The trio open up to Radio Times about what sets their political podcast apart from the crowd. <\/p>
If it seems like we can\u2019t move for political podcasts these days, Tory peer Ruth Davidson, Labour MP Jess Phillips and Sky News Political Editor Beth Rigby believe their offering Electoral Dysfunction nonetheless brings something brand new.<\/p>\n
They tell Radio Times<\/strong> about navigating the party lines and why them all being chums is good for the electorate\u2026<\/p>\n Aside from being an all-female line-up, how do you hope to stand out in a pretty crowded political podcast market?<\/strong><\/p>\n JESS PHILLIPS:<\/strong> I think of all the podcasters I am the only one who is actually an elected politician, still, [with] the ability to actually be like, \u201cThat was nothing like that, I was in the room and it was very boring\u2026 I was playing Candy Crush on my phone and you\u2019ve made it out to be the Night of Long Knives!\u201d Or to get the genuine sense of exactly how people are feeling. This week it would be politicians going to Reform, or the racism row that seems to be breaking out; it\u2019s all well and good looking at it from one perspective, but being there and seeing the people who are involved I think makes a massive difference.<\/p>\n RUTH DAVIDSON:<\/strong> A lot of the podcasts out there feel very Westminster-centric, and Jess and I try very much to be of the place we\u2019re from. If you cut Jess in half, it would say Birmingham like rock. I\u2019m very much of Scotland, so it\u2019s not just that our accents are from outside the Westminster bubble, our experiences are and we go to London to do a job. We have lives outside of what we do and I think that gives us perspective.<\/p>\n JP:<\/strong> The bit of politics that is actually about the people, not Westminster, I think is often missing. No one in the country is chuffed by the National Insurance cut, they haven\u2019t noticed and they don\u2019t care. [Our podcast] is a link to the actual people.<\/p>\n So being an all-women lineup is immaterial?<\/strong><\/p>\n RD:<\/strong> It just happens that we\u2019re women. Neither Jess nor I in our political lives have traded on the fact that we\u2019re women, we\u2019ve just done our jobs to the best of our abilities in a way that we are our authentic selves, and it turns out that sometimes our authentic selves are a bit more authentic than some people were expecting!<\/p>\n Jess, you\u2019re a serving Labour MP, and Ruth, you\u2019re a Tory peer in the House of Lords. How truthful can you be with your audience if you need to be seen toeing the party line? <\/strong><\/p>\n JP:<\/strong> Listeners will hear straight through lines being parroted out. At the moment, you\u2019ve got to feel for ministers and shadow ministers going out and saying a line in the morning, and by the end of the day it\u2019s no longer the line, as if viewers can\u2019t tell what is happening. But if you\u2019re honest and you say, \u201cI\u2019m not going to parrot the party line but I will defend it because\u2026\u201d name it for what it is, and people will tolerate it. But you also have to show the listener that you are willing to critique your own side, and both Ruth and I have.<\/p>\n RD:<\/strong> I have been criticised in my own party for being over-critical of Boris Johnson and despairing of Liz Truss. Actually with Rishi [Sunak], I have a huge amount of sympathy for the job he\u2019s trying to do; he\u2019s a serious man who works hard and is trying his best. But that doesn\u2019t mean that I can\u2019t say how\u2026 the man has a tin touch for politics. The politics of politics, like that is not his forte!<\/p>\n JP:<\/strong> We play the ball, not the man, so I will sit and say, \u201cWhat the bloody hell\u2026?\u201d about Rwanda or whatever it is in the news that week. I\u2019m obviously going to criticise the Tory Party, but we\u2019re not nasty about it, because actually people don\u2019t like the nastiness.<\/p>\n What is your role, Beth? As a political editor for a national broadcaster, do you have to make sure you are more neutral?<\/strong><\/p>\n BETH RIGBY:<\/strong> I\u2019m not going to be giving my own personal political opinions, but I do get to be a bit more myself [than on TV]. I can show a bit more of my personality, I can have fun, because they\u2019re fun to be with.<\/p>\n When you\u2019ve been doing political journalism for as long as I have, it\u2019s trained into you to try to see all sides of a story of an argument. I\u2019m more interested in what Jess and Ruth think. I don\u2019t think what I think in that moment is relevant. I\u2019m not the practitioner, I\u2019m the conduit.<\/p>\n There were issues around Trump last week where, you know, I had to make sure that if something is said I give the counterpoint. They\u2019re like Arsenal strikers and I\u2019m like the umpire\u2026<\/p>\n RD:<\/strong> Beth, you\u2019re just betraying women who like football there because they\u2019re not umpires in football, they\u2019re referees!<\/p>\n JP:<\/strong> Because she is the political editor of Sky, it\u2019s more difficult for her than it is for me, whereas every other interaction I\u2019ve had with Beth Rigby, it was definitely more difficult for me than it was for her.<\/p>\n