Oh dear. It has been a pretty grim night for Sir Keir Starmer’s party. Loyalists have been out spinning desperately, with Science Secretary Peter Kyle given the thankless task of defending the indefensible on the overnight shows. One ray of sunshine which the party is citing is the North Tyneside mayoralty, where Ros Jones narrowly held off Reform’s challenge by barely 400 votes.
So it must be a shame for No. 10 then that Jones’ first act as a newly re-elected mayor was to turn her guns on her own party leader. Speaking to the BBC, she declared that ‘national government needs to look and see what people are saying.’ Asked by Laura Kuenssberg what, er, exactly she meant, Jones replied:
I’m sure they’re saying the same as I have. I wrote as soon as the winter fuel allowance was actually muted, and I said it was wrong. And therefore, I stepped in immediately and used our household support fund to ensure no one in Doncaster went cold during the winter.
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