In this episode Nick Anstead is joined by Dr Ruth Garland of Goldsmiths, University of London and Spencer Livermore, Labour Party political strategist and member of the House of Lords.

They discuss how political communication has changed in the UK in the past twenty years, and think about the extent to which the New Labour model of message discipline remains an effective or desirable model of communication. They also discuss the recent rise of more populist communicators. Should we consider politicians like Boris Johnson to be effective political communicators?