Ben, 41, Manchester
Occupation Artistic director of a theatre company and former teacher
Voting record Voted Tory once and has regretted it ever since. Otherwise, Labour
Amuse bouche Is doing a PhD in how contemporary British pantomime is responding to evolving ideas of identity
Helen, 41, Manchester
Occupation Chartered accountant
Voting record Has voted Labour, Lib Dem and Green – anything but Tory. Now a Labour member
Amuse bouche Helen is a huge One Direction fan and went to their last tour heavily pregnant, with a sign saying “my due date is Harry Styles’s birthday”. He blew her a kiss
For starters
Ben We had olives, bread and some lovely, weird butter. Then cheese beignets and a pickled pear and goat’s cheese and toasted hazelnut salad. I was drinking and she wasn’t.
Helen When I told him I don’t drink he looked absolutely crestfallen for about five seconds, and then it was fine.
Ben I had rum baba in honour of my mother, who recently passed away. It was her favourite pudding.
Helen It was really good. And we disagreed agreeably.
The big beef
Ben It’s going to come out of the blue, but we had a real difference of opinion about the limits of democracy in a liberal system, or if you wanted to take another view, the limits of liberalism in a democratic system.
Helen He would take democracy completely to the logical conclusion – if a country thought you should chop somebody’s hand off for thieving or hang someone for murder, that’s OK. That’s what they’ve agreed as a country, and that’s no other country’s business. I totally disagree. I think it’s every country’s business if human rights are being broken.
Ben For instance, I’m a gay man, but I could accept it if a country voted to ban gays. I would never vote for that myself, I think that’s an awful idea, I love gays. I love them so much I married one. But I think people should be able to make their own rules about how they want to live in their society. People should be given the keys to their own destiny.
Helen His position was: do you think the UN charter on human rights is a static position? What happens if it was a bad person who set those static rights? Which is fair. But we’ve got a reasonable starting point. I’m more of a pragmatist than an ideologue.
Sharing plate
Ben We talked about education: she’s got kids, and I haven’t; we both had strong opinions. In my very socialist way, because I’ve taught some really disruptive kids, I think it’d be great to pull those kids out of mainstream education, so that the 80 or 90% who are working hard get a better education.
Helen He started teaching at a state school, and hated the crowd control element of it, the kids not being that interested in what he was trying to teach them. Then he went to a private school, where they were interested. I had a friend who had a similar experience, but went back to state schools in the end because she didn’t like the benign neglect the poor little rich kids were experiencing.
Ben She made a great argument about the benefits of seeing people from all walks of life while you’re at school, people who have mental health struggles, people with different economic circumstances.
Helen We all talk about what schools should be like, but the wraparound stuff that allows education to happen is more important. When I had my first child, we had 16 Sure Start centres in my borough and now we’ve got two.
For afters
Ben On immigration, we basically agreed. We talked about the Bibby Stockholm barge – she hadn’t seen it, so she wasn’t able to imagine what the rooms were like. Because we are Labour supporters, we ended up talking about how they had responded, and about the optics. It’s not great for Labour to say it’s not good enough for people to live like that when some of their voters live in worse conditions.
Helen A country should be judged by how it treats its most marginalised people, and sticking people on that barge seems horrendous. It’s not what I would want anyone to think of this country. And it doesn’t put anyone off, because if they’re desperate to leave where they are, a story about a barge on the BBC news is not going to help.
Takeaways
Ben I really enjoyed her company. She was witty and erudite, and when we disagreed, it was so well-mannered.
Helen I thought, “This person is going to be fun” within 30 seconds. I think my husband would like him as well.
Additional reporting: Kitty Drake
• Ben and Helen ate at 10 Tib Lane, Manchester
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