After a weekend of number crunching and sleep deprivation, Sam Freedman joined Sunday's Power Test crew to discuss the local election results and what they suggest about the tough choices facing a future Labour government. Sam and the team looked back at a week of high drama in Scottish politics and chewed the fat on Ayesha and Sam's recent sit-down with former Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale.

In a post-election Sunday special, The Power Test’s Commissioning Editor Charlotte Aldritt was joined by Sam Freedman and elections analyst Lewis Baston for a deep dive into what the results tell us about the tough policy and political choices facing a potential Labour government.

On the key policy decisions facing Labour in government, Power Test host Sam said that getting the keys to Number 10 would force Labour into an electoral corner on NIMBY-ism: “If they are serious about taking on the planning system, they will lose a lot of these council seats”.

“The question is whether [Labour] will have the political will to take on the powerful forces of NIMBY politics - this will be a defining question of Starmer’s first term”, Sam said.

The team discussed how a Labour government should work with the last Tory man standing, Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen, and the possible bust-ups between increasingly powerful Labour Mayors and a Labour government on spending.

Reflecting on the latest episode with former Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale, Sam and the team chewed the fat on the political management of devolution within the Labour Party, Labour’s proposed Council for the Regions and Nations, and whether constitutional reform would be “downplayed” on the list of priorities in Starmer’s first term.

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Defence expert and army reservist Peter Apps joined The Power Team team to dissect the latest episode and discuss how a future Labour Government might step up to international security challenges

Sir Lawrence Freedman, the renowned academic (and Sam’s dad!), told Ayesha and Sam in the latest episode that he believed the UK was facing its gravest challenge since the Second World War and that a Labour Government would need to increase defence spending significantly.

Speaking on The Debrief on Monday this week, hosted by Flo Hutchings, Peter agreed and warned that the UK would need to “step up” to prepare to fight a future war to deter further Russian aggression and maintain European security.

Joining from Washington DC, The Power Test co-founder Ed Owen, a former special adviser in the UK Foreign Office, believed that the need to bolster defence and security in Europe would encourage a future Labour Government to build closer ties with the EU, not least in the event of a Trump Presidency being elected.

Peter believed, however, that influential foreign and security experts close to Trump would ensure that some of the more lurid threats to undermine NATO would not, in fact, be carried through.

The Power Test's Commissioning Editor, Charlotte Aldritt, said that increasing defence spending significantly would put a huge amount of pressure on other domestic policy priorities. But, she felt that Labour would win public support for a strong response to the challenging events in Ukraine.

Responding to Sir Lawrence’s concerns about Labour pursuing an “ethical foreign policy”, Peter felt David Lammy’s recent essay laying out Labour’s thinking rightly stressed the need for strong values to underpin policy.

With such foundational principles in place, he said, there would be a public acceptance of the need, at times, to exercise a pragmatic approach towards regimes and governments the UK had to engage with but were not always to our liking.

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So it was Sunday again, and while thousands of others were out running the London marathon, the political geeks that we are sat down for a bit of post-match analysis from last week’s episode of The Power Test - when Josh Simons, the Director of influential think tank Labour Together joined Sam and Ayesha for a full and frank conversation about the shape of a future Labour government.

On this week’s Debrief, Jon Will Chambers, Charlotte Aldritt and The Power Test co-founder Ed Owen picked up where the pod left off, joined by The Guardian’s Aletha Adu. The crew take you through the secret world of think tanks - how they operate and what they exist to do - as well as the inside story of how Labour Together was formed, and how it has developed since.

Getting stuck into the question of who is influencing the thinking of the Labour Party, its leadership and shadow cabinet, the Debrief also talks about the shape of Labour’s agenda - and whether it really has a plan that can hit the ground running and help the party secure a second term in power, should it win the next election, so that it can truly deliver on its plan for a decade of national renewal.

Lastly, this week we look at the future - and how Labour can avoid becoming too reliant on a small group of people for its thinking, and even what a post-PM Starmer party might even look like.

Come and join us as we discuss our takeaways from the episode - and send us your thoughts, ideas and feedback! We’ll be back next week for the Debrief at 7pm on Sunday, over on Twitter Spaces - ready to discuss Sam and Ayesha’s conversation with Sam’s Dad - Lawrence Freedman, all about Labour’s agenda for the world beyond Britain’s shores.

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