PMQs: Starmer seeks to be more prime ministerial than the Prime Minister

If people were watching Prime Minister’s Questions on BBC Two today, it would have come after a Politics Live discussion around whether Keir Starmer can truly capitalise on these tough times for Boris Johnson. The Labour leader showed how he plans to do just that in his exchange with the Prime Minister that followed. Much like his coronavirus address to the nation on Monday, in which he sat in front of a Union Jack and talked about a “leadership that the country can trust”, Starmer today presented himself as more prime ministerial than the Prime Minister. Kicking off with a reminder of the serious Omicron situation and a plea for people to “protect themselves, the NHS and their loved ones” by getting vaccinated, his opening remarks could have been lifted from one of Johnson’s recent speeches. Then he raised the embarrassingly large Tory rebellion from last night.

Daring the Prime Minister to deepen divisions between himself and his backbenchers, Starmer asked: “Would he agree that the 100 Conservative members who voted against plan B measures last night voted against steps which are necessary to protect the NHS and to protect lives?” Johnson did not take the bait, but instead insisted that the new restrictions went through with Conservative votes. (This is true in the sense that the Tory rebels did not make up over 50% of their party, but obviously not true in the very real sense that the measures would have been rejected if opposition MPs had opposed them.)

“If further votes are needed,” Starmer said proudly, “Labour MPs will follow my leadership and we will always put the national interest first”. In fact, there was a small Labour rebellion on Tuesday evening, leading to two frontbench resignations – but as it was dwarfed by the defiance of Tory MPs and barely noticed, Starmer was able to make this argument confidently. The Labour leader followed this up with the demand that the Prime Minister “get his house in order”, and stepped up this criticism in subsequent questions, talking bluntly of Johnson’s “weak” leadership, of “overpromise after overpromise until reality catches up”, and of how “his own MPs no longer trust him”. “He claims no rules were broken,” Starmer continued, “I don’t believe him! His MPs don’t believe him, and nor do the British public.”

Johnson responded in the only way he can: by harking back to his sole achievement so far in the job, getting Brexit done (however imperfectly). While Labour has “wibble wobbled” during the pandemic, the Prime Minister made tough decisions such as leaving the European Medicines Agency, he said. Johnson also used his new attack line of accusing the opposition party of being political, concluding the exchange with: “we vaccinate, they vacillate; they jabber, we jab; they play party politics, we get on with the job”. He hasn’t thought of an alliterative phrase for the last bit yet.

Voters in focus groups have consistently complained about what they see as inappropriate point-scoring amid Covid, yes. But in the current context of story after story on Conservative rule-breaking, Johnson’s new attack line will struggle to compete with Starmer’s damning statement that the man in charge has “no hope of regaining the moral authority” and is “the worst possible Prime Minister at the worst possible time”.