccomb2594 The Tories have the lowest number of seats in their history. Never say never.
@@annette2653 Labour got their worse result since 1935 in 2019 and then got a huge majority in 2024.
Nope. The previous five Tory governments were Blair - Mark ll, lll, lV, V and VI.
Very true. Almost as if there's a "master" in the shadows pulling their puppet strings.
Far more credible guest, thanks ⭐
Peter doesn't see what everyone else sees, that the Tories let the whole country go to rack and ruin except for their mates who made a lot of money.
@douglasfielder
Maybe it’s you and everyone else who cannot see what Peter can see. He’s under no illusions about the way in which the Conservatives have “…let the whole country go to rack and ruin except for their mates who made a lot of money” He’s also under no illusions about how the Labour government are about to make things far worse.
No, he only wrote a book and umpteen excoriating articles about it🤡
Douglas Fielder doesn't see what everyone else sees, the labour party you replaced them with are letting violent criminals out of prison to make room for anyone who opposes them politically. Great Job 👍
The Pericles reference sums up Peter’s mantra - he refuses to play to the crowd: he may actually enjoy unpopularity.
Well he has failed at that so far.
I don't believe faith can be or should be 'private'. Why not be ready to give others an explanation for the hope that you have, or the grace you've received?
Do you believe faith should be private in the sense that religious beliefs should not be imposed on others?
@@Stafford674 Never imposed, but I see no reason why faith should not be freely expressed... It doesn't seem possible to me to 'impose' my faith on anyone else anyway. It would have to be freely received, or not at all...
@@gordonicus4637 I don't mean this unkindly, or snippily but if you really think that faith can't be imposed you have not read enough, or perhaps any, history. It is replete with examples of religious people imposing their values on others. From the Roman Emperor Theordosius banning all religions but Christianity, the Moslem conquests, the Inquisition, the Elizabethan Act of Settlement to Sunday Trading Laws in England to modern day Islamist terrorists forcing people to pretend to believe, or follow the rituals of belief. . They may not have been successfulin inculcating real faith, but they have imposed their values. Express your faith. Worship openly, bring your children up in your faith, proselytize persuade people that your religion is true; but don't force people to do things they don't want to do, or prevent them from doing things they do want to do.
Much appreciated 👏👏🙏
Peter Hitchens is Bagpuss!
I love him!
❤❤❤
What Hitchens fails to mention is that reform came second in many constituencies by a very small margin, meaning it would only take a small change to turn those 5 seats into 95.
Always good to hear Hitchens take on the dismal state of UK politics and whatever else. He has taken a lot of flak lately from young commentators (Lotus Eaters etc) re his position for defeating Labour in the recent election but he will be proved right.
Debt being an impossible task to fix that is a crisis is spot on. There is no public support for it.
Section 28 was a clear conservative policy introduced by Thatcher, in addition Trade Union Reform just to name two.
From 1960s or 1990s conservatives gone away from strong societal stance as in diluted family unit etc 🤦🏼♂️.
At the next election, Hitchens will probably say to vote Labour otherwise Reform will be even worse.
I suspect Hitchens would not promote Reform, even if he agrees with their policies as he considered Farage to be anti-intellectual and not a deep thinker, he could not bring himself to promote such a man...
Reform might be lucky to get there 6th MP !
@@FFS704 I said it kind of in jest - as we know that Hitchens is "the forever contrarian". I think actually, Hitchens main objection to Reform is its Thatcherite economy policy, and especially his love of "the railways" and the wish to see them renationalised.
Are you one of those "I don't change my mind just because the pesky facts change" lot?
@@ciarangallagher2729 No - I am not. I just see through Hitchens' act nowadays, the "forever contrarian" - it does help sell his book, keep his column going and very funny how he was complaining about not getting on to Question Time any more - and after the debates with Mike Graham on Talk TV, he now does.
Gday John love these high sounding conversations but I would like to see you have a wonderful conversation with a very low states person because we could all learn from you
In a Westminster style electoral system with more than 2 parties, it's quite common for the winning party to NOT have a plurality of the votes much less 50%+1. In Canada Justin Trudeau has won one majority, two minorities - and BOTH minority governments the Conservatives got more votes - SUBSTANTIALLY more than Trudeau. Essentially Trudeau won 90+% of the Toronto seats often in very close races while the Conservatives were winning huge majorities in Western Canada (which for various sketchy historical + constitutional reasons are 20-25 under-represented in terms of seats compared to what they would get by strict "rep by pop".
The ONLY unusual thing about Canada amongst "Westminster" countries is that that under-representation is in the constitution with an amending formula that ensures they will NEVER get the support of Quebec and the Maritime provinces to change things to something more equitable. The electoral balance in the Canadian Senate is even worse than the Commons where BC gets 6 seats, NS/NB/PEI/NL get 30 - with BC having more than double the population of all 4 combined.
Hitchens' position on Israel/Gaza is wrong. Israel would have received only superficial sympathy and the world *certainly* would never acknowledge that there's a religious component to the conflict. They've spent 75 years denying this. They aren't going to suddenly wake up and admit they were were lying the whole time.
Humans are tribalistic. And there we have two groups who believe in blood ane soil. There will never be peace.
The issue is the ideology of Jewish supremacism, enabled by the literal supremacy of Jewry in the United States: it's now their country, and it's run for them.
Peter has used his influence to preserve the two party system so he has no right to complain about it.
Outstanding
I admire all you who listened and commented because I can't. I didn't finish it because i could only catch every second word, i shall not listen to an interview with Peter Hitchens again unless he learns to open his mouth when speaking.
It really is disrespectful to to his listeners to mumble the way he does.
I have so enjoyed all John's other interviews but this has left me very grumpy ☹
Hearing aids have come a long way in the last 15 years
Isn't it odd that so many others *did* get to the end (likewise with the complaints of whistling, inaudible to me and others I have checked with). Have some of you not updated your hearing-aids lately? Could the problem be yours, like the way number plates on modern cars are blurrier than they should be?
If you press the CC button at the bottom right corner it brings up subtitles
Victor David Hansen, a US history professor, has made similar claims comparing the far left to Jacobins and the French revolution.
Disturbing on so many levels.
Philosophy major and Latin / classics studies at a state university in the late 1990s in the US.
Shaking my head. Destruction on both sides of the pond
Have not finish watching this, but I wonder if they ever mention the World Economic Forum?
Hello Peter.
Peter Hitchens: I disagree.
I think he’s brother, Christopher, was introduced to a show as a contrarian, and responded, ‘I am not a contrarian’.
Brilliant! Made me laugh out loud 😂😂
People who make these comments always show their incapacity for reasoned thought. What utter bilge. Maybe try listening a bit harder 😎
@@michaelmccomb2594 Indeed. They were both like this --- but of course only Peter gets flac for it. Everyone worshiped Christopher even when he was proved wrong (which was actually quite often). I love both and view them as actually temperamentally very similar. But.... the 'left' can only 'pick one side' as it were. Especially if it's the wrong one for 'the right reasons'.
@@joeobyrne9348 It's called a joke, mate
The thing is is that Labour now needs to be more Labour that the 'Conservatives' were. Moving that goalpost yet further away from normalcy & balance. And because that other post has never moved its appearance of being further away than ever leads to yet more demonisation.
Is hitchens a conservative or a socialist? I genuinely cannot tell
He used to literally be a Trotskyist. Look it up.
He says he’s a Gaullist. Look it up.
He’s a conservative social democrat
He's neither he's a free thinker.
A triplethinking Blue Bolshevik ideologue!
Peter is an intelligent man. But right now, all I see is Denethor telling the defenders of the city to abandon hope and flee for their lives. Endlessly complains, offers no solutions and when people do try to make things better he moans at them for not doing it the right way.
You should watch some different movies. WE aren't living in a pre-mediaeval world of horse-mounted soldiers and catapults.
@@peterhitchens4240 You should learn about analogies and metaphors.
This man is overrated.
Join us at Patriotic Alternative 🏴🇬🇧
I really want to see a Peter Hitchens on the rest is politics.
Interesting PW point about PMThatcher, the city became a bit more international perhaps but largely usa ( and euro) owned and administered
Peter bottled it in the end.
Overall a great conversation.
no british politition honestly believes we have a special relationship with the u.s it's a useful thing for them to say on specific occasions, and peter knows this as well as anyone .he's saying this in a fit of pique because his country is straying from his beliefs , correctly in my view as his views are mainly out of date . strangely the places he's not out of date are parts of britains foregn policy.
Another Great One John. Post Modernism rages on with low/no voters for elections. Pete's intellectual mumbling requires my closed captioning.
I dont think the alternate vote plus (AV+) system is merely "fashionable", Mr. Hitchens.
Keep the Nuclear deterrent, scrap overseas aid and halve the public sector, use that cash to tidy up the crumbling towns and then encourage private enterprise to maintain them, there is way too much state involved in the UK
And the Conservatives became New Labour largely because of David Cameron - he did immense harm
Peter should have backed reform instead of bottling it
what book is hitchens referring to regarding marxism - arthur what? what's the title?
Arthur Koestler. 'Darkness at Noon'
we know the importance of stable homes to children but we can't force people to stay in failing relationships the way societal pressure used to.
They did not say to put societal pressure on people, but that government should do more to facilitate families rather than attempt to replace the father.
@@grannyannie2948 reread my comment and tell me where I say they even mentioned societal pressure. What they suggest is male female relationships should be favoured in some way and that is just one of those ways I ment when I said hitchens views are outdated .
@@andrewmcewan8081 Apologies you did not attribute it to Peter or John. As for families being out dated all the statistics show that a traditional family has the best outcome for children. And I know zillions of Australian parents in their 30s who would like governments to provide more support.
@@andrewmcewan8081 I tried to reply, I've been having problems all morning
The possible truth is that Netanyhu only cares about not ending up in jail within Israel, not about the country existing in the near future. (He is like Zelunskyj in this regard, all the soldiers and people can be severely mutilated or killed for their wealth & power). Netanyahu's son is in the US, probably a dual citizen, and is not fighting with other Israelis, in the military.
He should be hubg, drawn & quatered for how he has manipulated his country and his people for about 25:years for the benefit of Netanyhu and his family.
Peter is the man😅😊
England is in fact moving to the right.... it's just that, in no small part due to the utter dereliction of duty of the "Conservative" party, we have accidentally found ourselves ruled by a far let government.
I think he missed one Blair government: Cameron's Conservatives in 2010. are second Blair government. This is the third.
Yet only last week, he told everyone to vote Tory to so labour.
Actually he said to vote against Labour, if that meant voting Tory despite the fact they don't deserve the vote or voting Reform despite the fact they won't win, then do it so long as you DONT VOTE LABOUR and make sure they don't get a majority, pity more people didn't take his advice.
Savagely strong lighting setup lol
You should have backed Reform, Peter!
Hitchens does not understand serious insecurity living in safe London and Washington DC. He certainly does not understand International politics , (Iran wanting regional hegemony sponsoring Hamas) though he does understand domestic left versus right economic politics(now becoming less important). Read the classics. Middle East balance of power is partly identity and democrats, versus barbarian despots. and partly it is in US/UK , Europes interests to prevent Iran's want to be regional hegemon.
Blair started the decline and all the governments since then have really only been other versions of New Labour. I always enjoy listening to John Anderson's interviews. Peter Hitchens is often interesting. In the UK election the turnout was around 60% of the 48 million electorate. Of those, Labour's vote share was 33.7%, less than Corbyn received in 2017 against May. So only 2 in 10 people voted Labour and half of those only did so to get the useless Conservatives out. Many people never received their postal ballots. It is going to be a rough ride over the next few years. Peter Hitchens is wrong to be rather dismissive towards Jordan Peterson, who is a force for good in the world, someone who looks for solutions. The two 12 Rules For Life books are outstanding.
Great interview
Quite a contrast to his late brother.
That's odd and well-spottd . Most brothers are identical to each other, aren't they?
I understand that he is very disappointed by how the new right shived the tories given that keer starmer has got free reign now. But I believe that was a necessary step. the tories are either indifferent to the suffering of britain, too incompetent to do anything about it, in line with the blairites of the labour party or too cowardly to stand up to the voices in the tory party that have caused the rise of this blairite dogmatism to begin with. In my opinion the labour crazies could've been stopped dead in their tracks by the tories showing even a modicum of backbone. they have failed to develop a backbone for almost 30 years now. what do you do with incompetent employees? you fire them and replace them with new ones.
Don’t mention drugs, John!
The tories are new labour, also vote for them over new labour, to save Britain from new labour. 🙄
Please stop interrupting everyone you speak to Peter.
I do not believe I have started doing so.
Democracy is about having the right to vote 🗳️ insofar is the fact of the voter turnout utterly irrelevant 🎉
Did I just witness Peter Hitchens lament the fact that trade unions are no more,crikey!
Interviewer: Hey Peter is there any tie or place or person in relation to politics, economics or any field of human endeavour which was to your satisfaction?
Hitchens: Of course not. There's never been anybody who understands anything except me. Everything was always as bad as it's ever been at every moment in history and it can only ever get worse and only I understand why. There's no hope for any situation because every decision that's ever been made by anyone who wasn't me is always wrong and I've always predicted the right thing to do and am correct about everything in hindsight. Every problem is always unfixable 5 minutes after everyone ignores my opinion on it.
Peter Hitchens is the perennial "Voice in the wilderness." Sadly, he can't tolerate actually being popular.
Stage one.
Shout "Destroy the Tories" for a decade.
Stage two.
Actually gain popularity.
Stage three.
Change your mind Instantly and start shitting on all the people you've actually convinced.
The Conservatives became new Labour. But what was "new" Labour? It was Labour that basically accepted and embraced Thatcherism except with higher immigration, maybe. So it's all very circular.
Liz Truss was what the conservative party members wanted. It failed because the Bank of England chose not to support the bond market. Hurrah you might say but do you want technocrats or democrats in control? What happens when the markets don't like Labour party policies?
I like Peter but I think he concentrates too much on the details of the problems of the past to be useful for the future. In my view the brightest future looks very little like the past. It's direct democracy with decentralised technologies replacing trusted institutions.
All that money on private education these days is only just overing century of in breading
Peter has an annoying habit of ending his sentence, waits for a time to pass when the interviewer thinks he has completed what he wanted to say and then starts again, cutting off the other person in mid flow. He has a lot of interesting and useful knowledge things to pass on but seems to be a total nightmare to interview.
If your mind cannot fashion a better voting system to determine what is the national will then it's time to stop thinking about it. Hint: Vision Representation. YT deletes any comment that refers to my website on that issue.
New Labour was the conservative party
Dutton needs to commit to responsible conservative economics.
I like Peter Hitchens and respect his intellect, but his negativity towards anyone who attempts to do SOMETHING is stunning
I have no such negativity. I just decline to pakce hopes in futile causes and dubious movements
Why would you look for the special relationship between the UK and US in Washington DC?
Perhaps he looked in the wrong location.
Maybe he should have went to Church.
Because I watched the USA humiliate and bully my country over the Irish issue.
Controlled Opposition , pile on hate Against the tories to seem Dissident...but then back them , when it really counts
20:34
24:23
If course there is a necessity for Christianity. No other religion has raised the morality & ethics of people like Christianity.
The others basically tear down the mieality &:ethics!
every tory has this arguement about the bbc and none of them can actually point out anywhere the bbc have shown bias as an organisation . they keep putting there own people in positions of power within the bbc yet they still complain at the result .at the start of this peter complained about advertising in politics yet doesn't mention the fact thatcher is responsable in large part for it .
The BBC is very much biased towards progressives on social issues. As their absolute embrace of the diversity agenda shows.
5 seats but 96 second places in Labour held seats and they are definitely going to lose a few next time around l. So not just 5 seats really it's a party on the up.
What an insult to New Labour😮
Can't forgive him for saying to vote Tory after the Tories became Labour, in order to prevent Labour winning 🤡
Certainly Peter Hitchens has a lot to offer however his view on Israel response to October 7 is idealistic even naive.
PH is so wrong re Israel... Otherwise, a great conversation. Thank you, JA.
wrong in which way?
Experience and knowledge of the British millenial political class, like the special relationship with the USA I find it difficult to see or beleive it.
Israel's only error so far is to not have a program to deport every single palestinian from gaza and the west bank to Somalia or some other weak failed African state, while drawing upon Jewish history to give a name to each phase of the operation.
When you let champagne socialist in charge of the conservatives
His talk at the end about the US and Christianity is not true at all in many places. Did he ever leave Washington DC? It appears not.
He should do what he did that changed his mind about his revolutionary position of his youth. Speak with ordinary Americans away from the big money and academia. He would changed is mind again.
When I lived in the USA between 1993 and 1995 I travelled to most parts of the country and did indeed 'speak with ordinary Americans'. I was seldom in DC and had nothing to do with big money or acadmeia when I was there, living as I did in a fairly modest Maryland suburb with an interesting mix of neighbours who qelcomed me and my family into their homes. I don't quite know how you explain my late brother's unquestionable popularity among the college generation of the early 21st century, if my theory is wrong.
@@peterhitchens4240 I grew up in the 80's and 90's. Pretty much everyone I met were Christian unless they recently immigrated here and those were of different religions but still theist as far as I am aware. I am a fair bit younger than you in my mid 40's now.
I live in northern Illinois and Wisconsin. I am a very active Catholic who previously went through many different protestant churches before coming home to the Church. I can tell you in the Midwest Christianity is very strong. I hardly know any atheists at all. I have never read your brothers writing and its highly unlikely anyone I know did excluding some who went to college and had to read into the subject or people deeper into their faith. Perhaps, other area this isn't the case, but the Midwest is still strongly Christian though some or more than some may be practical atheists especially in the more left leaning side.
There is a small group called Catholic Unscripted who in the last few years visited the US from the UK. They attest to how much stronger Christianity is in the US compared to in Europe. The have a YT channel and website you can check out.
The few atheist friends I do have do not read anything at all outside sports, entertainment, and/or work-related topics. The few things they have to say are something like science says and when pressed they really know very little on the topic at all. They seem to think science proves things. They are unaware that proofs are in logic and math but not science. Most of the people I know in hard sciences have views closer to the most recent Uncommon Knowledge video. While most atheists I know are unread even if they went to college, which they did so just for careers not to learn.
It is nice chatting with you, and I appreciate you. Maranatha
Voters need to know who is boss
Why does your channel censor comments that show people the truth . Do you have a moral conscience John ?
Lol, RUclips automatically removes/hides/disappears a lot of comments for seemingly no reason. It's not "John without his moral conscience" with his finger on the button.
Its not the channel.It's youtube and it's highly annoying, Comments get randomly deleted all the time
@@RichardPhillips1066 i cant even see my reply from several hours ago saying pretty much the same thing, RIP
I usually find interviews with Peter Hitchens entertaining. They are like a Monty Python sketch on Sanctimony.I don't disagree with everything but yes it's generally expressed in very sanctimonious terms.
Would you like the five minute argument , or the ten minute one .