New Statesman Debate | This house believes that Britain’s best days are behind it
Sat 25 Apr 2026 | 4:00pm - 5:30pm
There is in Britain today a widespread mood of public despair, a deep premonition of imminent national decline. According to Ipsos, just over half of Britons feel worse off since Keir Starmer was elected. Going further back, 60% feel the country has gone backwards since 2022. Both right and left have been appealing to an idealised past – before the Tories wrecked Britain, say Labour and Reform, or before New Labour did, says the right generally. At the same time, both left and right have been trying to imagine radical solutions for Britain’s ills, from the Anglo-Futurism of the right, to the radical utopianism of the left. It seems the political landscape could be remapped, not in terms of left and right, but of optimists and pessimists. Should we brace ourselves for a future in which things just keep getting worse, or should we embrace the possibility of genuine progress?
Join our politically-minded panel, featuring Pratinav Anil, Rachel Clarke, Maurice Glasman, John Kampfner, Gary Stevenson, Polly Toynbee, to decide where you sit on this issue.
Chaired by Anoosh Chakelian, Editor of The New Statesman.
Venue: TTP Stage (Cambridge Union)
Duration: 1.5 hours
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Speaker Biographies
Pratinav Anil: Marxist historian and critic, writing regularly for The Times, The Guardian and UnHerd. He is a lecturer at St Edmund Hall at the University of Oxford.
Rachel Clarke: a British writer and physician, specialising in palliative and end of life care, and writer of multiple books about medicine and life as a doctor.
Maurice Glasman: a Labour peer and intellectual founder of the Blue Labour tendency in British politics.
John Kampfner: journalist and former editor of The New Statesman, whose books include Blair’s Wars and Why the Germans Do it Better.
Gary Stevenson: a British YouTuber, author, economist and former financial trader known for his economic commentary and activism against economic inequality.
Polly Toynbee: veteran Guardian columnist and author and vice- resident of Humanists UK. Her most recent book is An Uneasy Inheritance: My Family and other Radicals.
