The Welfare State

This week on The Critic Show, Tom and Chris discuss the numbers behind Britain’s welfare state. Around 53 per cent of adults are net recipients of the state, yet most people who fall into that category would never describe themselves as being on benefits. Universal Credit, tax credits, disability payments, housing support: the money adds up, yet who is actually on benefits, and how much it all costs, is rather difficult to say.Without its people explicitly voting for it, Britain has drifted into a high-tax, high-transfer system, with little to show in terms of infrastructure or service quality. Once a “temporary” tax is introduced, it is rarely retired.As Tom points out, a welfare system designed around personal benefit and vote-winning is politically unsustainable. Chris traces the rot to the managerial politics of the mid-1990s, where presentation overtook reform. As the state dominates ever more in the lives of its citizens, personal responsibility becomes an ever more alien idea. The statistics may be imperfect, but the trend is worrying. Britain needs serious structural reform.Head to https://www.outpoststudios.net/s/the-critic-show for full access to this episode, and more thought-provoking political analysis. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe

This week, Tom and Chris explore the rise of sectarianism in British politics, specifically, the role of Biraderi networks and the extended family structures that shape political behaviour of immigrant populations in Britain today. In urban constituencies where traditional civic associations are weak, Britain’s individualistic political culture offers little institutional counterweight, and, as a result, Britain’s political culture becomes ever more transactional. As theLabour coalition of immigrants and the working class, which it has depended upon for decades, fragments and new parties seek to mobilise voters along cultural and demographic lines, politics risks drifting toward an informal “ethnic headcount”, where identity can matter as much as, if not more than, policy. Is modern mainland British politics becoming more like that of Northern Ireland, or even reminiscent of Balkans and the Middle East? And, when established, are such dynamics self-reinforcing? If in-group preference becomes a normal organising principle, can liberal, cross-community politics can be sustained? What do we really need to prevent permanent political fragmentation?For the full, uncensored episode, go to:https://www.outpoststudios.net/p/the-sectarian-stateNext week: Chris and Tom turn their attention to the British Welfare State.www.outpoststudios.net This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe

This week, Tom is joined by Poppy Coburn to look at the Conservative Party’s identity crisis and ask whether this is more than another bad election cycle. Whilst the top of the party is seemingly happy under the Badenoch regime, the grassroots have been hollowed out. The councillors, donors and activists, the footsoldiers of any election campaign are drifting away. As local associations wither and the coffee mornings and action days are ever more sparsely attended, the party has to ask itself, what does it stand for now?Voters themselves, fed up with years of betrayal are turning to Reform, while the Conservatives lash out at their populist challengers. Fiscal discipline is still invoked, but many doubt the party can follow through on its promises. The gap between Westminster and provincial Britain is widening, especially on touchstone issues like immigration and crime. Brexit once channelled a rebellious mood; that energy has moved on. If the Conservatives no longer set the terms of the right, are they still a leader, or just another fringe player, trading on the legacy of the past?Subscribers can listen to or watch the full uncensored episode here:https://www.outpoststudios.net/p/who-are-the-tories-fullSubscribers get access to full versions of The Critic Show, alongside the wider Outpost slate of podcasts and documentaries.Subscribe now at www.outpoststudios.net This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe

Chris Bayliss speaks to Fleur Meston about the slow break-up of the British left, and the end of the Labour party’s gauche-domination from Bloomsbury to Sedgefield. In the 21st century, this challenge mostly comes from the socialist ecologists of the Green Party. The Greens have evolved from their 1970s roots as a niche protest vehicle into something more electorally serious, drawing in voters uneasy with Labour in government and making electoral headway from Bristol to Brighton. What was once fringe now serves as a political home for a largely middle-class, self-described radical bloc, energised by Zack Polanski and his five MPs, not much different, in terms of parliamentary seats, from Reform UK.But who benefits from this fragmentation? Can the Greens turn local strength into real gains, or will they remain influential but limited? If Reform consolidates its insurgent vote, tactical voting could reshape key seats. With Labour under strain in parts of its base and smaller parties sensing opportunity, Chris and Fleur ask whether Britain is moving into a genuinely multi-party era, and what that means as the protest vote becomes a means of tangible political power. To subscribe, please go to www.outpoststudios.net This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe

In this Critic Show special, Adam Wren discusses the Open Justice Project, which works with survivors who want their stories told, and the public inquiry into one of the most serious institutional failures in modern Britain: the grooming gangs scandal. The conversation centres on a system that too often appears underfunded, diffused and structurally incapable of taking responsibility. It’s a story of the failure of multicultural Britain, and the legacy of the Blairite optimism that assumed institutions would simply function due the inherent competence of the British state. They also discuss the personal cost of working so closely with trauma, as well as the practical barriers Open Justice has faced, much the same as those that allowed abuse to happen in the first place, from the secrecy afforded to offenders to the way exploitation of the infrastructure of the small towns that make up England’s former industrial heartlands Yet, in spite of the horrific legacy of these crimes, the pressure created by survivor-led initiatives is beginning to force institutions to listen, raising the central question of the inquiry: how Britain’s institutions, which failed to protect vulnerable young women, can be forced to do better.For subscribers, you can listen to or watch the full, uncensored episode via the link below:https://www.outpoststudios.net/p/the-critic-show-special-open-justiceSubscribe now at www.outpoststudios.net This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe

This week, Tom and Chris look at foreign policy, and the widening gulf between Britain’s ambitions and its means. Defence spending is constantly under strain, artillery stockpiles are dangerously low, and Europe still relies heavily on Washington for its security. What happens if America’s defence commitments start to get transactional, particularly under Donald Trump? If a major war broke out tomorrow, does Britain have the industrial muscle or economic stamina to see it through?Is the US returning to realism, or simply making ad hoc deals as it goes, whether with China and the Indo-Pacific or Greenland, or Ukraine? As Europe looks static, Washington looks unpredictable. Britain under Keir Starmer is running up against the limits of soft power, the only weapon it seems to want to wield, hamstrung by the Chagos question, and its habit of outsourcing strategic judgment to international courts. What leverage does the UK actually retain, and can it rediscover hard-edged pragmatism of the past? Or is it doomed to decline, stooped in self-loathing nostalgia?Subscribers can listen to or watch the full uncensored episode here:https://www.outpoststudios.net/p/why-europe-cant-defend-itselfor on the Substack app.Subscribers will gain access to not only the full uncensored versions of The Critic Show, but the full suite of Outpost podcasts and documentaries.Subscribe now, at www.outpoststudios.net This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe

This month’s Wine Club has Henry Jeffreys in notably good company, Tom Harrow, better known as the WineChap, in town for Burgundy Week and armed with a trio of Italians that cheerfully make the case for looking south rather than east. While the merchants of St James’s are earnestly pouring tiny glasses of rain-thinned Pinot Noir and murmuring about yields, here we are with bottles that feel gloriously, unapologetically alive. Tom’s also takes us along on his journey into wine, via schoolboy tastings at Millfield, a spell in the army, Lee & Sandeman, and eventually Honest Grapes. The sort of anecdotes that make you wish wine education were still considered an acceptable extracurricular for fourteen-year-olds. As he puts it, learning to smell properly is a life skill criminally underrated.If you’d like a mixed case with two bottles of each featured in the episode, (for just £94.60 with free delivery!), follow the link:https://www.honestgrapes.co.uk/collections/the-critic-wine-clubAnd don’t forget to subscribe to Outpost at www.outpoststudios.net. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe

This week, Chris and Tom are joined by Critic associate editor, Patrick Porter, to talk Cricket. Fresh from another disappointing Ashes series, England seem lacking and out of ideas - except for one, the high-velocity aggressive style known as “Bazball”. The only problem being its not actually bringing England much success on the field.The failure the net Test wins is compounded, Patrick argues, by the corporatised, Year Zero philosophy of a team which thinks it has nothing to learn from the past. This arrogance, rejecting outright the notion they have anything to learn from the great England cricketers of the past, and obsession with Moneyball-esque sporting fads, will only lead to more failure.Patrick also brings to the show his specialism in International Relations, asking if the shock of Trump’s threatening behaviour focuses European minds on longer term strategic realities, then he’ll be the president Europe needs and whether they are about to embark on a costly rediscovery of why great power competition existed in the first place.Subscribers can listen to or watch the full uncensored episode here:https://www.outpoststudios.net/p/the-cricket-revolution-is-eatingor on the Substack app.Subscribers will gain access to not only the full uncensored versions of The Critic Show, but the full suite of Outpost podcasts and documentaries.Subscribe now, at www.outpoststudios.net This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe

In this episode of The Critic Show, Tom and Chris discuss Samuel Rubinstein’s review of Sir Lenny Henry’s new book The Big Payback, which calls for Britain to pay £18.62 trillion in reparations in penance for its colonial legacy.Whilst economically absurd, and historically myopic, ideas like these are rapidly gaining credibility in the western world, and within the British Labour party in particular, in thrall to the politics of celebrity.With the Chagos handover baked in, are proposals like this, though economically ruinous, inevitable?Subscribers can listen to or watch the full uncensored episode here:https://www.outpoststudios.net/p/do-white-britons-owe-black-britonsor on the Substack app.Subscribers will gain access to not only the full uncensored versions of The Critic Show, but the full suite of Outpost podcasts and documentaries.Subscribe now, at www.outpoststudios.net This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe

For decades, Nigel Farage was the ultimate political outsider, yet, after a year of topping the polls by some margin, it is slowly dawning on Westminster that, for the first time in a century, he might break the two-party system. How has he been able to do this? And why are the political currents of the mid-twenty twenties so different from the waters that UKIP swam in a decade before? You can subscribe to listen to the full episode at www.outpoststudios.netFor subscribers, listen or watch the full uncensored episode here:https://www.outpoststudios.net/p/is-a-reform-government-inevitableor on the Substack app.Subscribers will gain access to not only the full uncensored versions of The Critic Show, but the full suite of Outpost podcasts and documentaries. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.outpoststudios.net/subscribe