Keir Starmer is back at the despatch box for Prime Minister’s Questions today and his honeymoon period is unquestionably over. He will face hostile questions on the winter fuel payment, on arms export licences to Israel, and on whether Labour plans to raise taxes in the autumn budget. And he will want to talk about the Grenfell Inquiry, which is publishing its report shortly. That report will be uncomfortable reading mainly for Conservatives, but the recommendations will be Labour’s to implement – or not –and the pressure will be on the Prime Minister to accept them in full.
Starmer has made public injustices and the system not working for ordinary people one of his major themes, and he will want to expand on that today. But one of his more political themes is the ‘mess’ left by the Conservatives and how all the difficult decisions this government has to take are the fault of the Tories. At yesterday’s Treasury questions, Rachel Reeves was grilled by MPs for a good 20 minutes on the winter fuel payment, and spent most of the session enforcing the ‘mess’ narrative. For once, Jeremy Hunt didn’t go on the counter-attack, and instead chose to talk about cronyism allegations. Those claims about donors and other key figures getting plum jobs and access to Downing Street will likely form part of the Conservative attack at PMQs today.
What was striking was that while Labour MPs contributed to the winter fuel payment discussion, it was largely to try to reinforce the Chancellor’s arguments. There was clearly an organised operation with backbenchers in the governing party backing Reeves. Only Rachael Maskell, who has been very outspoken on the payment, was openly critical. It will be interesting to see whether the same happens today when Starmer is on his feet.
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