Sunday shows: Starmer says hope of Labour in power has ‘turned into belief’

Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg

Labour leader Keir Starmer declared that the hope of a Labour government has “turned into a belief in a Labour government”, telling viewers that he has seen “signs” that voters are returning to the party and that the party has made “real progress” since 2019.

• On what the next few months will be like for consumers: “We’re in a very serious situation when it comes to our economics, a very fragile situation. We’re going into a very very difficult winter… It’s on the back of 12 years of Tory failure. We’ve had an economy that hasn’t really grown very much for 12 years. We’ve had wages which haven’t really moved for 12 years, because they’ve taken the wrong decisions… And now we’ve got this decision on Friday to take a very risky approach to the future driven by this ideology, this argument, wrong-headed argument in my view, that if you simply allow the rich to get richer, somehow that money will trickle down into the pockets of all the rest of us. It didn’t work last time. It is wrong-headed, and it’s completely the wrong way to approach what is going to be a very difficult winter.”
• On whether Labour would freeze energy bills for two years: “We’ll freeze for six months was our plan… At the time, the government said they wouldn’t do that. We made the argument, they’ve now accepted that’s the only thing to do. The divide now, the political question, is who is going to pay.”
• Pressed on Labour only offering to freeze bills for six months: “Our plan is for six months. Obviously, in April, we have to look at what the situation is, what the forecasts are then, and we need to have a longer-term answer to this. But the key issue at the moment is, who is going to pay for this freeze.”
• Pressed on whether people need to know now what Labour would do: “We’ve set out a plan for the next six months fully costed and we’ve explained exactly how it works, a price freeze and including to be paid for by the excess oil and gas profits. After that, of course we need another plan, I don’t shy away from that, but we need to know what the forecasts are. We didn’t put our plan on the table until the middle of August, because we needed to know exactly what the forecasts were for this winter. Nobody knows the forecasts for next April.”
• On Labour’s green energy plan: “We need to double onshore wind, we need to triple solar and we need to quadruple offshore wind… The prize here is huge, which is lower prices in the longer run, lower prices for people on the bills that they’re going to pay, which is crucially important, and this isn’t for the short term, this isn’t a short-term fix. This is a mission that would actually bring those bills down… but it’s also about energy security, because it would make us less reliant on the international market, which is what’s driving those prices at the moment.”
• On how achievable Labour’s plan is: “Of course it’s an ambition, it’s absolutely doable. It’s going to be difficult… But one of the problems that we face is that, over the last 12 years, the government hasn’t done this. So if you come to wind turbines, they as good as stopped onshore wind turbines in 2015.”
• Pressed on how reliable renewables are: “You’ll always have a transition with oil and gas… but we’ve got to have the ambition to get off fossil fuels when it comes to our power. This is a plan that can be delivered.”
• On whether fossil fuels will still be there as fallback: “It might be there as a fallback. But the plan is 2030, for all of our power, clean power. And we think you can double onshore wind power, triple solar and quadruple offshore wind power. It can be down. We need a government that is prepared to partner with business on an ambition that can be turned into a result in 2030.”
• On whether people’s pay should rise with inflation: “Of course people want their pay to go up… Wages have been stagnant for ten years or so, prices are going up, and therefore it is completely understandable that so many people want the wages to go up to match. What I’ve said, what we’ve said, is that we’ll get the Low Pay Commission to set the living wage, not just by reference to the median wage, but also by reference to the cost of living, so that you lock in for the long term an increase in the living wage which takes account of the cost of living.”
• Pressed on whether people should expect their pay to rise in line with inflation: “It’s reasonable for people to want a pay rise. And each of the trade unions involved in negotiating is negotiating the best deal that they think is right for their members in the particularly sector. It’s not for me to wade in and saying I think it should be this amount or that amount.”
• On whether it is “reasonable” for workers to go on strike if they do not get pay rises: “It is reasonable to expect that wages are set taking account of the cost of living, which is going up. And that’s what we will put in through the Low Pay Commission.”
• Pressed on whether he backs people going on strike: “When people go on strike, it is a last resort at the end of negotiations and I can quite understand how people are driven to that… And I support the right of individuals to go on strike. I support the trade unions doing the job that they are doing in representing their members. I want to see the strikes resolved as do everybody who is on strike.”
• On why frontbenchers have not been more visible on strikes: “The single most important thing I can do for everybody that is on strike today, everybody that is struggling to pay their bills, is to usher in a Labour government. Because when we do that, we can have day-one employment rights for every single person… and a way of settling pay disputes with fair pay agreements.”
• Pressed on why that cannot include joining picket lines: “I work with the trade unions all the time. We’ve got a long history in our party of that link with the trade union movement, and it will be long into the future… My job is to discuss this with trade union leaders as I do on a daily basis, understand the disputes… but my job as leader of the Labour Party is not the same job as the leader of a trade union. My job is to make sure that we get the Labour Party from opposition where we can just say things but not do things into power where we can do things.”
• On whether Labour would reintroduce the top rate of tax that the government scrapped: “Yes. I do think that the choice to have tax cuts for those that are earning hundred of thousands of pounds is the right choice when our economy is struggling in the way it is… I would reverse the decision that they made on Friday.”
• On whether Labour supports the cut to the basic rate of income tax: “Yes. I’ve long made the argument that we should reduce the tax burden on working people… No, we wouldn’t reverse that.”
• Asked how Labour would fund social care without the increase in National Insurance: “An incoming Labour government would inherit a situation where that money has been paid by this government through general taxation.”
• On the current state of the Labour Party: “What I’m seeing increasingly is people looking to the Labour Party to provide the answers to the challenges that we’ve got. I see a very big political divide because you’ve got the Conservative Party now saying the future of this country is one where the rich get richer and we offer nothing meaningful to working people. You’ve got the Labour Party saying we do need to grow our economy… but we need to recognise who grows this economy… I would grow the economy from the bottom up and the middle out to reflect the reality of our country.”
• Pressed on whether he thinks Labour could win an election: “We were very pleased with the local election results in May this year, where we did better than expected and we tracked that against what we need to do for the next general election. I’m very pleased with the progress we’re making… But it’s more than that, Laura, it’s this sense that people are looking to the Labour Party for the answers to the big challenges…. As you go out and about, you can feel that sense.”
• On whether voters are coming back to Labour: “I do see signs that’s happening… That’s a big step from where we were in 2019. I’m not complacent, every vote has to be earned. We need to do much more, but are we heading in the right direction? Yes… The hope of a Labour government has turned into a belief in a Labour government… If you consider where we were in 2019. To now be in a position where there’s a belief that Labour will win the next general election is real progress.”

Sophy Ridge on Sunday

Shadow Climate Change and Net Zero Secretary Ed Miliband said Labour’s green energy plan is a “world-leading commitment” that would cut people’s energy bills, improve the UK’s energy security, create jobs and put the country at the “forefront of the fight against the climate crisis”.

• On whether he would be pleased to see Andy Burnham return to Westminster: “Definitely. Andy is doing a brilliant job as mayor of Greater Manchester… Andy is a great talent for our party, and he can serve us in multiple ways.”
• On Labour’s green energy plan: “A zero-carbon system. This is a world-leading commitment that we are making. And why are we doing it Sophy, it would make a difference in a number of ways. First, it would cut people’s energy bills, because let’s be clear, the only way to get out of this fossil fuels crisis, the only way to cut bills, is green energy… It will save £93bn off bills over the coming years. It will give us energy security, we won’t be relying on Putin’s gas for example. Homegrown, renewable and nuclear power. Thirdly, it will create jobs, half a million jobs for our country, and it puts us in the forefront of the fight against the climate crisis.”
• On how much the plan will cost: “The vast majority of this will come, not from the taxpayer, but will come from private investment. You see private investors are lining up… for wind energy and solar energy but they can’t because government blocks them on onshore wind, blocks them on solar and doesn’t make the investments we need.”
• Pressed on the cost of the plan: “We’ve made a pledge of a £28bn each and every year, a green prosperity plan pledge, we think this will cost around £2bn a year to make this happen, so a small proportion of that pledge. And it is the right thing to do for the country.”
• On whether the party should be looking at other energy sources to ensure affordability: “Gas is sold on a global market, the price we pay for North Sea gas, or fracked gas if that ever happens, is exactly the same as we pay for imported gas… We’ve got to use the North Sea, we’re going carry on using the North Sea. But if what you’re asking me is if fracking or some dash for gas in the North Sea is going to be the answer, it is not going to be the answer, because it won’t bring down prices.”
• On whether the £28bn per year spending commitment is the right approach given current levels of borrowing: “Absolutely, it is… The whole reason we’re making this investment is that we get a return… You’re going to be hearing a series of policies from me, from Rachel Reeves, from Keir Starmer, about how making those investments will create the jobs across our country that we need.”
• On trickle-down economics: “The International Monetary Fund, hardly a group of loony lefties… says that actually if you look, increasing the incomes of the top part of our society does not lead to higher growth, quite the opposition.”
• Asked whether Labour would reverse the scrapping of the additional tax band for the highest earners: “We’ve said we’re against it. We said it’s the wrong thing to do… Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves set out tax policy, and Keir will be saying more about this quite shortly. But let me be clear, we’re going to be consistent in our election manifesto with our opposition to the 45p tax cut.”
• On the cut to the basic rate of income tax: “No, we don’t think that should be reversed.”
• On how he would sum up a future Labour government in a word: “It says on our conference backdrop ‘A fairer, greener future’, and that’s what we’re about.”
• On whether Labour needs to be bolder: “There’s a kind of cycle to these things that at the beginning of the parliament you tend to be less specific, more thematic. I think what you’re seeing from Labour this week and what you’re going to see in the coming days and the first thing today, this is a bold plan we’re announcing… you’re going to be seeing a lot more of that in the days to come.”

Great Manchester mayor Andy Burnham said it is right to be “more open minded” about more public ownership to ensure that the UK is less exposed to rising energy costs. He declared that he is a “little disappointed” Labour has ruled out electoral reform and told the party to “listen to hear the mood of conference on that particular issue”.

• On the mini-Budget: “I can still barely believe what we saw on Friday. We’re in the midst of the worst cost-of-living crisis we’ve every experienced… and then you have a Budget that splurges billions on the wealthiest people in the country and actually doesn’t do anything meaningful to get people through the autumn and the winter. So honestly, I can barely believe it… Friday’s Budget was a flagrant act of vandalism on the social cohesion of this country. The government has drawn battle lines with working people… I think Labour conference now has a chance to pick up that battle, speak for ordinary people and in doing so, put the government on borrowed time.”
• Asked whether Labour should commit to reversing Truss’ tax cuts: “Personally, I would have said this wasn’t a time for tax cuts. This was a time to use what money was there to help people for instance on benefits. There should have been an uplift to Universal Credit.”
• Pressed on whether Labour should commit to reverse the tax cuts: “I think I answered it, I said: “Yes, this wasn’t the time for tax cuts.” I think money needs to be in the system now… That money should have been used instead to help people with their pay packets.”
• Pressed again on whether Labour in government should reverse the changes to income tax: “Yes I am saying that, because I don’t think it’s the most targeted way of using the resources that we’ve got.”
• On public ownership: “We’ve got to a position in this country where people can’t afford life’s essentials. They can’t afford water, they can’t afford energy, they can’t afford gas to cook… they can’t afford to travel by bus and they certainly can’t afford to travel by train. And I think, if you go back to the 80s, people warned about this, that if you lose control of these services, in the end the price will go up and I don’t think the service has improved to be honest and certainly with rail it’s gone massively backwards. And you’ve got to have, I would say, more public control of the basics, so that you can make them affordable to ordinary people… I do think it’s right to be open minded about more public control, more public ownership, so that we don’t leave ourselves so exposed to energy costs.”
• On Labour’s focus on green energy: “This is a good, bold policy from Keir Starmer and Ed Miliband this morning. This is the right way to go, face up to the future, rather than going back to the past with fracking… Fracking would disproportionately affect the north of England. It’s backward looking, but it’s also divisive. And that’s why I say embrace the future, and Labour’s doing that.”
• Asked whether Labour needs to be bolder in its approach: “This is the time for Labour to move up and set out an alternative that people can support. So I want to be clear, I am supporting Keir. I want the party to unite here in Liverpool. They’ve got us in a position, we’ve got a clear and sustained poll lead, which is no small achievement… and I think the government has now opened up a huge opportunity for Labour to put out a programme that connects with ordinary people. So yes I would say be bolder, be clear about what we will do.
• On electoral reform: “I’m a little disappointed to see the party saying it’s going to rule out electoral reform. I would say to them listen to hear the mood of conference on that particular issue. I hope conference will still vote in favour of that, because we’ve got to maximise the chance here of a Labour-led government. But I would also just say for people who doubt the case for electoral reform. Over the summer, we have just seen the most graphic demonstration we’ve every seen of how a small number of people, a small elite, can manipulate the political system in their interest. And that’s what we saw on Friday.”
• On whether he is tempted to contest the West Lancashire by-election: “I said I would do a full second term in Greater Manchester, and I’m in the middle of that. And to be honest with you, it’s so energising what we’re doing. We’re making change happen here.”
• Pressed on whether he would consider running for parliament in 2024: “My term is still going in 2024, so as I say that’s where my focus is. I’ll be honest with you, I’ve said I’ve not ruled out coming back one day. But I’ve made commitments to the people of Greater Manchester. I’m going to see those commitments through.”
• On making another bid for the Labour leadership: “I’ve taken a step outside, and I think it’s been to my benefit. I wouldn’t rule out one day going back, as I’ve said… I probably am a better politician I think these days, because as I say I’m not kind of caveating everything. I’m not sort of second guessing everything. I’m just calling things as I see them.”