YouSaid · the spoken record

Nadhim Zahawi

lines on the record: 53
first: 2024-06-13
most recent: 2024-06-13
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Because that short trip you refer to Iraq as mini envoys for the then Prime Minister, I watched him operate on the ground and his ability to just cut through and very quickly focus our people on the ground from the foreign office on what really mattered, what was material to what would be a positive outcome, which is obviously the destruction of ISIS ultimately. three short days I think in total we had to go phenomenal”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I still think you want it. By the way, hold on a second. Let me evidence it for you. You guys are smashing it out of the broadcast.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, because you and I go back far enough to know that you've always had your very strong opinions about Boris. And there are those in our party who will take a different view to me on Boris. And so that was sort of logical. I thought his genius was this man is probably one of the best communicators the country has. And he worked out that there was a moment in time where social media was young enough and powerful enough to persuade a bunch of members of parliament who literally have not had the ability to be in the same building together to panic. And I thought there's a genius. Incredible ability.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, no, no. I'll tell you what you were able to do brilliantly is you found the flames of the storm on Twitter and on social media so brilliant. You said that people weren't caring about Twitter, it's not in the world. That people just buckled, right? Because this thing to them, I'm so cool to hear it became so big because you know how the ecosystem works, right? You fan out in social media, gets into the mainstream media and keeps going. And you were brilliant.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Rory Stewart, and he's going to do this job, but he'll have the same levers as a Director General so that actually they can make decisions and stuff will happen in the machine. I think that will make a huge difference to outcomes because if you can do that, whether it's on large-scale infrastructure projects, on whatever the government's trying to achieve, then I think you'll deliver better outcomes. And Kate would be the first to admit it wasn't just her. The magic of Kate is she then found five or six people who were brilliant, absolutely brilliant at understanding vaccine vaccine manufacturing.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Building to go to the Treasury to become Chancellor when he was then allowed to be a non exec on the Department of Education's board. No serious human being is going to wait 12 months to be told, you know, please come forward and bring your talents to help this country deliver better services. So one of the things I'd like to do is if I can get cross-party support for this is any secretary of state should be able to bring in AK Bingham people from the private sector who can contribute within 46 weeks of vetting would be normal and then you can bring them in. But I'd go a step further. At the moment you can, but you have to make them a special advisor, right? Which means the reporting lines. I refer to most of my perm sex as the CEOs, right? Because actually as a sector of state, you're probably more like a chairman rather than a CEO. And all the sort of levers lie with the machinery of the civil service. What I'd like to be able to say, look, I'm going to bring in.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Really great question, and one of the things I'd like to do, I hope, in the future, is if I can convince all party leaders to agree to this, is to be able to reform how secretaries of state are able to bring in additional talent to help whether on a project basis or a more long-term basis. So the great lesson I learned, there's a couple. One was we talked about earlier, which is actually transparency and opening up data. It's the best way to reform complex systems, right? Whether it's education or health or elsewhere. The real challenge was, you know, if you want to bring talent into Whitehall, it's really hard. I wanted to bring Sir Peter Basiljet. Into the Department of Education because I thought he had some really good ideas around the creative industries. It took me with a really supportive Permsec, and Susan Acklan Hood, it took us 12 months to get him into the building. I was actually leaving.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, again, on that, when you are in the either storm, and when our city, for example, Dan Needle was inaccurate, he accused me of tax evasion. He accused me of investigation to me by the SFO or someone else, maybe not him by the serious fraud office, which is completely untrue and alien to me. I was like, you're getting bombarded with these attacks. And then what happens is you put up your defenses. When I reflect on it now, I think actually maybe I should have been, you know, up front and say, actually, by the way, yes, I have settled. My settlement is this, and this is what happened. That was my mistake.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So from my perspective, I was dealing with HMRC on this. My real mistake was I was not specific enough on my ministerial declaration on the settlement I had reached with HMRC. And that was my mistake. And we own our mistakes ultimately. I should have been much more specific to say this was a settlement. They found that there's a category called careless, which is non-deliberate, but it still carries a fine with it. And I wasn't specific enough to say, by the way, there was a fine attached to this category, which then gave in many ways Rishi no other choice but to say, I'm afraid you weren't specific enough, although you've declared it. Rory, I know this, when you become a minister, you go before pet and you say all these things. That was the real mistake.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Somebody's leagues of parliament. One you won't be surprised. Some of the stuff Dan is needed is inaccurate and incorrect.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I just worry that the whole construct of parliament and parliamentary democracy is so important that the quality of human being entering it is on the decline.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Coming through Kier is actually, you know, I say, is probably the exception to that. I just worry that very few people understand that entrepreneurs lose money. Before they make money. So it's really hard to make money. You guys are a perfect example of a startup. You didn't know where this thing is going to go with this podcast, right? You had no idea. It could have been, you could be sweating here all day long making nothing. You've been incredibly successful. Well, okay, what happened to Piers Morgan, right? These things happen in business.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Actually, and this is really something that you might want to take back, Alistair, to the team in the Labour Party, they're worried because they're hearing mixed messaging from Rachel at the moment. And I don't want to obviously turn this into a party political argument here, but there is a bit of a apprehension as to what could happen. My biggest concern, I've got to tell you, and this is a cross-party, and I hope Rory agrees with me, is so few of my colleagues in Parliament have actually got any real experience outside of the world of politics. It is now dominated by people who are either special advisors or work in unions and elsewhere who are then saying.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I didn't disagree with you, but of course, ultimately, there are risks associated with any. I still think in the long term, if we have a government that looks at competitiveness beyond the G7, then I think we're in a good place. I spoke last night in the city of London, and I normally use my sort of opportunities there to almost run it like my own mini-focus group. They're all doing well. You look at fintech.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, I think the national security element to this will remain where we are core and front and center to the European security. You see it in Ukraine, without going into too many details, but we play a leading role, a coordinating role in the effort to protect Europe.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But, well, I think if the direction of travel in Europe does not alter, right, there's going to be massive challenges and possible fracture in Europe.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“See, I would respectfully disagree with you in the sense that I tell you for one. No, I tell you for why. There was always going to be friction as you end a deep relationship that was pretty much frictionless. We tend to look at most political events in our lifetime, right? Sometimes you just got to take the long view beyond the sort of five, ten-year horizon.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He has a mounted climb as an ex pollster being 20 points behind is a massive challenge for him. In saying that, Labour need a 12.5% swing to have a majority of one. So it is a challenge for Kir Starmer as well. I tell you what, I do think Rishi would certainly, I would have him absolutely in the room to deal with these challenges. Why? He follows the evidence. He's forensic when it comes to understanding the economy and what needs to happen with the economy. When he came into the economy.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“National debt. If you take into the unfunded pension liabilities of the civil service, we will be insolvent by 2035. That worries me. And I don't think we are yet in a place where we're talking about.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, no, and I tell you what I think worries me we are now a mid-sized economy. The G7 is not our competition. Three of the G7 are in Europe. I listened to Macron there when he had his investor conference saying, look, if you want to come and take advantage of a market of 450 million people, then of course we'd be competitive, but we don't have to be as competitive as some other countries on taxation. The fourth is the US and the G7, which is a continental economy that is extraordinary because its ability, because it has devolved taxation to the states, that competition between California and Florida makes the economy so dynamic. We need to be much more competitive. And I don't think in that space yet, no politician is talking about actually we need to reform, whether it's health or welfare and look at what is really costing us versus what is coming into the Treasury. You look at where the national debt is versus the real”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Pretty bitter pill. Now, in all of that, once you accept that the British people never accept someone in Europe setting their budgets for them, then we should come out. That was my hypothesis.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I worry, I genuinely worry. I was a Brexiteer, and 60 seconds on that. The reason I was a Brexiteer is because I initially wanted us to stay in and reform from within. I had a wonderful dinner with Herr Sch ⁇ uble, who was then the finance minister of Germany. Actually, we ended up in the same place, but his solution was more Europe, not less Europe. Because once you set up a sovereign with the single currency, we have the most successful transfer union on earth because the Bank of England stands behind sterling. We transfer wealth from London the South to less well-off parts of England to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, but we have emotionally bought into that because we had civil war, war with the Scots, but we accept the fact that we pay our taxes and transfer wealth. Will the German people accept transferring wealth to the less well-off parts of Europe for the next hundred years? I think they will if their chancellor is able to tell them, but we control the budgets of those countries in the way they did with Greece and Ireland, where they were forced to swallow.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Indeed. But there's a bit of me that gets slightly wound up by people who sort of live a life that looks perfect But actually, never get anything really seriously done. And I just instinctively are much more attracted to the people who actually want to get stuff done but may be flawed.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Familiar with the truth. No, no, no. That's not true. I just think, I don't know whether maybe it's the breaks I've been given and maybe a bit of it is my own sort of flaw, the imposter syndrome that I have that I sort of, you know, when I first joined the cabin, I sat there thinking, how did I get here? What do I know? And then you realize actually you're quite good at fixing some of these things within your department or government and you get rewarded for it. So again, I go back and say to you, I think there are no superhumans. And I'd much rather work for someone who may have flaws, but will get the job done, worry about outcomes rather than just inputs. Then someone who has the sort of the halo of you look at Paula Vennels and the post office stuff, which I was obviously on the back benches in the Select Committee on.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You spoke about it at the outset. You and I, our faces didn't fit with the Cameroon team for different reasons, very different reasons, but they kept us on the back benches for the best part of six, seven, eight years. And so I admire that. I admire people who will actually, you know what? There's a job to do here. I'm going to bring the best people in to do this job. They may not be my clique, but they're good people and I want to.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There are no superhumans in politics, government, in business. Everybody's deeply flawed, in my view. And I just look at how people have treated me. You mentioned Geoffrey Archer. He knows that he has some deep flaws, but also some really great attributes of identifying talent. When he wanted to run for Mayor of London, he literally picked up a load of young conservatives and around the table were Tobias Elwood, Robert Half on Sag Javid. We were all literally kids in politics. I was a local counsellor in Wandsworth, I think, at the time. An incredible ability to identify talent and back it being completely colorblind when actually my party at that time was much less welcoming, let's put it that way, for people of my background. We've just been through it with Boris, it was my experience of how he backed me.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think my party needs to at the moment focus on this general election and flirting with ideas leadership is a terrible error in my view. The point I was making in that interview for the Sunday Times, I think it was, was when asked, was it an error at the time to remove Boris? I still... Would contend it was an error because I actually think in many ways he'd learned from the early mistakes of the pandemic. He'd come through that. The vaccine deployment actually allowed him, in my view, to mature into the role. Prime Minister”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Whether that's deliberate or otherwise, those are the perceptions, right? And perception can become reality. I just think my experience of the man in the way he backed me. And then when he made me Secretary of State for Education, when I took serious challenges to him about how the department was run, what I wanted to do with the department. He was good to his word. He said”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I can only speak from my own experience. You don't think it's untrue for me? And every time we talked about things that we need to tell the country, he would never stand in the way and say, no, no, no, for political advantage. Look, you and I are probably in the same place on the rule of Saddam, but I think you've been attacked.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Complex systems. And I think it's one of the lessons I hope we learn going forward by treating the nation as adults, saying, look, here are the numbers. Within those numbers, you'll see some stuff that the red tops will be shock horror. For example, very low uptake of vaccines in postgos around Tottenham in North London. But at least it allows us to focus on those challenges and then fix them. Boris backed me on that because initially the pushback was no no, we can't do that. And he said, hold on a second. But Nadim's right on this. Let's get this stuff out there. People need to see it because they're hurting. They're locked in.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Often we saw that it didn't, but also to be able to back his minister to say, let me give you an example. So I took on the job and every morning we had this fantastic piece of software from Palantir where I can see exactly who's been vaccinated the day before. And I went to the team at the NHS. Simon Stevens said, look, we've got to publish daily data because you're expecting me to be on television every day. I can't just ask the nation to trust me on this and we're going to only give them fortnightly data or weekly data. We have to do daily data. And initially the pushback from the NHS was like, we can't do that. We're the NHS. The data has to be perfect. This data will need cleansing. It takes days to do that. It might take resource away from something else. But I see it every morning. Why can't we share it? And actually one of the lessons of the pandemic, and I hope we'll come out through the inquiry, is transparency helps you reform.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Thing today, he's changed. And look, as I say, I'm probably going to say something that people find extraordinary, but he could have been, I wasn't there, I wasn't around the table in the early days of the pandemic. But when we got to vaccine deployment, he was incredibly good to work for because he actually empowered me to cut through some of the bureaucracy where I needed to. I can give you many examples where we did that. And he was literally on top of the numbers in a way that I found surprising.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He was on top of the detail. We would brief him every week on the numbers, on the vaccine program. And he would literally say, can we just go back to last week something?”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Let me try and answer the question in my experience of him as a boss. So when he called me to say I'd like you to take on the vaccine deployment role, of course I said yes, but I said on one condition and he said, what's that? What's that? I said, I need to speak with your authority. And what I mean by that is I need to be able to get access to you in minutes and hours, not days or weeks. And he said, you've got it. And I have to tell you, and I've worked as a junior minister under Teresa May, and then, of course, I did a little bit of work for Cameron, not on apprenticeships early on in my career as the apprenticeship czar, as he called it. But his ability to make decisions when you have his attention and he's focused, I thought was incredibly impressive. He was brave, but also contrary to what actually most people think.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“To a place where the herd just then stampede, which was why I said to Boris when I went to see it saying, I'm afraid you've got to go now because the Herder stampede”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And therefore, in many ways easier spooked if there is a social media storm than where the real world is. Let me give you an example. When I was Chancellor of the Dutch of Lancaster, second day in the job, we got the news that Her Late Majesty had passed in the cabinet office. We've got this whole communication floor, giant screens, which you probably are both familiar with. And if you believed Twitter that day, you'd think half the nation was Republican. His Majesty gives his first address to the nation the next day. 98% approval rating. So Twitter was not the country clearly. The reason I was making that point is you were so smart at using social media to drive the whole storm around number 10 better than anyone else. So I was giving you as an example. My colleagues”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I tell you what I'll tell you. No, you're not. First of all, you are a communication genius, right? You have many flaws, but that is not one of them. And you and I both know that. You are a communication genius. And you have, clearly, as I'm sitting here in probably the most successful podcast in the country, have adapted to new media in an incredible way. My colleagues, certainly the 2010 intake, didn't have the privilege that Rory and I had, which is years of being in parliament with the wiser heads, learning, listening, engaging. They'd been locked down because of the pandemic.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Who's egging us on to keep attacking one another and to do all this bloodletting? Because people like Alistair Campbell, and I think where Alistair Campbell is at any conservative should be on the other side of that argument, in my view.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The people who are egging a song to turn on each other, to form a circular firing squad are people like Alistair Campbell. I can tell you wherever Alistair Campbell is, no conservatives should be in the same place. The people egging assant to turn on one another are people like Alistair Campbell, and in my view, wherever Alistair Campbell is, any conservative should be on the other side of the argument.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The people, by the way, who are egging us on to divide and to turn on one another are people like Alistair Campbell. And wherever Alistair Campbell is, you want to be on the opposite side of the argument, in my view.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And Jara is bravery in a much more sort of animated way. And Amalwada is that you have a clear work rather than planet, you know whatever.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I speak Arabic better than I speak Kurdish in many ways because I was born in Baghdad and having a mother from Basra my Arabic was much more polished. I understand Kurdish. I'm reluctant to speak of it. I sound like a six-year-old, but I speak fluent Arabic.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Went and had a chat, and the student behind the desk happened to be captain of the show jumping team. And that was a good start. Then I began to understand about freedom and opportunity values. And those two words have defined my life in many ways.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So real, anyways, the Labour Party. I walked around Fresh as Fair. There was a little trestle table with a concertive collegiate forum”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So Completely accidental. And I tell you for why. So I had zero interest in politics growing up in school in England. I was much more interested in wanting to become a show jumper. Was yeah, very much so, and when I got to university, I got to University College London and I read chemical engineering, Torrington Place, across the road into the University of London Union, ULU, as it's referred to, and fresh as week I am walking into Yulu and there's a big bloke outside and I was about a third of the size. I was quite slim when I was at uni with goofy teeth and a sort of full head of hair. And this bloke was handing out the Socialist Workers Party magazine. And all I did, and I promise you this, all I did was politely say no thank you, not because I knew anything about it. I just had no interest in politics. At which point this guy decided he's going to literally physically attack me. I thought I was going to get beaten up because he was so angry with me for not taking his magazine, especially someone of my color, which really offended me. And I thought my way of getting back at him was to go and find out what the other party thinks.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Correct, exactly right. And he deliberately set up a decoy, so he called his office and said, I'm driving up north to the Kurdish areas because he had a project there. And instead, he went to Baghdad International Airport and got onto the Swiss air flight out of Baghdad.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And so we had about 24 hours warning over lunch at my aunt's home where they took my dad aside and said, look, they're going to come for you tomorrow. So, you know, try and get out.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The UK because of his history and because he did business with British companies, but also it was a pretty easy target to come after because the easiest accusation to make of anyone is that they are a British agent. If they happen to represent any British brand or any British company and what happened is that one of his employees in his business, who was a member of the Bath Party, had written a report because he was disgruntled, he hadn't received a promotion or a salary increase, that my father was a British agent fortuitously for him on my mother's side, her sister was married to someone who was actually quite high ranking in the Birth Party long past now, who clearly got or was in receipt of the message that they're going to come for my father.”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So my father had deep links to the United Kingdom. In fact, when my grandfather was busy being governor of the central bank and then becoming trade and industry minister, and actually I think he was interim oil minister when OPEC was set up, he sent my father to boarding school in England for a short period of time. And that was the link. So your dance spoke. So, my dad spoke reasonably good English, but obviously had gone back to the Middle East again. And that sort of link with the United Kingdom, and he had agencies from British businesses in Iran, which was a treacherous path to tread anyway, because Saddam had”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Rather than a political activist in the way his father was, my grandfather, but didn't want to join the party. And in Iraq, and this is the bit that actually then we can talk about sort of what happened post the removal of Saddam and the mistakes we made, Alistair and I are probably on the same page that Saddam needed removing, I think where I would differ is the consequence of what happened afterwards. The lack of planning and delacification, the lack of pushback, certainly from us as in the British government on the Americans to say, whoa, hold on a second. What are we going to do the next day? And can you show us the plan type of thing?”
2024-06-13 · The Rest Is Politics: Leading · 79. Nadhim Zahawi: Iraq, Conservatism, and why he backed Boris Johnson · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source