Kemi Badenoch must be fuming that Keir Starmer is flying back from the G7 in Canada right now, with Angela Rayner standing in for him at PMQs and convention dictating that the Leader of the Opposition also offers up a deputy. So it was that in a week where the headline topic remains the grooming gang scandal that Badenoch has decided is one of her key passion projects, it was one of her shadow ministers asking the questions.
Badenoch has chosen not to have a regular deputy for these occasions, offering the job to a revolving cast of Tory frontbenchers. Unsurprisingly given what was obviously going to be the main issue, today it was the shadow home secretary. No, not Robert Jenrick (though you’d be forgiven for the mistake), but Chris Philp.
That’s the same Chris Philp who appeared with Badenoch on a panel of grooming gang survivors, parents and activists yesterday morning, during which they were urged that “all the political stuff needs to be put aside” by survivor Fiona Goddard. And it’s also the same Chris Philp who seemed to show very little interest in the scandal until Elon Musk brought it back to Westminster’s attention in January, including for the almost two years in which he was policing minister in the Home Office.
All of this meant that, when Philp began his questioning by noting he had met with survivors on Tuesday, he was greeted to heckles that he’d never met with any of them while in office. He brushed this off, adopting a dignified tone as he asked about survivors’ justifiable insistence that the national inquiry announced on Monday will be fully independent, have statutory powers, cover all affected towns and put the affected individuals at its centre.
It was an attitude that won him appreciation from Rayner, who struck a stateswomanlike poise as she thanked him for “his tone and for putting the survivors central”, adding wryly that she hoped members of his party would follow his lead. Badenoch’s own tactic of ferociously hammering the government over Louise Casey’s report, most notably in the Chamber on Monday afternoon, has drawn criticism – including from victims, and from Casey herself.
The air of cross-party respect didn’t last. Before long Philp was channelling his inner Badenoch, calling on Rayner to apologise for Starmer’s claim in January (which the Prime Minister surely now regrets) that those calling for an inquiry were “jumping on a bandwagon” and “amplifying what the far right is saying”. Rayner responded with the universal Labour defence of pointing out what the Tories had done in office: “precisely nothing”. It was notable that, while Philp raged, Rayner was flanked on both sides by female colleagues (Lucy Powell and Yvette Cooper to one side, Rachel Reeves and Bridge Phillipson on the other). It was a powerful image.
From there, we got an unedifying spat over illegal migrant numbers, the failure of the Rwanda scheme, asylum accommodation and – a nice new addition, presumably due to Rayner’s brief – house building. Philp walked into a number of traps Badenoch could have told him were coming. Bringing up immigration at PMQs enables whoever is representing the government to return to their comfort ground of the Conservatives’ own record. Philp’s retort that the Rwanda scheme “never started” isn’t quite the win he thinks it is, given one of the key reasons voters abandoned the Tories was a feeling the party was so incompetent it couldn’t even do what it was said it wanted to.
As for his line wondering aloud how Rayner “has the brass neck to claim she’s got it under control, when the numbers crossing the Channel this year are the highest in history”, Philp should have guessed his adversary would be prepared. And she was, punching the Boriswave bruise (nearly a million arrivals in 2022-3 alone), reeling off stats, and condemning Philp for the “one million pounds a day ‘spiffed’ up the wall” (an allusion, perhaps, to Boris Johnson’s similar turn-of-phrase discussing money spent on historic child abuse investigations – at any rate, a new one for Hansard).
It wasn’t the finest audition piece from Philp. One wonders why Robert Jenrick wasn’t chosen to stand in (although the answer to that may be apparent). Rayner brought less of her characteristic fire to today’s proceedings, and all in all it was a somewhat anticlimactic session, with the mood around the House gradually souring. We had Lib Dem and SNP MPs ask about cuts to disability benefits, designed to rile up Labour backbenchers who are queasy about what Liz Kendall will be announcing later today. And instead of an explosive intervention from Reform’s MPs, we got two planted questions: one about a Reform council cutting a fire engine in Nuneaton, and another about the dodgy arithmetic behind Nigel Farage’s claim he could save £7bn of government spending by cutting DEI programmes.
We did hear Rayner signalling that the UK would not join the US were Donald Trump to choose to attack Iran, and stressing the need for a diplomatic approach. But given Keir Starmer insisted the US had no intentions of bombing Iran just before Trump implied it was a live consideration, who can say. (This week’s New Statesman magazine is a War Special, covering everything going on in the Middle East, including an insight into Benjamin Netanyahu’s mind from his former head of personal security and a deep dive into what Iran will do next by Lawrence Freedman, for once you’re done digesting PMQs.)
Question of the day probably goes to Nick Timothy, who noted that channel crossings are up this year, and asked whether, if they fail to go down, the Home Secretary’s job could be at risk. Yvette Cooper has so far not been a major target of the Tory frontbench, with the force of their efforts aimed more at Rachel Reeves, Ed Miliband and Bridget Phillipson. Is Timothy testing out a new attack line for the Conservatives? Or is he simply reminding his colleagues of his presence should a shadow ministerial vacancy come up?
[See also: Keir Starmer’s grooming gang cowardice]
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