Poll Shows CRUNCH By-Election Is Three-Horse Race

March 12, 2026·1 hr 1 min·5 clips

The Trump administration is threatening to nationalize AI company Anthropic for refusing to allow mass surveillance and autonomous weapons.

Michael Walker opens by presenting the Opinion poll showing Labour at 28 percent, Reform at 27 percent, and the Greens at 28 percent in the Gorton and Denton constituency, with the Greens pulling slightly ahead when only likely voters are counted. Ash Sarkar explains what is at stake for each party: Labour needs to establish a two-horse race with Reform ahead of the 2029 general election, a Green win would be damaging because it would signal that a credible left alternative to Labour can consolidate votes in English constituencies the way Plaid Cymru does in Wales. Walker and Sarkar discuss Reform's candidate Matt Goodwin and speculate that Nigel Farage may have assigned him an unfavorable seat to neutralize a potential internal rival. They examine how both Labour and Reform have attacked the Greens for running Urdu and Bengali campaign videos and appealing to Muslim voters over Gaza, noting the hypocrisy: Labour used an identical Modi handshake image in the 2021 Batley and Spen by-election to appeal to Muslim voters, and Reform's own Matt Goodwin pivoted on his stated commitment to Britain-first politics when the subject of Israel arose in debate with Aaron Bastani. Sarkar formulates the argument that everyone engages in ethnic identity politics when it benefits them, criticizing the shallow pandering of community-leader politics that she traces back to post-Scarman statecraft and British colonial administration. The programme then shifts to a PMQs recap in which Kemi Badenoch presses the Prime Minister on frozen student loan repayment thresholds, a line Walker and Sarkar consider effective even as they note PMQs rarely moves public opinion. They discuss the broader student loan system, agreeing with money expert Martin Lewis that raising the repayment threshold is more progressive than reducing the interest rate. The second half of the show is dominated by the Palestine Action story. Walker summarises the acquittals: six activists charged with aggravated burglary for targeting an Elbit Systems factory in Filton were found not guilty, and a subsequent 18 defendants facing the same charge were formally acquitted after prosecutors reconsidered the evidence. Charlotte Head, one of the original six, is interviewed about being rearrested under counter-terrorism legislation, spending 17 months on remand without a conviction, and the mutual reinforcement between the aggravated burglary charge and the government's prescription of Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation. Head describes the prescription creating confusion inside prisons and argues the charge was maintained not because it was credible but because it was needed to justify the prescription. She explains the specific legal requirements for aggravated burglary â€” entering a building while intending to harm a person â€” and says defendants always knew they had not met that definition but feared the truth would not matter to the judicial process.

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