In response to Sir Keir Starmer’s speech to the Labour Conference, the first by a Labour prime minister for fourteen years the four Conservative leadership contenders said this:
Robert Jenrick
“This was the speech of a Prime Minister at the end of his five-year term, not three months in. Sir Keir is already a busted flush – a Mr Grey, with a dour plan for the UK.
Behind all the rhetoric there was no substance. How can Starmer have no plan to grow the economy, reform the NHS or control and reduce immigration after 14 years? It appears he is too distracted with sleaze, infighting and chaos in Downing Street.”
Kemi Badenoch
“Keir Starmer’s first Labour Party conference speech as Prime Minister will be mostly remembered for him calling for the return of the sausages. But he should be pleased that the commentary will focus on this, because the rest of the speech was a platitudinous word soup read out by an emperor naked without his free clothes”
James Cleverly
“The Labour Party has had years to prepare for government; Keir Starmer’s speech shows those years were wasted.
He talked about the mandate he won but he doesn’t have a mandate to strip millions of pensioners of their winter fuel payments, hike up taxes for hard working families, and introduce nanny-state policies that will destroy local communities and businesses.
Keir Starmer won’t match our commitment to defence spending; he doesn’t have a plan to safeguard our borders; and his latest sleaze row has exposed him as a hypocrite. The only thing that hard working people can be sure of is that this Labour government will take their money so they can give it to their Union paymasters.”
Tom Tugendhat
“Instead of apologising for plunging millions of pensioners into poverty this winter and releasing dangerous criminals back onto our streets, all we saw today was arrogance and gloating. Keir Starmer continues to be dishonest about the choice he has made: to put his union paymasters before the service of the British people.
This isn’t the leadership we need, this is a Labour government that only serves the unions and is taking the public for fools. It’s time to start acting like a Party in government. Not opposition.“
