Starmer digs in on attack ads with poll lead lowest since Sunak took office

If you were a Labour member hoping for a quiet Easter weekend on the politics front, I am willing to bet that this weekend was very much not what you were bargaining for. On Thursday, Labour released the first of a series of attack ads taking aim at Rishi Sunak and the Conservative record, particularly on criminal justice. Given Labour’s strong push on crime and antisocial behaviour in the run-up to the local elections, the subject matter was hardly surprising. The manner of presentation, however, was very much a departure from the norm: it featured a picture of the Prime Minister, overlaid with the text “Do you think adults convicted of sexually assaulting children should go to prison? Rishi Sunak doesn’t”. This series is ongoing (a release this morning targeting Sunak’s wife’s use of the non-dom tax loophole reads: “Do you think it’s right to raise taxes for working people when your family benefitted from a tax loophole? Rishi Sunak does.”) but it was the advert appearing to suggest Sunak is personally soft on paedophiles that drew most comment and criticism.

While the advert received support from Shadow Justice Secretary Steve Reed and Shadow Attorney General Emily Thornberry, a series of current and former Labour politicians refused to endorse it. Shadow Culture Secretary Lucy Powell termed it “not to everybody’s taste” and former Home Secretary David Blunkett penned an article titled “My party is better than this brand of gutter politics”. Most notably, the Observer reported that the current Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper – who is nominally in charge of the party’s strategy on crime – had not been shown the advert in advance and “had nothing to do with it”. This led to some notably scathing briefing against Cooper, with a Labour source telling the Mail on Sunday that the Shadow Home Secretary’s move to distance herself was “sheer cowardice from a serial failure who should have left frontline politics long ago”. Starmer himself came out strongly in defence of the adverts, saying he “stood by every word”.

The intention behind the adverts is clear. Six months ago the Conservatives were in utter disarray and Labour was clocking poll leads in the 30s. Sunak was handed the task of steadying a half-sunk ship and has fared better than many might have expected: a new poll released last night showed Labour’s narrowest lead since Sunak became Prime Minister. While the poll still shows Labour 14 points ahead, and overall the party is still polling very well, a distinct note of caution has crept into discussions of a potential Labour victory at an election which, the Telegraph reported last night, Downing Street is planning for autumn of next year. The thinking behind the adverts is presumably that, while his predecessors Liz Truss and Boris Johnson essentially oozed mud from their pores, Sunak needs some thrown at him.

However, whether the blow against Sunak is worth the cost – a public spat between members of the shadow cabinet and the leadership, full-throated criticism from Labour grandees such as Blunkett, not to mention the hostage to fortune that is potentially revitalising smears on Starmer which allege he allowed Jimmy Savile to go unpunished – very much remains to be seen. It is recess until the 17th, so we won’t see Starmer and the Prime Minister face off at Prime Minister’s Questions until next Wednesday – but a renewed enmity between the two men when they do is one thing we can bet on.