Election 2024: Row erupts over Keir Starmer’s working hours if he becomes Prime Minister
Labour have hit back at “desperate lies and hypocrisy” over their leader’s working schedule, after the Conservatives alleged that Sir Keir Starmer plans to work a “four-day week” as Prime Minister.
The Tory campaign has seized on remarks by the Labour leader, in an interview on Virgin Radio, that he will try to continue clocking off at 6pm on Friday evenings to spend time with his family if he takes office as Prime Minister.
Sir Keir Starmer said: “We’ve had a strategy in place and we’ll try to keep to it, which is to carve out really protected time for the kids, so on a Friday – I’ve been doing this for years – I will not do a work-related thing after six o’clock, pretty well come what may.”
“There are a few exceptions, but that’s what we do,” he clarified.
Following the interview, the Conservatives’ twitter account said that Starmer will “clock off at 6pm if he became Prime Minister”, seeming to omit that the Labour leader’s remarks were about Friday night in particular.
The tweet included a mock-up of Starmer’s calendar, which ended at 6pm with the engagement: “Go home – If Emergency, contact Angela”.
Maria Caulfield, Tory health minister, told Sky News this morning that Starmer plans to work a “flexible” week, while defence secretary Grant Shapps tweeted: “Virtually every military intervention we’ve carried out has happened at night, partly to keep our servicemen and women safe.”
“The British people will wonder who would be standing in for Starmer between 6pm and 9am – Angela Rayner, David Lammy, Ed Miliband?” Shapps said.
Wes Streeting, shadow health secretary, hit back at the Tory campaign tactic this morning, describing it as a “desperate attack” and accusing Caufield of “debasing herself on national television”.
“The stench of their lies and hypocrisy is even more overwhelming than the vomit they left for Downing Street cleaners to clean up. And, like the Downing Street cleaners, if we’re given the chance on Thursday, Labour will clean up the Tories’ mess too,” Streeting said.
Sir Keir Starmer later hit back at the remarks too, describing the furore as “increasingly desperate stuff”.
Speaking to journalists at an event in Nottinghamshire, the Labour leader said that the Tories are in a “negative, desperate loop,” and that their response to his remarks is a sign of “increasing desperation, bordering on hysterical now”.
Some pundits have drawn attention to the fact that Starmer’s wife is Jewish, saying that he has implied in the past that he takes part in weekly Friday night dinners with her family.
Caulfield’s remarks come amid pressure for the Labour party to back a four-day working week. Though a number of unions are pushing Starmer’s party to adopt the policy, a senior adviser told the Telegraph that “there are no plans to do it”.