Paddy, are you there . Icertainly am. Theres probably a delay because liverpool to london by modern tech means youll sound like youre in space. Henry, are you there . I am, and i am also in liverpool, but about 20 minutes away from laura, so i dont know whether that means a slightly shorter delay. Well, were not in space, but we are together for Sundays Edition of Newscast. And theres a lot of News around, isnt there . Its the first proper full day, i suppose, of the Labour Party Conference, and its getting going. But more stories this morning about donations and holidays and dresses and awkward, embarrassing things that the Labour Party really wishes would just go away. But will they . So lets get under way with the Sunday Episode of Newscast. Newscast. Newscast from the bbc. Hello. Its paddy in the studio in london. And its laura in a beautiful set by the River Mersey in liverpool. And its henry in a portacabin round the back of the mens toilets at the liverpool, uh, venue forthe Labour Party Conference. 0k, well, i know we like detail. I know we like detail. What a vision. So you two are there. Obviously, this is a reminder, the first time that labour has met as a party of government in 15 years. But theres been some noises of, you had your first Tv Interview on a sunday with the Deputy Prime Minister, Angela Rayner. Um, why do you think shes been absent from the screen . And how did it go this morning . I dont know. I always wondered we always, you know, as we would with every prominent member of the Shadow Cabinet as they were, we would say, wed love to have you on the programme. Do you want to come on the programme . And whether it was she didnt want to do it because she was busy doing other things on a sunday, or whether it was because the Labour Leadership Didnt100 trust what she might say on the telly. I dont know, i never got quite to the bottom of it, but we were very pleased to have her this morning. And at such a time when, notjust that, there is, as you say, a momentous week for labour back in government and lots of the big things they are doing are on her desk, but also uncomfortably for her shes one of the people about whom stories have emerged this week about her taking donations and free outfits, and there were some more detail this morning about a Holiday Accommodation that she accepted when she went to manhattan. And the embarrassment for her about that this morning, she told us very strongly she doesnt think she broke any rules. She was going on a holiday and she declared that she was taking accommodation from a friend of hers who happens to be a wealthy labour donor. But i thought, henry, that she was pretty unrepentant and sort of saying, well, people have always taken donations and gifts and we declared it, and so what . I think she was mostly unrepentant, as you say, she had this eye catching line that she said shed been overly transparent, and that wasnt her complaining that shed been too transparent, but she was saying essentially, ithink, look, the reason that she, and perhaps she meant some of her colleagues as well, are facing so many questions here is because the facts are all there in the Public Domain for people to see, because theyve declared them all. I did think, though, at other points there was a note of contrition. She said she she understood why people were upset. She understood why people were angry. And i think that phrase struck me because that wasnt the posture of the Labour Party, that wasnt the posture of Keir Starmer when questions were asked about him even earlier this week. And i think that shows that there has been arguably a bit slow, but there has been an awakening at the top of the Labour Party that all these stories could actually do them some quite serious political damage. And i think thats what Angela Rayner was trying to at least acknowledge, and then perhaps begin to stem in her interview with you this morning. Lets have a listen. Well, first of all, mp5 i have accepted donations and gifts for years. All mps do it. And what we talked about is| making sure that were open and transparent about that. And that was why the Prime Minister made sure that he corrected the record when he was advised that he needed to do that. He actively pursued that and took that advice. I and i think thats the right thing to do. And we want to make sure that i the government are transparent. And, henry, there was a trip to New York. Thats right. So we knew that Angela Rayner had gone on holiday to New York and that while she was there, shed stayed in a flat owned by waheed alli, lord alli, that man again. The sunday times this Morning Reporting that she was joined, at least in part on that trip by sam tarry, who at that point was also a labour mp, though he no longer is after the general election. And there are some questions over whether that meant that she should have declared that. Ultimately the parliamentary commissioner for standards is going to take a view on that, potentially. And so that is potential trouble down the line, though Angela Rayner absolutely adamant with laura that she doesnt believe she broke any rules. Ijust pick up on one thing in that clip we just heard there, though. Angela Rayners Defence was politicians take, uh, have been taking these gifts for years. Politicians of all stripes. I think it is really striking that less than three months into this government, you have the Deputy Prime Minister essentially making an argument that all politicians are the same, at least on this front. I cannot think of anything further from the case that labour pressed against the conservatives for the last three or four years. Their whole argument was that no, things can be different, not all politicians are the same, and that suggestion that they might have not only failed to draw a line under some of the sort of allegations about previous conservative governments, but embroiled themselves in them i think its really damaging. And speaking to senior Labour Advisers around this Conference Yesterday and this morning, i think there is this growing feeling that theyve got themselves into more of a mess here than they initially realised. I think thats right, henry, and theres a lot of frustration as well. I was picking up that how long it has taken some people around Keir Starmer to realise that this was an issue. So there are people in other bits of Government Sort of around the place ive been speaking to who kind of think, why did it take so long for the penny to drop . And even though, as Angela Rayner told us again this morning, they dont think theyve broken any rules, they dont really think theyve done anything wrong. Its not necessarily a very convincing defence for members of the public who are just scratching their head thinking, why do politicians get free Stuff Anyway . This was how she defended herself. I dont believe i i broke any rules. I had the use of the apartment and i disclosed that i had the use of the apartment. In fact, i think i was overlyl transparent because i think it was important despite it being a personal small holiday because that person, i as a friend, had already donated to me in the past. For my deputy leadership. So, youre not sorry for doing that . Well over on the radio, we had the education secretary, Bridget Phillipson. Now she has declared 14,000, part of which was used for a function around the time of her 40th birthday. And she told me what kind of event it was and why she felt it was appropriate that this would come from a donation, which was of course, declared. In the case of the donations i received, i appreciate it is a considerable sum of money. I appreciate its a privilege to be able to receive those kinds of donations,. To use them to host events. Primarily, the donationsl were used to hire venues which in central london, where, you know, journalists, education people often work, you know, it is expensive to hire such venues. 0k. I wonder if we should talk about policy, because actually theres this massive budget coming. And also Bridget Phillipson herself was talking about, young people should be persuaded to consider trades as much as they do degrees. So do you think that they will be able to break out some policies, laura . Youre obviously watching the week ahead, so it seems funny to ask you to get a Crystal Ball out when were talking about todays News. But will policy break out at the conference . I think they will definitely be hoping that it does. And, you know, we did also talk to Angela Rayner this morning about her very big plans for housing. They obviously want to do what previous administrations failed to and actually start getting houses built in significant number. Thats a challenge for them because although theyre doing all sorts of different things to try to change the planning rules and to try to speed things up, theyre not prepared to do what governments did in days gone by, which is actually get diggers in the ground and build houses themselves. So she says she wants the biggest wave of Council Housing ever in modern history. But actually, shes hoping to create the conditions for local authorities and builders to get on with that rather than government actually doing it themselves. So thats one of the big things that they will really want to talk about this afternoon. Shes on the platform this afternoon also talking about improving standards in rental flats. You had Bridget Phillipson talking about the difference between vocational and academic, Higher Education this week. What i dont think were going to get though is tonnes and tonnes of new shiny stuff, not because they dont necessarily want to or because they havent got other plans that they want to put forward, but because theyre just hard off a general election, which had a manifesto that was absolutely stuffed full of plans that they had carefully worked out. So sometimes when governments have been in charge for a while, its kind of the normal routine. You know, they give you a policy to feed the journalists pack on a sunday, and then another policy to feed the journalists pack on a monday. And so they go through the week. But because theyre just out of a general election campaign, theyre not really going to do that. So i think the tone of what were going to hear from the politicians is largely going to be rhetorical. Its largely going to be political storytelling rather than any new giant plans that theyve been keeping under wraps until this moment. Henry, Bridget Phillipson told me to expect a lot of hope from the podium. Yes, i think that is what will be new this week. I agree with laura. Im sure there will be some new policy, and ive picked up a hint though i havent quite managed to land it that Keir Starmer might be focusing on education in his speech as well. So lets see if theres an announcement there. But i dont think um, i dont think therell be bundles of new policy. I do think that there will be a new kind of message, um, even before the sort of arguably chaos in the sort of Government Grid of this week, of all the talk about Sue Gray and of, um, gifts and so on. Even before that, there was a bit of unease in some corners of the Labour Party heading into this conference, because there was a View Taking Hold that the party, the government, had been too gloomy. That in what everyone in the Labour Party believes was the necessary task of identifying the flaws in what theyve inherited from the conservatives. They perhaps have gone too far in depressing people, essentially. Not just the country generally, but theres also been reports about, you know, some of that messaging essentially depressing Business Confidence and potentially even investment. And so talking to people around the leadership, what they see as the task for this week is not just laying out again that there are going to have to be tough choices, although im sure we will hear Keir Starmer and especially Rachel Reeves do that, but actually beginning to do more of talking about what the dividends will be from making those tough choices. And i think youll hear that running through all the big Cabinet Speakers is a sense of where things are going to, as well as how tough it might be On The Road to get there. Yes, because obviously growth is a big part of this governments promise. So, you know, if you get growth, you get you get more jobs, you get a rise in living standards. Thats the idea. So obviously theyve got to be some kind of shining city on the hill. The other thing that dawns on me is that it is still the case that injuly, which is not that long ago, the voters delivered a Knockout Punch to the conservatives. Its like the public did say very recently that they wanted to punish the conservative party. And Liz Truss did, in her 49 days, take the country onto skid row. And we were accused of being a Submerging Market by larry summers, the former us treasury secretary. So all that is true, and i wonder, in a way, do you both think, expert as you are, that this frenzy over freebies is actually going to be dwarfed by the economy, the budget, the meat and potatoes of what a government actually does . Thats certainly what the leadership hopes. And perhaps also, you know, some people listening and watching this might think thats what they hope, too, because of course, in the big picture, whats been going on around donations and dresses is nowhere near as important to whether or not people can put food on the table, whether or not people have a job, whether Angela Rayner does get her dream of having 1. 5 million homes being built by The End of their time in parliament. And i think at the moment we just dont know, really, the answer to the question, which is this is this farce, the kind of growing pains of a group of people who suddenly find themselves in power and they work terribly hard to get there. And actually they find its really, really difficult. Or is this mess actually a sort of canary in the Coal Mine of an operation that actually maybe isnt going to be that good . We talked about it yesterday, paddy. Thats the thing thats sort of been whispered in labour circles, particularly actually by some, shall i say kindly, of the older generation, people who were around in the blair and brown years who sort of looking at this and scratching their heads and going, why have they allowed this to happen . What is going on . And the thing about politics is it can be small things that set off big reactions. And if you think about Sue Gray, the chief of staff, for example, and of course, lots of people will say, oh, this is a story about personnel. Who cares who it is . Its somebody ive never heard of, and this and that and the other. But its really, really important that Downing Street runs properly. Its really, really important that people at the top of government are able to work well together. And at the moment, that is in lots of ways not happening. So yes, i think maybe lots of Newscasters and people will want them to get on with the big things. We all want to hear more about the big things, and we are nerdy enough that we will promise we will talk about policy in those big things, too. But if the politics is not working very well and theyre all grumpy and its misfiring, then the bigger stuff can be squeezed out, notjust byjournalists, but also in their day to day, in their day to day life. If theyre having to sort out rows and nobody s working well together, that is a problem. And also, he told the observer, Keir Starmer, that he wanted to stop the leaks. Harriet harman told me in the week that leakers should be sacked. So is there action coming, do you think, henry . I think its clear that Keir Starmer needs to find a way to stem this leaking. Im just not sure he knows what he wants to do about that and how he wants to do it. I mean, im sure hed be very happy to sack whoever it is, if he could find the sort of initial source for chris and my story on Sue Gray salary this week or whatever, but hes not going to. So, you know, there is a question there about, uh, you know, identity and how he can identify this. I mean, you know, without speaking specifically about the story chris, and i did this week, i canjust say there is an incredibly broad coalition of officials, advisers, ministers who dont think Downing Street is operating in the way that it should be at the moment. And that is a problem. I mean, i think one of the things about this week and some of the difficulties that the government has got itself into is it is very plausible that, in fact, likely that in four years time, whenever the next general election rolls around, you know, you come to look back on this as sort of ephemeral, and its one of those rows which we dont quite remember. But i do think one thing were going to find out in the next few weeks is how much of a reservoir of goodwill this new government has or doesnt have to fall back upon, because generally, you would expect a new government swept into office on a landslide to be able to say to the general public, look, you know, there is this row which you would have thought very dimly of previous governments about, but, you know, come on, youve only just installed us in office. You know, trust us. But it doesnt quite feel certainly from some of the polling in the Newspapers Today again, early Days Polling Wasnt great at the general election and so on, usual caveats, but some of the polling in the Newspapers Today for Keir Starmer and for this government is little short of disastrous. And i do wonder if were starting to see the extent to which his victory was a negative proposition. His victory was about people not wanting the conservatives to continue. Lets see its early days in terms of assessing public opinion and so on but i do think Thats Something being looked at very closely at the top of the Labour Party. And i have to say from our inbox on the programme, most people whove got In Touch, which is not a scientific process, i absolutely would be clear about that its not a scientific thing but we have had a very strong response from people who watch and listen to our show on sundays about this. And it started when David Lammy appeared on the show last week and said, oh well, in america,<