Steve Hilton
The Catalyst
Ideas with a spark, energy, range and the ability to start things.
Steve Hilton is a former advisor to UK Prime Minister David Cameron who is now running for governor of California. This interview reveals his energetic approach to politics, focusing on reforming the state's business climate and addressing economic challenges.
“Academic or intellectual, anyway, and they remember there was someone I'd worked with in the Obama administration, a guy who had been part of Samantha Powers National Security Team. And we'd worked on something called the Open Government Partnership, which was an idea to sort of promote.”
“Exact So I was thinking, how can tech help? What problem in the way politics works? Could tech maybe do something about? And after thinking about that a bit and actually reflecting on what had gone wrong in my view in terms of my experience in government, I actually got to the point of money in politics.”
“And it's not a partisan thing, it's the same with the influence of public sector unions on the left and whatever. Whatever you look at it, it's forcing candidates. So when they, by the time they get to positions of elected office and power, they're so constrained in what they can do. Exactly.”
“Yeah, exactly. And so he just was amazing. He set up for me a few weeks later a kind of two days of meeting everyone around the campus. And it was like a sort of matchmaking thing. You know, do we like each other and whatever? And I ended up as a result of all of that doing two things when we moved.”
Political Thinking with Nick Robinson — From Downing Street... to California Governor? Former Tory adviser Steve Hilton on making the Golden State great again
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