Thread by @SebastianEPayne

For the new edition of #brokenheartlands, I sat down with Boris Johnson earlier this spring for an hour discussion about the red wall, blue wall, policy challenger and how he hopes to win the next election:

Here’s some highlights of what the prime minister had to say 🧵

#1: How does he define levelling up? No one is quite sure what it is.

"It's a frustration that the Treasury spent so long in the postwar decades, particularly after the great 1980s boom in the City, thinking that the cash cow for the UK was just in London and the south east.”

#2: Johnson said the "the single most important thing in levelling up was high skilled/high wage jobs.

“I believe in equality of opportunity. I really do think there are places around this country which could achieve so much more and which are starting to achieve so much more.”

#3: Johnson referred to his Eton/Oxford background:

"My strong belief, born of experience in my own education, is that human intelligence reverts to the mean and you will find genius everywhere. So genetically you find brilliant people in every background, in every community."

#4: On HS2, Johnson said the eastern leg *would* go ahead in some form despite concerns about the route from local residents:

“What I'm telling you is that it is not off the agenda at all. We want to do the eastern leg, it will happen, it’s about getting the route right.”

#5: On energy:

“How insane that previous governments should have relied on interconnectors from France to provide our energy and not have provided us with enough nuclear power of our own or enough hydropower or solar or wind? We have the potential in this country to do it."

#6: Johnson talked up the government's skills agenda for LU, particularly the focus on further education and T-Levels:

"Levelling up is about infrastructure, technology, but the most important thing is skills. Skills are the single thing that really transform people's live"

#7: Johnson contrasted his policies with Thatcher

“It’s actually dealing with something that was such a plague when I was younger, which was youth unemployment. Youth employment used to be terrible in this country, it was one of the things that was most shameful about the 1980s"

#8: Johnson predicts the UK will "become much more prosperous" over the next 20 years thanks to LU:

"In some areas there will continue to be disparities, of course there will be. I'm not saying that there's going to be a bland uniformity about this country."

#9: Johnson on his Brexity Hezza devolution vision:

"I think you're going to see local achievement really taking off and it's going to be a fantastic thing for the UK. The overall vision for the UK is that by levelling up, we can become the most prosperous economy in Europe”

#10: I asked Johnson what he would say to those who voted Tory for the first time in 2019 and felt disappointed with the last three years of turbulence.

“Thank you for your trust. We’re dedicated to repaying your trust and we were working on it every day.”

#11: Will the red wall feel actual tangible change by 2024?

“Every single [red wall] seat is going to have at least a couple of things that I'll be able to point to that have made a material difference — and this is not just of pork barrelism."

#12: PM on next election:

“The choice will be pretty stark. Do you want a sensible one nation Tory party? This is a one nation govt that has done some fantastic things already and we'll do a lot more. Or do you want Labour propped up by the SNP? We're going back to that choice.”

#13: I asked PM about Rwanda policy and whether it was turning off voters in the south.

"What could be more humane than trying to stop people drowning at sea? I'm willing to have that argument...I find actually once you want to explain to people they really support it."

#14: PM on Rwanda cont:

"It’s not just the evil of the traffickers. What's happening is because you see these pictures of people coming ashore, people have a sense that it's not properly controlled. It undermines people's natural generosity towards immigrants as a whole"

#15: "The traffickers are toxifying the natural wellsprings of all our goodwill to immigrants. And actually, if you look at the British people, they have always been in favour of immigration, but in favour of controlled immigration. But if it's uncontrolled, they lose faith.”

#16: On economics, Johnson said "I'm believer in government, the job of government is to create the conditions for capitalism to flourish".

PM added, "sometimes the Treasury will think that we don't need to do XYZ because things are going to happen anyway with capitalism"

#17: I asked Johnson whether he is fiscally incontinent. He responded:

“No, I want to cut taxes. You have heard what the chancellor said in the spring statement. We both want to cut taxes as fast and as soon as we responsibly can."

#18: Johnson on Keir Starmer's Labour party:

“I'm not really sure what it is. It seems to be Corbynism with a lick of paint and plaster. I think it's very hard to think of another government that would have got Brexit done in the way that we did."

#19: Johnson claimed that eight members of the Labour front bench voted against Trident (expect to hear more of this in 2024):

“I do not believe they're the right people to be trusted right now with the security of this country."

#20: Johnson was more vicious towards the Lib Dems, claiming "they have zero consistency, I don't know what they stand for.”

PM pointed to the party's rhetoric on housing and HS2. "They don’t campaign with one voice, they speak out of both sides of their mouth."

#21: I asked Johnson is he was serious about fighting the next GE:

“Are you crazy? Of course! I’ll fight the next election and I’ll win it. Look, this government has a huge amount to do — a big, a colossal progressive agenda that will be transformative for the country.

#22: Finally, I pointed out to Johnson that many of his government's policies were not popular on this site. His response:

"I haven't logged on to Twitter for one minute, let alone five minutes.”