Keir Starmer has accused Kemi Badenoch of losing control of her party in just six months after a leaked recording revealed Robert Jenrick has been talking up a pact with Reform.
The PM said “the mask has slipped” as he questioned where the Shadow Justice Secretary is during an ill-tempered PMQs session. He branded Mr Jenrick “a man doing everything he can to replace her”.
He said: “Mr Speaker, the mask has just slipped, just one week before the election because the Shadow Justice Secretary is not here, a man who is doing he can to replace her, a man who most members want as a leader of their party, has admitted the Tories and Reform are working together.”
He claimed there was a “coalition between Reform and the Tories being formed behind her back – we know what means when the Shadow Justice Secretary and the member from Clacton cook up their joint manfiesto… in six short months she’s lost control of her party.”
In a spiky session he also urged MPs not to use trans people as a “political football” as he accused his predecessor, Rishi Sunak, of demeaning himself at the dispatch box.
Following Ms Badenoch’s attacks over transgender issues, Mr Starmer hit back: “The only fiction here is the idea she delivered anything in office.
“She held the post of minister for women and equalities for two years and she did precisely nothing. She provided no clarity on the law, did nothing to improve women’s lives which got materially worse under her watch.
“And they talk for example about hospitals and mixed-sex wards. Up hill and down dale, what happened in the last decade? The use of mixed-sex wards in our NHS rose by 2,000% and there’s a pattern of behaviour here. Women and equalities minister failed to do anything for women, the trade minister who failed to get a trade deal with the US, the business minister who failed to get a deal with British Steel.
“She’s a spectator, not a leader.”
Labour MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy has called for rules around blood donations to be updating – saying failure to do so is “costing lives”.
Hailing a new blood donation centre in Brixton, in her constituency, she said rules around travel and iron tests are seeing willing Black donors turned away.
She said: “Of course, blood donation must be safe, but failing to reduce these guidelines is costing lives.” Ms Ribeiro-Addy said that with sickle cell anaemia cases rising, demand for blood from people of African descend is outstripping supply.
Mr Starmer said: “Increasing donor diversity is a priority for the NHS, and we’re working to increase blood donations by engaging with communities are more likely to have this blood type.“
The PM wished Liberal Democrat MP Steve Darling’s guide dog a happy birthday as he began his Prime Minister’s Questions remarks.
Responding to a question from Mr Darling about the impact of the increase to employers’ national insurance on the tourism industry, Sir Keir said: “May I start by wishing Jennie his guide dog a very happy birthday, I think for yesterday, six years old.
“Well she doesn’t look particularly interested in my answer I have to say.”
Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey has challenged the PM to ensure MPs can vote on a trade deal with the US.
It comes amid fears the UK may be forced to accept lower food standards on imports. He asked: “(Farmers are) worried that a bad US deal could see American agri business undercut them with inferior meat. So will the Prime Minister guarantee a vote in this House on any trade deal that he agrees with the United States?”
Mr Starmer responded: “He raises a really important point… We will negotiate as he would expect in the national interest to uphold the highest animal welfare standards. We are making progress on that.”
Keir Starmer has gone on the attack after Robert Jenrick’s remarks about a pact with Reform – branding him “a man doing everything he can to replace her”.
He said: “Mr Speaker, the mask has just slipped, just one week before the election because the Shadow Justice Secretary is not here, a man who is doing he can to replace her, a man who most members want as a leader of their party, has admitted the Tories and Reform are working together.”
He claimed there was a “coalition between Reform and the Tories being formed behind her back – we know what means when the Shadow Justice Secretary and the member from Clacton cook up their joint manfiesto… in six short months she’s lost control of her party.”
The Prime Minister goes on to say that transgender people should not be treated as a “political football”.
He referred back to Rishi Sunak, who shamefully made a joke about trans people while the mother of murdered teen Brianna Ghey looked on.
Mr Starmer said: “When we lose sight with that approach to make this a political football, which has happened in the past, we end up with the spectacle of a decent man – and he was a decent man, the previous prime minister – diminishing himself at this despatch box making promise jokes whilst the mother… watched from the public gallery.”
As expected, Kemi Badenoch goes in on transgender issues.
She asks the PM: “Does the Prime Minister now accept that when he said that it was the law, the trans women were women, he was wrong?”
Mr Starmer says it is the time to “lower the temperature and conduct this debate with the care and compassion” needed. He said: “I welcome the Supreme Court ruling on this issue. It brings clarity, and it will give confidence to women and to service providers.”
Keir Starmer opens by paying tribute to the Pope, who died on Monday.
The PM will attend the pontiff’s funeral in Rome on Saturday. He praised Pope Francis’ “courage and leadership”. He went on to wish MPs a happy St George’s Day.
Keir Starmer has branded Reform UK “a bunch of moaners without any answers” as he shrugged off the local election threat from Nigel Farage.
The Prime Minister turned his fire on the right-wing party, saying: “They stand on the side lines moaning, that’s all they do.” And ahead of St George’s Day, he said Labour was the “patriotic party” and accused Reform of fawning over Russian tyrant Vladimir Putin.
Read the full interview with Keir Starmer here
Kemi Badenoch has been accused of already throwing in the towel before next week’s local elections.
The under-fire Tory leader conceded the results will be “very difficult” for her party as experts predict hundreds of Conservative councillors will lose their seats. But she went on to claim it was a positive thing that newspapers are no longer filled with stories of Tory squabbling.
Ms Badenoch told the BBC’s Radio 4 Today programme: “We lost last year in a historic defeat. These elections next week are going to be very difficult for Conservatives because the last time we fought them [2021] we were on a high.
“Two-thirds of the seats four years ago, we won. There’s no way we’re going to be able to do that again.”
The Tory chief also bizarrely claimed stories of Conservative infighting and rows no longer existed. She said: “I think the biggest thing that people will notice is if you picked up a paper this time last year you would have been reading about Tory rows and infighting.
“All of that is gone.” The comments were seized on by the Lib Dems, who accused her of giving up. Deputy leader Daisy Cooper said: ” Kemi Badenoch has already thrown in the towel before a single vote has been counted in next week’s local elections.
“The Conservative Party doesn’t have any answers on the big issues facing the country, because their fingerprints of failure are all over them.”
Keir Starmer no longer believes trans women are women, Downing Street has said.
The PM is expected to be pressed about a Supreme Court ruling that could pave the way for transgender people to be barred from same-sex spaces. On Tuesday, asked if the Prime Minister still believes trans women are women, the PM’s official spokesman said: “No. The Supreme Court judgement has made clear that when looking at the Equality Act, a woman is a biological woman – that is set out clearly by court judgement.”
In 2022, Mr Starmer told The Times: “A woman is a female adult, and in addition to that trans women are women, and that is not just my view — that is actually the law.”
Tory leadership hopeful Robert Jenrick has spectacularly broken ranks with Kemi Badenoch as a leaked recording revealed he may push to join forces with Reform.
The Shadow Justice Secretary, who was runner up in the divided Conservatives’ most recent leadership contest, said he is “determined” to “bring this coalition together” before the next general election. The remarks reveal a deep split within the party leadership over how to deal with Nigel Farage, with Ms Badenoch emphatically ruling out a deal.
The Tory leader now faces pressure to sack Mr Jenrick. He told young Tories at the UCL Conservative assocation last month that he would try “one way or another” to make sure the two parties do not compete next time around. In a recording shared with Sky News, he said: “[Reform UK] continues to do well in the polls. And my worry is that they become a kind of permanent or semi-permanent fixture on the British political scene. And if that is the case, and I say, I am trying to do everything I can to stop that being the case, then life becomes a lot harder for us, because the right is not united.
“And then you head towards the general election, where the nightmare scenario is that Keir Starmer sails in through the middle as a result of the two parties being disunited. I don’t know about you, but I’m not prepared for that to happen.
“I want the fight to be united. And so, one way or another, I’m determined to do that and to bring this coalition together and make sure we unite as a nation as well.”
Ms Badenoch has repeatedly ruled out a deal with Mr Farage. In an interview with The Telegraph in March she mocked the rival party, saying: “Only five of them and they’ve already had a massive squabble and lost 20% of their MPs. If they can’t unite with five people, how are they going to unite the Right?”
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