Angela Eagle: Labour would speak to other parties to get a Queen’s Speech through

On the Sunday Politics just now, Angela Eagle shifted Labour’s position on what it would do in the event of a hung parliament. Previously, Labour has insisted that if it was a minority government it would simply propose a Queen’s Speech and dare the other parties, and in particular the SNP to vote it down.

But Eagle told Andrew Neil that in the event of a hung parliament Labour ‘would speak to any party that has got representation in the House of Commons in order to try to build a majority for a Queen’s Speech that the country desperately needs’. What makes Eagle’s comments so significant is that she is the shadow Leader of the House of Commons. This means that Labour can’t dismiss her comments as simply someone talking about matters they don’t understand, for parliamentary procedure is part of her purview.

The Tories are already busy trying to make hay out of Eagle’s remarks. I suspect that the Labour leadership will be furious that she has said what she said. But given her position, it will be hard for Labour to convincingly disown them.