Starmer faces PMQs amid pressure over why ex-No 10 aide friendly with sex offender was given peerage
Good morning. At PMQs last week Keir Starmer had to face questions about a Labour peer with a paedophile friend. Today he seems likely to face questions about another peer in this category.
As Peter Walker reports, yesterday Labour said it had removed the whip from Matthew Doyle, who only recently became a Labour peer, having previously served as Starmer’s director of communications.
Doyle had campaigned for a friend who had been charged with possessing indecent images of children. The friend claimed he was innocent at the time, but subsequently pleaded guilty. Yesterday Doyle issued a lengthy statement apologising.
Given that Doyle’s peerage was announced in December, and that he took his seat in early January – after the details of his friendship with Sean Morton had been made public – Labour’s decision to remove the whip yesterday looks like a move timed to minimise the dangers from this issue being raised at PMQs.
But Starmer still faces questions about why Doyle was allowed to take his seat in the Lords in the first place. In a post on social media last night, Kemi Badenoch said she would not let the matter drop.
Keir Starmer handed a peerage to Matthew Doyle despite knowing about his ongoing friendship with a man charged with child sex crimes.
The Prime Minister has now suspended the whip, but he must come clean about what he was told before making this appointment.
We won’t let this go.
Last night Anna Turley, the Labour chair, said she did not think Doyle should be in the Lords at all. That was her “personal view”, she said. But Starmer is likely to be asked if he agrees.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9am: Daisy Cooper, the Lib Dem deputy leader and Treasury spokesperson holds a press conference where she is due to make “a major Treasury announcement”.
9.45am: Dan Tomlinson, a Treasury minister, gives evidence to the Commons Treasury committee on business rates.
Noon: Keir Starmer faces Kemi Badenoch at PMQs.
1pm: Starmer speaks to the women’s PLP (parliamentary Labour party).
1.30pm: Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, gives evidence to the Commons energy committee.
And today Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, is publishing an education estates plan, including more space for classes for children with special educational needs.
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Key events
Cooper defends Lib Dem plans for windfall tax on banks
Q: You are here being hosted by UK Finance. But the financial services sector does not like your plans for a windfall tax on banks. Have you dropped your support for that?
Cooper says the Lib Dems are still committed to that. She says it is justified because banks have made unexpected profits relating to the QE system. She accepts that banks are not happy about the plans. But the party is talking to them about that, she says. And, although the banks don’t like the plan, they “do like what we’re trying to do with it” (measures to promote growth).
Q: How would you justify the cost of such a big reorganisation?
Cooper said these plans were consistent with existing plans to move civil servants out of London.
Lib Dems say they would locate new growth deparment in Birmingham
Cooper said the Lib Dems would locate their new growth department in Birmingham.
She said this reflected the fact that the Lib Dems were a party representing seats all over the country.
We Liberal Democrats are the only political party with MPs that span from the Highlands and Islands of Scotland down to the tip of the southwest. So we know we see the differences in economic growth between the southeast and everywhere else.
Lib Dems call for ‘anti-growth Treasury’ to be split up, and replaced with big growth department, and smaller spending department
Cooper says that some people wanted the Treasury’s powers to be tweaked, and others said the PM should have more power over economic policy.
But the Lib Dems were proposing a different plan, she said.
Today I can announce that we Liberal Democrats don’t just want to get rid of this anti-growth chancellor. We want to get rid of this anti-growth Treasury.
And as part of our plan for government, we would break up the Treasury and replace it with a new, powerful, full Department for Growth, with a mandate to boost long-term prosperity, improve living standards and end the cost of living crisis.
The Department for Business and Trade would be merged into this new Growth Department, recognising the central role of British business in driving growth.
And a smaller Department for Public Expenditure would be set up to oversee department spending and ensure value for money.
This new Department for Growth would focus minds on what growth could help us achieve stronger economic growth.
Cooper said having a Department for Growth would force the government to focus properly on growth policies. And it would make parties contemplate pulling “the biggest growth lever”, having a better trading relationship with the EU.
Treasury has too much power, Cooper says
Cooper said one of Labour’s problems was that it had been led by “Treasury brain”.
The winter fuel payment fiasco – a short-term Treasury tax grab driven by the desire for immediate bankable cuts.
The jobs tax – a short-term Treasury tax grab with no regard for the crushing impact on jobs, on growth or investment.
The family farm tax and the attack on family businesses – short-term Treasury tax grabs by the chancellor that could lead to some of the most resilient, long standing British businesses being broken up and sold off.
The list goes on.
But this isn’t a new problem. For too long political parties without a vision for growth have allowed the Treasury tail to wag the political dog. And it must stop.
For decades, everyone has identified this as a problem. The Treasury does too much.
Cooper said parties had recognised this as a problem for decades.
The Treasury does too much: fiscal policy, economic policy, and controlling government spending.
In most other countries, these roles are split up. The Treasury enables governments to go for short-term tax grabs that suit political cycles over the need for long-term growth.
And the Treasury is disconnected from the real economy. Despite holding all the economic power, the Treasury isn’t responsible for policies on business or trade. This leaves British businesses jumping through hoops.
Daisy Cooper opened her press conference, hosted by UK Finance, a trade group for the financial services sector, by saying the Lib Dems believe in talking up Britain.
But Britain is stuck in a doom loop, she said.
We have strong institutions. We have dynamic markets and universal public services. We have world leading universities, creative industries and life sciences. We are the third largest market for artificial intelligence, and we have awesome entrepreneurial people.
The United Kingdom is an amazing country and has enormous potential, but we can never take this for granted and we must accept that we are stuck in a rut, stuck in a doom loop of low economic growth, and that is a big problem.
Economic growth matters. We need to get Britain growing again to end the cost of living crisis. We need to get Britain growing again, to rebuild our public services. And we need to get Britain growing again, to invest in the climate transition and create the well-paid jobs.
Cooper said even Wes Streeting says the government does not have a growth strategy.
Lib Dem deputy leader Daisy Cooper holds press conference
Daisy Cooper, the Lib Dem deputy leader and Treasury spokesperson, is holding a press conference now. There is a live feed here.
Minister rejects suggestion Doyle’s appointment to Lords shows No 10 doesn’t take child abuse seriously
Georgia Gould, an education minister, has been the government voice on the airwaves this morning.
In an interview with Sky News, she said that when No 10 announced that Matthew Doyle was being made a peer in December, it did not know that he had campaigned for someone who was subsequently convicted of paedophile offences.
Referring to Labour’s decision to remove the whip from Doyle in the Lords yesterday, she said:
There’s an investigation going on. We’ll wait for that to conclude. But the prime minister said on Monday night that we want to ensure the highest standards in public life. He’s gone back and looked at this appointment. He’s taken action to withdraw the whip.
Asked whether the government was taking child abuse seriously enough, she replied:
We’re taking it incredibly seriously.
And Keir Starmer is somebody who has spent his whole career putting people into prison, And this is his lifelong work. It is deeply important to him. And no one is harder on themselves than the prime minister. But he’s clear that things need to change. Vetting has to be better.
Asked if the documents submitted as part of the vetting process for Doyle’s peerage would be published, she referred to the ongoing investigation and said “we’ll have more to say when that’s completed”.
Starmer faces PMQs amid pressure over why ex-No 10 aide friendly with sex offender was given peerage
Good morning. At PMQs last week Keir Starmer had to face questions about a Labour peer with a paedophile friend. Today he seems likely to face questions about another peer in this category.
As Peter Walker reports, yesterday Labour said it had removed the whip from Matthew Doyle, who only recently became a Labour peer, having previously served as Starmer’s director of communications.
Doyle had campaigned for a friend who had been charged with possessing indecent images of children. The friend claimed he was innocent at the time, but subsequently pleaded guilty. Yesterday Doyle issued a lengthy statement apologising.
Given that Doyle’s peerage was announced in December, and that he took his seat in early January – after the details of his friendship with Sean Morton had been made public – Labour’s decision to remove the whip yesterday looks like a move timed to minimise the dangers from this issue being raised at PMQs.
But Starmer still faces questions about why Doyle was allowed to take his seat in the Lords in the first place. In a post on social media last night, Kemi Badenoch said she would not let the matter drop.
Keir Starmer handed a peerage to Matthew Doyle despite knowing about his ongoing friendship with a man charged with child sex crimes.
The Prime Minister has now suspended the whip, but he must come clean about what he was told before making this appointment.
We won’t let this go.
Last night Anna Turley, the Labour chair, said she did not think Doyle should be in the Lords at all. That was her “personal view”, she said. But Starmer is likely to be asked if he agrees.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9am: Daisy Cooper, the Lib Dem deputy leader and Treasury spokesperson holds a press conference where she is due to make “a major Treasury announcement”.
9.45am: Dan Tomlinson, a Treasury minister, gives evidence to the Commons Treasury committee on business rates.
Noon: Keir Starmer faces Kemi Badenoch at PMQs.
1pm: Starmer speaks to the women’s PLP (parliamentary Labour party).
1.30pm: Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, gives evidence to the Commons energy committee.
And today Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, is publishing an education estates plan, including more space for classes for children with special educational needs.
If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line when comments are open (between 10am and 3pm), or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.
If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. You can reach me on Bluesky at @andrewsparrowgdn.bsky.social. The Guardian has given up posting from its official accounts on X, but individual Guardian journalists are there, I still have my account, and if you message me there at @AndrewSparrow, I will see it and respond if necessary.
I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog.
