The Sunday Showdown: Camilla Tominey and Bridget Phillipson go head-to-head

the telegraph what happens when you get a right-wing journalist like me at the telegraph interviewing bridget phillipson chair of the labour party well we're going to go head-to-head on vat on private schools whether she actually is a vindictive class warrior and bridget whether i've ever kissed a tory that must have been difficult when with the fall of kirsten you then lose that job you know it was disappointing but that's politics and why were you happy to be called a spiteful class warrior i don't believe nigel farage could care less about any of this you will only ever hear no i don't believe he cares do you still think trans women are women uh i believe that i'm a woman defined my bible defined by my biology bridget phillipson lovely to see you and thank you for your time today because i'm going to be talking to you in a minute and i'm going to be talking to you in a minute and i'm going to be talking to you in a minute and i'm going to be talking to you in a minute because i know you're really busy so let me ask you something born in gateshead in 1983 brought up on a washington council estate you end up being educated at a catholic school you get all the way to oxford studying modern history at hartford college you then run a women's refuge for a while and become a labor mp at 26 the crucial question is this have you ever kissed a tory never in the habit of uh asking people their political views before uh getting to know them better shall we say so we can't rule it out you can't rule it out the world is full of all kinds of people and tell me when you um ended up at oxford how did you feel with the background you had i'm not sure there'd be many people that had that journey to hartford college did you feel at home there was it difficult to adjust were you like a fish out of water just explain what your educational situation was like at that point i mean i was in college at the time so i was incredibly fortunate the school that i went to had encouraged lots of us to apply to oxford and cambridge and it was a brilliant school and i owe them so much my family really valued education really prized education when i went to oxford in 2002 the numbers of state school students was improving was increasing although it's much much better now even than it was today um i said the big the big shift wasn't just going to oxford it was living in the south of england which someone like me was quite a big did you have a nosebleed did you have a nosebleed you crossed over the midlands you couldn't cope like me going north to your neck of the woods no but was it all right being in northern southern there weren't there weren't many of us uh but i i loved my time there it wasn't it wasn't 100 positive no experience ever is but it was an incredible place to study i was so lucky to have to be taught by such amazing people to have access to such a wonderful education and everything that's always motivated me is how we can make more children have experiences that aren't determined by their background because whilst i feel very fortunate it's still the reality now that lots of kids from ordinary backgrounds don't achieve all that they're capable of because where you're from your family background the town that you're born into i i believe still determines too much about your life chances and you know my experience there was i always felt i had just as much right to be there as anybody else i'd worked hard i've got the a levels i needed to be there and i wanted to make the best of it but you know there were people from better off backgrounds i didn't begrudge them that i want yes people not to have to struggle well we'll come on to that in a minute because you have been accused of being a spiteful class warrior but before we get on to that question what role did your mum play in all this because you seem to be saying that that your journey to um oxford was predicated on this very strong catholic education but brought up by a single mother what was she like was she encouraging you to to reach for the stars yeah my mom is an amazing woman really formidable and was always really active in politics and in campaigning so set up a women's charity with some friends in the late 70s early 80s and did amazing really pioneering work championing women's rights and education was just so important to her and to the whole family my grandparents too they'd come over from ireland my granddad um right from when i was very very little would always give me books teach me times tables you know he was someone who had been in education to the age of 18 he his family had moved to scotland and were it not for the war probably would have gone to university himself but his life was totally changed when the second world war broke out and therefore the value that he placed not just on formal education but also the importance of that and learning within the family home and i think as a you know parties of the left progressive parties like labor we don't talk enough about the importance of family i believe you know there is of course we need to have brilliant schools to support children but the people that first teach their children are their parents and and family now when i talk about family i don't mean that in a judgmental sense because i come from a single parent family and i think families that give love are the families that matter the most and come in all different shapes and sizes but supporting families has always been a key part of what i've believed in and it's the role of government to give families more freedoms and make life easier that families shouldn't have to struggle life shouldn't be shouldn't be tough but if you're on the left and you're on the right you can start talking about for instance fatherlessness which might be something people on the right talk about more and there have been successive studies the center for social justice has done a lot of work on this when it comes to working class boys both white and black falling behind and they have identified fatherlessness as a factor but then you grew up without your father around so how do you tackle that issue because i had a really loving wider family so i had my granddad and he was just the most amazing man um but i didn't have a father my dad walked out when my man was pregnant i never met him he had no part in my life that's just how life goes but i don't i don't yearn for what could have been i value what i had and what i had was a wonderful loving family and i feel really fortunate and that to me demonstrates that it is the love that families can give and the time that they can give that matters the most when you got the education brief because you were shadow education and then you went on become to become education secretary and that seemed to me to be a role that you absolutely kind of like got into politics to do that must have been difficult when with the fall of keir starmer you then lose that job and specifically sorry not to rub salt into the wounds but you lose it to lucy powell who's also got the deputy leadership of the labour party you're given the chair role and that's a really important role but you must have been pretty gutted to have lost your job yeah i was i'd be lying if i tried to pretend otherwise i'd worked on education since shadow education secretary in 2021 so i'd given it a lot of time and energy and thought and of course you know it was disappointing but that's politics and you know andy burnham has the right to build the team around him that he thinks you know is in the best place to drive forward on his agenda i'm still obviously a part of the cabinet and i'm really proud to be the first ever standalone minister for women and equalities and i wish and i wish lucy every success because i genuinely want um education to continue to improve under this government and lucy has my absolute full support is it true to say that you and andy burnham might not have seen eye to eye on education as far as kind of the more command and control from government structure that you advocate which is less autonomy to academies and free schools he in manchester was trying to do this thing of kind of t levels and getting kids straight from manchester schools into local businesses that was somewhat juxtaposed to your approach if i've interpreted your approach correctly which is that the government should be setting the rules and the schools should be following them so i've spoken to andy about this a lot and i did in my time as education secretary because i think the work he did around making sure that you had work really good work placements for young people t level students but also expanding work placement opportunities for young people was absolutely fantastic alongside making it easier for young people to travel so with cheaper and reduced travel for young people going into education i think the balance that you need to strike in any education system is how you allow for innovation and allow for schools and colleges to deliver really new ways of doing things and drive up standards in the process whilst you also ensure that you don't end up with a postcode lottery depending on where you happen to be in the country and you know i think if you look at the history of education in terms of educational policy over the last 30 or so years it's not just been labor governments that have believed in high standards everywhere so when i was at school i saw the impact that kenneth baker's policies and the transformation that he brought made to my life so i remember i was the first year of at primary school to to do sats the first year i think they were boycotted so the very first year of all of all of the primary school children sitting sats it was because that was coming that my school having not done it before started doing spelling tests and times tables sure and for working class kids that you can't you can't get away from not not having those basics so i've always believed that there is a strong role for government in setting the direction and ensuring that all children have we have high expectations and high standards for all children it was kenneth baker who also brought in the national curriculum but yes there will be the need to adapt to recognize the kind of the strengths and the challenges that local communities face alongside that so if you don't mind me saying you sound quite govian in your approach you sound like you're back to basics let's get the three r's sort it let's make sure that they learn you know phonics that they can read by the time they're leaving year six into year seven that they've got good maths They've got their times table. And yet he became a bête noire of the left. And actually, he's been vindicated with these PISA results because England adopting his reforms and Wales and Scotland opting not to. I mean, we can see the disparity in the attainment of young people in England compared to Scotland and Wales very, very clearly. So there's two things I'd say. Firstly, I believe in high standards in our schools and I believe it's working class kids that need it the most. So if you leave school without a good level of English and a good level of maths, you will find opportunities closed down to you. So that matters most to the kids who haven't got a granddad like I had doing times tables at home. So it's absolutely critical. I think alongside that, you know, to take phonics as an example, phonics is a great example of where education policy shifted and where there was consensus. So the last Labour government under Ed Balls started the process of rolling out phonics. It continued under the Conservatives and it has led to really strong results. What I would say, however, around both PISA and our school system overall, is that we could be even better if we close that disadvantage gap. And I think Michael Gove himself has acknowledged that it was a mistake to hollow out Sure Start because if we invest in children and their families when they're young, that makes an enormous difference. If we don't, we see children arriving at school not ready to learn. That disadvantage gap already open and then it widens through the school system. There is a limit to what you can do. There is a limit to what you can achieve through schools alone. And I think Michael Gove himself acknowledges that had they continued to pursue policies that really backed young children, then that would have made a material difference to outcomes in schools. But what I could never understand from your period as Education Secretary was your enormous beef with Catherine Burblesing. Now, I appreciate that Catherine does like to voice an opinion. But here you have a headteacher that is running a school that's got the highest progress eight school for the last three years running. And she is teaching. And she is teaching disadvantaged children. It's not as if you can look at a private school exemplar in some leafy Hertfordshire town and say, well, we know why the results are so good. She's taking children that don't have much opportunity at all, massively improving them and sending a lot of them off to Oxbridge where you studied. Why didn't you at the time think that that was an exemplar for you? You know, she has complained that some of the measures you brought in removed her autonomy, removed her ability to set her own standards, set her own discipline codes, set her own uniform requirements. And that's actually set the school back. I have the utmost respect for our school leaders and I have the utmost respect for Catherine Burblesing as well, because I think being a headteacher, being a school leader is a really tough job and they deserve our backing. I think the changes that we've made around school uniform policy, for example, I just didn't understand the level of outrage about it, because what you will see is schools often insisting that parents have to buy lots and lots of very expensive branded items that just aren't necessary. You can have kids looking smart. You can have kids looking smart without, you know, costing parents the earth. I don't see why you should have to have branded pencil cases or water bottles or, you know, coats or bags. You know, my school had high standards, quite strict uniform policy for the area at the time, but it was just a standard kind of blazer, a standard kind of tie. But it's about more than that, because you've criticised schools like hers for not wanting to follow the national curriculum, for wanting to recruit people that might not on paper have the conventional route into teaching. The point is, I feel there's a contradiction at the heart of your argument, because schools like hers and academies and free schools, they are autonomous. They want to do things in their own way, away from government. And you, because you're on the left, don't really like that, because you think the government should have more state control. It's also for that reason that you think that breakfast clubs should be started and that teachers should be potentially brushing children's teeth. The right will say, well, what happened to parental responsibility for those jobs? On what children are taught? Yes. I think we've drifted, I find it odd that we've drifted quite a long way away from what, as I said earlier, was a conservative innovation. That you have the national curriculum as a baseline for what all children should, what we should expect all children should be taught in school. Schools can go beyond that. They can innovate. They should. You know, but the national curriculum ensures that whoever you are and wherever you are, you have a good standard of education. And breakfast clubs. Look, I think that breakfast clubs matter to parents for two reasons. One, it means you can get to work, and that does matter to parents. But two, it means your children get a soft start to the day. It's not about the breakfast. It's about the club. And I think what hasn't been so well understood about breakfast clubs is that it is, in effect, an extension of the school day. It's not mandatory. But for those children who need a bit of extra time, need a bit of extra care, including children with special educational needs, it's an absolute godsend for parents. And I find the way in which the Tories often laughed when. We would talk about breakfast clubs. I just think it shows a detachment from the lives of parents who, you know, 30 minutes at the start of the day. Sure. If that allows you to then get to your shift at work, it allows you, if you're self-employed, to get to your next job. That's just making life easier for families. It's not obligatory. You don't have to take it. No, I know. But you were also trying to scoop up the children of parents who didn't give them breakfast and wouldn't brush their teeth. And that's saying something quite different. That's saying that there's some kind of societal breakdown. Because even though you. You were brought up on a shoestring by a single mother without any fatherly support. I would put a tenner on the table now and say there wasn't one morning that Bridget Phillipson went into school without having had breakfast. Which is why it's about. For me, it was genuinely, genuinely always about the club. Yes, there will be a small number of children whose families, for a range of reasons, will be really struggling. And I wish that. You know, I don't want children to be going to school hungry. But for me, it was always about the club. And actually, to go to the academic evidence around this. One of what allowed us to start the process of rolling out breakfast clubs was the evidence that. The research that had been done that showed that children made stronger academic progress. Their attendance improved and their behaviour improved. That's not just good for those children. It's good for the whole class. If a teacher's got, you know, more children arriving who are ready to come in, get going, sit down and start learning. That avoids the disruption. It means the teacher can get on with. Sure. So actually, it's not about asking teachers to do more. It's about freeing up teachers to do the things that they have trained for. Teaching. Not having to spend so much time. Supporting children who, when they arrive at school, haven't, you know, haven't been supported to learn how to use the toilet independently or can't put on their coat. Which, again, we've seen lots and lots of challenges, especially post-pandemic, around school readiness. So. And that's where I think government does have to come in. Let's grasp the nettle. You and I have rowed about this before. VAT on private school fees. Now, I know you and I are going to debate about the numbers. I think we can probably come to a fairly safe conclusion. This isn't overinflated or underestimated. That it's caused around 40,000 private school pupils to go into state schools. Now, notwithstanding whether the state schools were oversubscribed or undersubscribed, or the fact that sometimes, in any given year, private schools close, do you accept that you have upset the education of those children because, consequentially, their parents haven't afforded the fees, they've had to be moved away from the schools they loved, away from the classmates they loved, and away from the teachers they loved? And how can that possibly be branded a successful policy? God, we've had this ding-dong so many times. Right. So, the facts here. We haven't seen this mass exodus that people were predicting. We have seen 40. Do you agree with 40,000? No, that was a projection of the number of children who, not just around those that would leave, but also around those. That's not a projection. who would not take up a place in the first place, is my recollection. This is official data suggesting that more than 40,000 private school pupils have moved into the state sector since the VAT was introduced. Official data from? Not ISC. This is a calculation that's been put together. 43,126 pupils, according to our own analysis, which is based on D of E figures. Yeah, there's a lot of numbers that the private schools lobby push about. But, okay, even if it were only 10,000? The numbers have been stable. And alongside that, it has allowed us to raise a lot of money that we're investing in state education. Well, hang on a minute. You promised that this would deliver 6,500 teachers. It hasn't. We made a commitment to make sure that we've got teachers where we need them most. And that means in secondary and it means in post-16, where the numbers have increased by more than 2,000. But they haven't got to 6,500, which was the promise. No, we're on course to. When I left the Department for Education, we were on course. We were on course to meet that target. What about my point about displacing pupils? And there was something that some people felt was particularly vindictive about the policy being introduced in January and not in September. So you have kids in school for a term, and then their parents go, oh, no, we can't actually make this work. I think it was designed to tackle people at Eton and other public schools where, you know, a thousand pounds here or there doesn't affect the parents. You were rightly criticized, I think, by middle-earning parents. How much more do you want to squeeze us? And by the way, the parents of SEND pupils who didn't have any state options and so sent their kids to SEND. So children with SEND, where their places came from education, health care plans, were not affected by this. That didn't affect those children. Hang on a minute. Some were because they didn't have the EHCP. And if a parent has chosen to educate their child in the private sector, that is absolutely their right. So I believe the parents have that choice. However, I don't believe that we're talking about middle-earning parents here. I mean, you have to. have quite a lot of money to send your children to private school these days because the costs have gone way, way up. over the years and I respect parents choices I respect the right for parents to choose private education but we had said you know to the point about what how it was introduced we'd said I think we announced our policy in 2021 2022 you know it was quite clear by 2024 that a label that we were on course to win the next general election so I think we had given fair indication as to the policy I do believe it was the right policy to bring in and it has allowed us to raise money to invest in state education I also look if I'm honest I'm happy to go around this but I find it we have you know obviously talked quite a lot about state education which I appreciate but the obsession that people have with what is effectively a minority interest when 93 percent of kids in our country go to state schools the amount of time and energy and bandwidth that gets dedicated I know but it's quite a small section of pretty well off it does help I do find quite extraordinary it does help out state schools doesn't it because if people privately educated then they're not in the state system and I've had this debate with you because I had two children in private and one in state so I could see it from both perspectives and in my part of leafy Hertfordshire we did see an exodus from the private schools into the state schools which then put pressure on the state schools my point was always when you were education secretary how can it ever be a good policy to move children from the schools they love to schools they perhaps don't and second of all to witness school closures we've got more private schools now than we had previously the numbers have actually increased we have more private schools I'd always say the other thing about this middle earners don't send their children to private school that's not right I mean the average fees nigh on twenty thousand pounds a year I mean who's got that kind of money well in Sunderland well Diane Abbott she had that money she privately educated her son which is her right which is her right I would look I would defend any parents right to do what they believe to be right for their child but I will also defend the 93 percent of kids in state schools who need money invested in their education so you sure that this is a good thing because I'm not sure state schools are necessarily reaping the rewards of VAT on private fees I'm not sure they're seeing it I know I've had a chat with the state school headmaster about staffing there's a constant need to find more stem teachers particularly you're saying you're going to meet that 6500 target but you haven't yet is it really worth it was it really worth kind of terrorizing that sector we said we were going to do this and we did it and I think it I absolutely believe it was the right choice to make and we've invested a lot of money in state education through budgets through spending reviews the extra money that I announced in July now on another two billion pounds thanks to Rachel Reeves's support to fund to put extra funding into supporting our teachers and we have invested a huge amount in education we have prioritized education but are there challenges absolutely we're picking up the pieces of you know years and years where where the amount of money going into state schools did decline significantly and why were you happy to be called a spiteful class warrior uh because if being a spiteful class warrior means you have a focus on tackling disadvantage and lifting children out of poverty which I do then I will wear that badge with pride let's move on to some of your um announcements this week on misogyny um you think misogyny is a big problem in the workplace right now in 2026 I think it's a big problem everywhere in our society for women yes okay the obvious question then is why did you vote against the rape gang inquiry so there's a lot of misunderstanding about this point so let me just briefly touch on that I brought forward the children's well-being in schools bill as it was then it's now an act of parliament and within it were contained the provisions that we've talked about around schools policy but also lots of incredibly important measures around child safeguarding around how we keep children safe and how we change the law to make sure we deal with some of what we've seen in the past where people dodge responsibility and they don't work together to protect children so this was the biggest upgrade in terms of child protection legislation that we've seen in decades there was a motion put down by the conservatives that would have declined a second reading to that piece of legislation so if that had passed all of that legislation would have fallen so the conservatives knew what they were doing when they tabled that and yes I do believe we have to better protect children and we have to better protect and better understand and take action against child exploitation in crew including what people will call grooming gangs I've always believed that I support the children that have experienced abuse but had I voted in that way then all of that legislation would have fallen because you can't reintroduce the same legislation in that form again so if there's a disingenuous it's a disingenuous political argument if there had been a separate vote on having a national inquiry into grooming gangs you would have supported it so we had the Casey review that was underway at that point and the argument that we were making was that we were not going to have a national inquiry into grooming gangs we were not going to have a national inquiry into grooming gangs we were not going to have a national inquiry into grooming gangs we were not going to have a national inquiry into grooming we were not going to have a national inquiry into grooming gangs we were not going to have a national inquiry into grooming are very, very worried about the safety of women and girls. You yourself said in a recent interview, and I quote you, all of us women are unsafe. Yeah. Do you believe that? I do believe that. I believe that women are, I believe that women make choices, we make choices about how we live our lives because of male violence. Right, but wouldn't that worry any bloke, be it Nigel Farage, your husband, my husband, Andy Burnham? I'd hope so, but I've yet to hear him, I've never really heard him say much about it other than in the context I've described. Also, to what extent do we need to look at the Labour government and its own failings on this? You know, I interviewed on the Daily T, Siobhan White, whose daughter Rhiannon was killed by that illegal immigrant who was in her migrant centre, followed her to the train station. I mean, it was one of the most appalling interviews I think I've ever conducted, how brutally Rhiannon was killed, literally a couple of stops from home. And by the way, she'd gone into that migrant centre to help run things, to help the people who had come in there, if the Labour government don't stop the boats and we have undocumented migrants still coming into the country in their droves, then women and girls aren't going to be safe, are they? And we do need, and we are taking action to stop illegal boat crossings. The numbers are at the lowest they've been in six years. And we do need to deport more people who've got no right to be in this country, and we are. And we do need to reduce illegal migration, absolutely. You can believe all of those things, and yet still believe that parties like Reform only want to use, the suffering of women, as a political football. All right, quick couple more questions before we go to the audience. Do you still think trans women are women? I believe that I'm a woman, defined by my biology, and that the Supreme Court made very clear what a woman is. But you did say previously you thought trans women were women. So do you now think trans women are trans women and women are women? I believe that everyone in our country should be treated with dignity and respect, and that includes trans people. But I also believe that women should have access to single-sex spaces on the basis of biology. I used to run a women's refuge. So you wouldn't have let a trans woman into a women's refuge? No. Right. You can provide alternative provision, but it would. My view is that services should be run for women, by women, and that trans people who have, who are experiencing abuse absolutely have the right to access services that are appropriate for them. But I don't believe a women's refuge. I believe a women's refuge, but I don't believe a women's refuge, but I don't believe a women's refuge. should be for those of us who are biologically women. But plenty of your Labour colleagues would have been perfectly happy with a trans woman going into a women's refuge. They were saying things like, women can have a penis, men can grow cervixes. They didn't see that distinction. Did you all really need the Supreme Court to rule on that? I can understand why people want to make sure that trans people are not harassed or intimidated. And I don't like the nature of how this is discussed. I feel very strongly about the need for single sex, I believe for single sex spaces. But I also believe we shouldn't be abusing people or pillorying people online because of who they are. And I think the Supreme Court were also clear that trans people have rights in law as well. The right not to be harassed or intimidated. Sure, of course, we've all got that right. But then we as women also have the right to spaces and services that meet our needs. And it's not about what politicians want. It's actually about what women want when they are healing from male violence. They want spaces that are suitable and appropriate where they can heal, where they have the therapeutic support that they need. So did some on the left get it wrong? I think it was well-intentioned, but I think fundamentally misguided to think that you can suggest that women don't have the right to their own spaces or to organize in a way that works for them. But I don't think that is just about the kind of sex and gender discussion that we have. By which I mean, women had to fight really hard for a long time. Women like my mother had to fight really hard for a long time. To actually create women's refuges, to create rape crisis centers and to get councils to take that seriously. That took such a big fight. And I think it is really important and that progress was hard fought and hard won. And there were battles over many, many years, long before this was ever had the level of discussion that it had, about did women's services even really matter? I believe women's services really matter. A couple of questions on Andy Burnham on the BBC this morning. So he failed to set out a plan to cut welfare. He failed to rule out tax rises. He declined to back a third runway at Heathrow. He mentioned reviews and consultations 12 times. And he failed to commit to spending 3% of GDP on defense, 2030. So it's a bit of a car crash. No, there's a lot of topics there. I could go into each of them. I don't think we've got the time, but you'll be hearing from Andy on Tuesday. So I'm sure he'll be addressing a lot of your points. Well, let's just zone in. Zone in very quickly on the economy then with John Healy due to speak tomorrow and the budget coming on October the 28th. You were on my show last week, I think, where I mentioned Jim Ratcliffe saying the country's gone to the dogs. And you were like, I'm not taking any lessons from him. He's lived in Monaco since 2020 and doesn't pay his taxes here. There are quite a few billionaires that did pay their taxes here, including Chris Rokos, who has now disappeared off into the sunset with his 330 million. Do you regret what you said to me about Ratcliffe now that he has paused, was production in no less than three plants in Hull? No, I'm not going to take any lessons from tax exiles, no. Hang on a minute. He's a wealth creator in this country, isn't he? Well, he can pay his taxes here then, can't he? Okay, then Chris Rokos, are you happy he's left the country with his 330 million pounds worth of tax receipts? I want, and what John Healy wants, is Britain to be a great place to start a business, to grow a business and to do business. And you'll hear more of that tomorrow from John. Don't we safely conclude ahead of the budget, that this government is spending too much and borrowing too much? Eight billion pounds worth of borrowing, in addition to what was anticipated, revealed last week. You just can't cut spending because you're lefties and you're addicted, as Thatcher said, to spending other people's money. No, we do need to bring down borrowing. That isn't something that has just started under this government, but it's absolutely a challenge and John Healy's been pretty upfront about that. On spending, one area I'd like to spend less is the amount of money we spend on young people who are not in education, employment or training, who were just at home, directionless, with no purpose in life. And that's why the work that Alan Milburn is leading for us will lead to big and real radical changes that support young people that do mean we spend less on the cost of failure. I mean, it's a devastating failure for those young people and for our country that we're spending so much on young people having lesser lives. Some of those neats are outside the conference building right now shouting, Zionists control the Labour Party. I had to warn some of my Jewish staff that they wanted to be perhaps careful walking into conference today because there are people spouting actual blood libels outside the building. Your thoughts? I mean, I've always taken a really strong line in standing against antisemitism. It has no place in our country and we shouldn't tolerate it. It should be noted that Bridget Philipson did not serve under Jeremy Corbyn and has been quite vociferous on the topic of antisemitism in university and schools. Right, some quickfire questions and then we'll open it up to the floor. I haven't prepped you with these, have I? No. Oasis or blur? Blur. Really? You're a Northerner. Oasis aren't Northern. That's coming from somebody born in Gateshead, ladies and gentlemen. Ketchup or HP? Ketchup. Number 10 North or 10 Downing Street? Ooh, 10 Downing Street because number 10 North is like number 10 Midlands to me. I thought you were going to say it's like a gimmick. No, I wouldn't say that. Of course you wouldn't say that, no. This is a very important one. Ant or deck? You don't know who the little one is, do you? You must know them both. I do. You know them personally. I don't know them personally, but I was once on Biker Grove. Were you? Yeah. What did you play on Biker Grove? I was an extra on Biker Grove twice, after they'd left, unfortunately. Have you got a little screenshot of that? No. We need it for our socials. No. But deck, because his brother was a Catholic priest. He was a Catholic priest in the local area. Are you a practicing Catholic, Bridget? Are you as practicing as my podcast co-host, Tim Stanley? Almost certainly not. But you are a Catholic? I am a Catholic. I'm not the world's best Catholic, but it is an important part of what I believe. You're in good company with me on this stage, then. Alan Shearer or Jordan Pickford? It's got to be Jordan Pickford. Why? He and I went to the same school. Ooh, lovely. Safe pair of hands. Safe pair of hands. What book are you currently reading? Oh, a friend just gave me, there's a bit of a Catholic theme to this. I'm going to sound a bit obsessed. The Pope's recent book on AI. Oh, very good. Which I haven't started reading, but I have got it. I brought it in the bag to read on the train, and I didn't quite get there. Yes, no answer. Is AI going to kill us all in 10 years' time? No. Okay, great. What series are you currently binge-watching? Oh, goodness me, what's it called? The Split Up on BBC. Somebody's just gasped. It's like a divorce thing, like a divorce drama. Bridget Philipson. Do we end this as the best of frenemies? Is that best to describe us? Do you know any other righties in the journalistic sphere? Have you discussed matters like this with any other righty more than me? We've had a lot of debates, haven't we? I always love coming on your programme. Yeah, why is that? Because I like the challenge. I like the debate. Yes. And it makes you confront how you view the world when you're challenged by others that come at it from a different perspective. Yes, we're trying to get out of our echo chambers together. I've enjoyed it. I hope you've enjoyed it. I hope you've all enjoyed it. We've got some nodding heads. That's good. Thank you very much, Bridget Philipson. Thank you.