Who Really Owns Britain? w/Hettie O’Brien. Plus: We Read Tony Blair So You Don’t Have To
5/28/20261 hr 7 min
This week, Nish and Coco head back to Makerfield, where the by-election campaign is already turning into a political demolition derby; Andy Burnham is just ahead of Reform, the far right is fighting itself, Elon Musk has wandered into the discourse, and Nigel Farage has reappeared after questions over his £5 million gift.
Plus: they’re joined by Hettie O’Brien, journalist and author of The Asset Class, to break down how private equity quietly bought up the services we rely on, from nurseries and care homes to vets and water companies, and why that matters for the broken economy we’re all living in.
GUESTS
Hettie O'Brien, journalist and author of The Asset Class: How Private Equity Turned Capitalism Against Itself
USEFUL LINKS
Amnesty Report | Like a snowball: the growth and impact of the gender critical movement in the UK
Tony Blair Article | The Labour Party Is Playing With Fire Over Its Future and the Future of the Country by
CLIP CREDITS
Carol Vorderman via Instagram, (@carolvorders)
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Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsTJ Watt0:00
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Speaker 3· Soundbite0:24
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Nish Kumar· Host0:40
[upbeat music] Hi, this is Pod Save the UK. I'm Mishal Husain.
Coco Khan· Host0:46
And I'm Coco Card.
Nish Kumar· Host0:48
We are three weeks out from a monumental by-election in Makerfield, and campaigning is in full swing. In two weeks, so far, we've witnessed candidate withdrawals, an Elon Musk cameo, and enough Brexit chat to take you all the way back to 2016. We'll be discussing it on today's show. Plus, we speak to author Hetty O'Brien about her groundbreaking expose of the private equity industry and how it's contributed to our broken economy. We're three weeks out from the most consequential by-election in recent memory. Polling day in Makerfield is set for Thursday the 18th of June. The candidates have been announced, and there has been no shortage of headlines.
Coco Khan· Host1:21
That's right. So in just two weeks, a Green Party candidate was announced and then withdrew on the same day. Reform's Robert Kenyon has