West Streeting. Dan Porter's defection is obviously a coup for you, but is it a bit odd that someone who credits Tony Blair and Gordon Brown as radically transforming patient care back in 2007, goes on to be a Tories councilor, then a Tories MP, then a Tories Minister. Has he explained why it's taken 16 years to realize he was in the wrong camp?

Well, I think it's a reflection of the state of the modern Conservatives Party. I I think it reflects the disaffection and disillusionment felt by millions of conservative voters across the country who are thinking about who to vote for in the next general election. I think it also reflects a changed Labor Party, frankly, that someone like Dan Porter, who has worked in the NHS, cares passionately about the NHS, has come to the conclusion that only Labor can be trusted with the NHS. He's just the latest. Remember, we've got the Chairman of Iceland, Richard Walker, saying only Labor can be trusted with business. Business, nick Bowles, the former conservative Minister who led David Cameron's preparation for government, who says that only Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeve have a serious plan for the country. I hope that gives Conservatives the confidence.

Has nick Bowles, the former Tori MP and Minister, Minister. Has he joined the Labor Party?

Not that I'm aware of, but he's giving a ringing endorsement. I don't know if the Tories have kicked him out, if he's still a conservative. But it just says to people who are thinking about who to turn to, that Labor is a serious party of government.

Dan Porter was Health Minister for two and a half years. He defended the reforms. He carried them out during 2012, '13, '14. Has he held up his hand to you and said, I'm responsible for some of the problems that I now share are so terrible?

Well, I think that's explicit in the article he's written for the Observer.

No, it doesn't. He doesn't say, I was a minister and I implemented these policies. Has he said to you, I now think I was wrong?

Well, he said in the Observer, I mean, look, you've got people who voted conservative at previous elections, who trusted what they said. When David Cameron said, You can sum up my priorities in not three words, but three letters, NHS. People expected that he would leave the NHS in as good a position as he found it. But we've had five conservative prime ministers. Every single one has left the NHS in a worse position they found.

I don't want to talk more about Mr. Poulter, but it's a curious thing. But let's just talk about what Mr. Sunak has said. You've seen the interview with him. Do you accept that the increased flow of asylum seekers from UK to the Republic of Ireland does show that people smugglers are getting the Rwanda message?

I do not believe that even if the Rwanda policy is implemented, and the government's got no excuses now, it's gone through parliament, even if it's implemented, even working at the Prime Minister's best expectations about flights taking off, it is still not going to deal with the problem of small boats. That requires There's serious solutions. They might not be headline-grabbing solutions, but the solutions of putting the money that's gone to Rwanda into the National Crime Agency so we can have proper cross-border policing to tackle the criminal gangs, speeding up the processing of decision making, making sure we've got serious returns agreements with other countries, those are solutions that can work. The Rwanda scheme is a very expensive gimmick, and I don't believe that £2 million per person is an acceptable use of taxpayers money.

You said that you'll get rid of the Rwanda legislation if you're in government. Would you bring the people back from Rwanda?

Once people are settled in Rwanda, they're settled in Rwanda, and I don't think-They won't be settled.

They'll be asylum seekers.

I don't think we're looking to unpick that situation. What we are looking to do is to move forward in a more serious way to deal with this problem of small boats, to tackle illegal migration, and to get our immigration system back on track. We've had plenty of chances, plenty of prime ministers now under the Conservatives Party.

To be clear for those people who might be in Kigali, you're not going to bring them back if you come into government. The other thing that the Prime Minister was semi-clear about was that he's still holding open the possibility of a July election. Is Labor ready?

He should get on with it. We are not just ready, we are, as with the rest of the country, fed up with waiting. I can tell you, having campaign right across the country in these local elections, the number one question that's asked right across the country is, When do you think the general election is going to be? People are crying out for an opportunity to deliver their verdict on this government and to vote for change. That's why the Prime Minister bottled an election early this year. That's why he's bottling it now, and that's why he will have to be taken out of Downing Street by his fingernails by the end of the year. I thought in that extraordinary interview, I don't know what planet he's living on. He tells people they're better off. Even after the budget, they are worse off as a result of inflation and other tax changes than they were before. He says that he's making things better. Tell that to people waiting on an HS waiting list. He's got a cheek to talk about crime. Look at the 20,000 police officers that were lost that they're now trying to put back.

That's his record. That's the Conservatives record.

You sound just as bullish as he does. You're very confident you're going to win, aren't you?

We're not complacent, but we want a general election. The fact the Labor Party wants a general election, the Conservatives don't, tells you about our pride in the change, the pride in the change that Kierst Farmer has delivered and our readiness for government versus a conservative Prime Minister who is running scared of the public.

But it's really interesting that I'm detecting in your tone a clear confidence that if you went to the polls now, you would win.

I think we've got a serious leader and a serious platform and a serious chance of putting this country right after 14 years of conservative failure, and that change can't come soon enough.

All right, let's talk about what you're going to offer the electorate if and when that general election comes. Your leader says this morning that you're going to keep the triple lock on pensions, raising them every year in line with inflation earnings or 2.5%, whichever is the highest. Labor has decided to reward rich pensioners at the expense of the Health Service, police, and young people who can't get on the housing ladder.

I don't think that's a fair characterisation, either of the policy or You can't spend the money twice. Or of the state of the country. When I'm out, in fact, just the other week, I spoke to a pensioner in my constituency who was unloading her shopping, and she stopped me to have a chat because she wanted to tell me that she is worried about the cost of living, that the price of her shop has gone up, and that she is struggling in retirement. This is someone who's worked hard all her life, lives in a home that she owns, and she is struggling, and she's not able to live the retirement she expected, taking the grandkids on holiday, those sorts of things because life is too tough. I had an email from another pensioner whose teeth are literally rotted thick, then he won't leave the house. I don't want to go through your whole inbox. When you make sweeping generalizations about the pensioners, bear in mind, those are the people you're talking about. I think that it's important to bear in mind with pensioners, too. If the economic circumstances change, if the cost of living change, they can't go out and earn more money.

We're giving pensioners that certainty, that of assurance that labor will keep the triple off.

There is no doubt that there are poor pensioners. But here is what the Office for National Statistics says, if you want to talk about sweeping generalizations. Average wealth varied most by age in the UK, with median total wealth amongst respondents aged in their early '60s, almost nine times as high as those aged in their early '30s. Nine times. We are, me, a wealthy older generation, and you've decided to keep the triple lock, you're right, but you are rewarding older, rich people at the expense of young people who cannot actually afford to buy that.

I don't buy into that intergenerational conflict argument. What I do think is that we need to give pensioners the reassurance to know that as they have planned for retirement and as they are now in retirement, that a labor government will protect the triple lock, unlike the Conservatives, by the way. This is about votes. No, the 46... Older people vote. It is about the fact the Conservatives have said they will scrap national insurance, which would put £46 billion hole in the public finances. When pressed, Richie, will you rule out cuts to the state Pension or cuts to the NHS or rise in national insurance, the Prime Minister pointedly failed to rule out any one of those three things. He can't reassure pensioners, a labor government will.

Okay, he's not here, and we are talking about you.

Well, he doesn't do live TV interviews, does he? He does the cozy prerecords. He does the cozy prerecords. He doesn't like live scrutiny, but that tells you everything you need to know about what you're seeing.

If I can say so, I don't think he was very cozy at the end of our interview. But let's deal with you. You've been clear this week that you're pledging to nationalize the railway system, that you're not going to buy the rolling stock. Is it a labor principle now that the public sector does things better than the private sector?

I think the plan that Louise Hague has set out is a reflection of the failure of privatized rail, the absence of competition. So passengers are getting the worst of all worlds, where we are doing enormous subsidy and getting poor service and getting poor fares. I've argued for many years, as many people in the Labor Party, that what you can do with the railways is bring those franchises back into public ownership as they come up. We'll be able to do that in labour's first term. Then we can reinvest the profits and the proceeds into better services and better fares. Because this is, for me, the kicker on public ownership of railways. They've already enormous public ownership of our railways, but they're owned by French, German, Dutch, and Italian taxpayers. Our profits go into their countries, their rail systems, their passengers, their fares. It's time that we have public ownership of our railways so we can reinvest.

That's a good gag. It's true. Is public ownership of our railways going to be something like London's ownership of transport for London, where the politicians set the price of tickets, where a lot of the funding comes from council taxpayers, and the transport for London budget had to be supported to the tune of six and a half billion since 2020. And they had another quarter billion last year when they were in financial difficulty. Is this going to be the future of the railways? Is it going to be supported by the taxpayer, come what may?

On TFL, by the way, a lot of the subsidy was due to a massive fall in passenger use as a result of the pandemic. We just got to put that qualification in on the subsidy. But more generally, look, where we want to see the future of our railways is the railways washing their own face, but also better services, fair affairs, and also there will be an element of competition because private operators, like the Grand Central Service that runs up to northeast, with open access railways, you can have private sector competition competing against the public sector. I think that's a good thing because it means competition on standards, services, and fares. I think our railways have been a much better position thanks to a Labor government.

All right, just tying together to health and transport. Is this nationalization going to make Keir Starmer the fact controller?

How dare you attack my leader in that way. It's obviously outrageous thing to say. It's very cheeky. Is Peter Manderson right in your question? Peter Manderson said he was a bit more very... Let me just finish on a serious point. You've just heard from me this morning. We've got a serious plan on the health service to cut waiting lists, a serious plan for our railways, and a serious plan for pensioners. What a contrast to 14 years of conservative failure. That's why we want a general election, Trevor.

West Streeting, thank you very much. Thank you.