Dining across the divide: ‘If I made a point he couldn’t argue with, he said he didn’t want to talk about it’

4 hours ago 1

Rhodri, 47, Fishguard, Pembrokeshire

Rhodri, a balding, bearded man wearing a blue striped shirt

Occupation Farmer, and also has a construction business

Voting record Has voted for most parties, except Labour, “because he’s not a total idiot”. Has voted Ukip, but not Reform

Amuse bouche Played senior rugby from 18 until he was 44. Broke his nose seven times, but was only knocked out twice

Harriet, 59, Cardiff

A woman with long dark hair and glasses, wearing a patterned shirt and burgundy cardigan

Occupation Social scientist

Voting record Always Labour

Amuse bouche Can find lost cats through dreams. With her daughter’s cat, she dreamed it was near some chickens, and it was found under a chicken shed

For starters

Harriet He seemed to be quite set in his ways. Once he started talking, he really didn’t stop.

Rhodri Harriet seemed pleasant; showed up on time. She seemed fine.

Harriet We were brought poppadoms, then I had a vegetable biryani.

Rhodri I had a chicken tikka masala.

A balding, bearded man wearing a blue striped shirt and jeans, and a woman with long dark hair and glasses, wearing a patterned shirt and burgundy cardigan, sitting at a restaurant table

The big beef

Harriet He thought Israel had to defend themselves because Hamas are a terrorist organisation. I thought it was a bit limiting to call Hamas a terrorist organisation without taking into account the past history of the way the Palestinian people have been treated. Either way, I don’t think you can justify what I see as genocide. I don’t think he really acknowledged the scale of it.

Rhodri I don’t condone what Israel are doing, but I’m not surprised by it. If you go into a music festival and start gunning people down, you can’t really be surprised when there are repercussions. I think they have gone too far, but if you poke a bear with a stick, it’s going to rip your face off. She didn’t say anything that persuaded me.

Harriet When I tried to point out the history, he said he didn’t really know that much about it. And that seemed to be a pattern of our conversation generally: if I made a point he couldn’t argue with, he’d say he didn’t know about it or didn’t want to talk about it.

Rhodri You’ve got two sides that seem to want the destruction of the other. Hamas’s whole thing is the end to the Israeli state, and Israel’s whole thing is the end of Hamas. I think there would be more worth to bringing an end to Hamas than bringing an end to Israel.

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Sharing plate

Harriet I think we agreed that Labour weren’t doing a great job, but for different reasons. We agreed that the communication was really bad. He said he thought when Labour came in it was going to be an improvement in terms of having more truthful politicians, but they were just lying now. Which I agree with to an extent.

Rhodri Labour have gone after farmers, who don’t vote for them. They’ve gone for pensioners, who don’t vote for the Labour party. They’ve gone after small and medium businesses, who don’t vote for the Labour party. They’ve gone for people who send their kids to private schools, who don’t vote for the Labour party. It’s very targeted. I live in Pembrokeshire, and we get next to nothing from the Welsh government. If you think Wales is ignored by Westminster, we’re ignored by the Welsh government.

Harriet What I found difficult was that he was saying things like: “The Welsh government haven’t done anything for the people in the valleys.” And I would say: “They’re opening up a lot of infrastructure with train routes,” and because I’d said something I felt he didn’t want to hear, it seemed he just moved on to the next thing.

For afters

Harriet I thought the government didn’t listen to medical advice with Covid. They were basically just focused on it as an opportunity to make money for themselves. He thought they did the best they could; I completely disagreed with that. I thought the “Eat out to help out” thing was completely insane. He didn’t say anything that changed my mind.

Rhodri The thing with agriculture is, we were quite insulated from Covid. It made no difference to me at all. If anything it made my life easier. I’ve still got to feed cows in the morning, I’ve still got to plant crops, I wouldn’t see anybody anyway. We were flat out lambing at the beginning. It just meant there were fewer cars on the road.