francis scarr, a russian media analyst at bbc monitoring, but first of all let's also bring in chris curtis, editor in chief of broadcast magazine. chris came a very good to have you back on the media show, and i've got to ask you about two of the biggest names in bbc news, emily maitlis and john sopel, both leaving it altogether and heading to the media company global to make a podcast, to do a show for the bbc as well and of course all of this comes not long after andrew marr left bbc and also went to global. so i wonder, chris, how you assess this announcement? i mean, it's been characterised as a brain drain and it's pretty clear that there is a string of high—profile talent. i mean, it was not that long ago that eddie marr made the same move. there's a lot of attraction, i think, in those big name presenters moving away from the bbc. if it gives them a little bit more freedom. and it might be editorial freedom given bbc�*s crackdown on impartiality. but it also might be sort of commercialfreedom, too, because at the moment, it's difficult for those guys to write a column in the mail on

chris can curtis is from opinion. he joins us live. s i suppose we expt, quite a big difference between the overall population and conservative voters themselves. >> yes, indeed. what we have seen now is a majority of the population and actually a sizable minority of conservative voters, certainly enough to -- for the prime minister to worry about, don't think the prime minister is telling the truth are pretty sure he breck the rules and increasingly think he should go as prime minister. that's the finds of the latest poll. if you're looking for one bit of good news for the prime minister, what we have seen is that a sizable minority of voters including most of the people within boris johnson's voting coalition tell us they think that this is actually now becoming a bit of a distraction from more important issues that we should be focused on. obviously that's a big line for the conservatives and the prime minister. however when you ask, how do you think we should move on and focus on other issues? they tell us probably by getting rid of

well, earlier i spoke to chris curtis, head of political polling at 0pinium.n lower in by—elections, we have seen that historically in this parliament, people are just less driven to turn out than they are in normal elections. secondly, because of the circumstances of this election, if you were a labour voter in that seat, you have not got anybody to vote for so you are probably better off staying at home, same if you are someone who votes for the liberal democrats or the greens. the other reason this one was so bad compared to previous by—elections is because it is happening at a time when conservatives are really doing incredibly badly in the polls. about half of those who voted conservative are not confident that they would vote conservative again if there was an election tomorrow so if you have a by—election where, even if you are a conservative voter, you are not happy about voting conservative and you do not have an alternative, your best bet is probably better to stay at home. how easy is it draw wider conclusions from this one by—election given that it