Lucas, 23, Blackpool
Occupation Works for the NHS
Voting record Labour in 2024, which he now regrets – is considering voting Green or for Your party, if they get it together in time for the next election
Amuse bouche Lucas travels regularly to Manchester as part of Carnifolk, a performance art collective. He usually plays the role of a magical bureaucrat who sends people to fill out forms
Rose-Marie, 69, north of England
Occupation Retired, has worked in many different fields – with the police, at a newspaper, as a hotel inspector
Voting record Always Conservative, except when she voted for Tony Blair in 1997. But last election, she couldn’t bring herself to vote Conservative, after everything they’d done with Covid
Amuse bouche For a while, Rose-Marie ran a French restaurant with her husband, who is originally from Argentina. When they sold up, many of their customers invited them over for dinner, because they created such a great atmosphere
For starters
Lucas Rose-Marie is much older than me and she’s done a lot more in her life – some really fascinating things. She’s been all around the world. She was a wonderful person to talk to, composed and sure of herself.
Rose-Marie I thought, “He looks young.” He was very pleasant, very smiley. Naive, I would call him. He must have used the F-word about 15 times. It wasn’t offensive or aggressive, it was just “that fucking thing” and “those fucking people”. I don’t think he even realised he was doing it.
Lucas We both picked banquet C, which started with duck pancakes.
Rose-Marie The second course was a chilli prawn thing, then a chicken sweet and sour – all delicious. I had two glasses of wine. He had two beers.
The big beef
Lucas The big point that we didn’t agree on was immigration. I would consider myself a European, a proud multiculturalist and very pro-immigration. Even down to the genetics of it all; the island nation that we are can’t survive without immigrants. Even the 19th- and 20th-century history of ideas – we owe a lot to the people who have come here. She was very staunchly anti-immigration, I’d go so far as to say conspiratorial.
Rose-Marie I laid back on my chair with my arms folded, listening to what he had to say, and I felt like he was reading from a book on Trotsky and waving his arms about. Immigration is totally out of control. People are paying higher and higher taxes – it’s all going on immigrants who have no intention of working. It needs somebody strong to sort it out. And once the country is on a better footing, then it’ll be up to people to vote for something a bit more moderate.
Sharing plate
Lucas We are both very much for nuclear power. I was quite surprised about that. She believes in climate change, but I said, corporations get away with their climate-destroying policies by persuading you it’s your fault for not recycling enough. She didn’t agree with that.
Rose-Marie Without capitalism, where would we be? Sure, there are a lot of companies that take the Michael. But he was on a roll – he was saying that he was a total socialist, bordering on communism. Then he went on about energy and windmills and all the rest of it. I said, “We have a sea in Scotland that we can have lots of oil, lots of gas out of, until we sort our energy problems out.”
For afters
Lucas I don’t like Trump; I compared him to a ghoulish creature of the village. There were economics points that she agreed with him over. And I was, like, look at the number of times he’s bankrupted himself …
Rose-Marie He started ranting about Trump and the trouble he’s getting us into, comparing it to the Cuban missile crisis. I had to say, “Son, hold on a minute, the Cuban missile crisis? Do you know who the president at the time was?” And he said, “No, not really.” Trump’s a Marmite character, there’s things I hate about him and things I think he’s done well, and that’s it.
Takeaway
Lucas We were quite present. I really liked her company.
Rose-Marie We didn’t argue, but we had different opinions. I think it was to do with his naivety.
Additional reporting: Kitty Drake
Lucas and Rose-Marie ate at Michael Wan’s Mandarin in Blackpool
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