About this episode
HARDtalk’s Stephen Sackur speaks to Ed Balls, former Labour MP and UK cabinet minister. When elected politicians are booted out by the voters there's no safety net to soften their fall. And Ed Balls has the bruises to prove it. He was one of the key players of the UK Labour Party's era of political dominance under those partners and rivals Blair and Brown. He was a formidable political operator whose ambition was to lead his party. He failed in that, and last year lost his seat as the unravelling of the Labour Party began in earnest. How does a political heavyweight make sense of failure?