{"id":669093,"date":"2026-07-02T03:32:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T03:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/669093\/"},"modified":"2026-07-02T03:32:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T03:32:09","slug":"stroppy-starmer-in-no-mood-to-take-dip-stick-from-tories-at-pmqs-john-crace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/669093\/","title":{"rendered":"Stroppy Starmer in no mood to take Dip stick from Tories at PMQs | John Crace"},"content":{"rendered":"

The search for the perfect present to welcome Andy Burnham to No 10 has been a worry for Keir Starmer. What do you give the man who seems to have everything? The support of his own MPs. The belief that Nigel Farage<\/a> is beatable. The sense of being at ease with himself. Comfortable with who he is. The charisma. The ability to hold a room. Everything Keir would have wanted.<\/p>\n

He needed a small Welcome to Downing Street gift, a token of friendship. To show there was no bad feeling about losing his job. And then he had it. A \u00a34.7bn shortfall in the defence investment plan<\/a>. What better start to his time in office could the king of the north expect? It would be their own private billet-doux. Definitely no hard feelings. The very idea.<\/p>\n

The Dip was on everyone\u2019s mind at prime minister\u2019s questions<\/a>. That and England\u2019s game against DR Congo later in the afternoon \u2013 the more painful of the two. What is it about the World Cup that makes politicians feel the need to boast about their sporting credentials with lame gags? Honestly, no one cares if our MPs like football or not. We didn\u2019t elect them for that and we don\u2019t need public demonstrations of their patriotism. Especially ones that indicate the only games they ever watch are England ones in international tournaments. There were times when I needed to bash my head against the rail in front of me. Enough.<\/p>\n

At last week\u2019s PMQs it had sounded very much as if Kemi Badenoch<\/a> had been having a bad day. This week she was rather more disconnected. It was as if she had already mentally checked out for the summer. That she knew Starmer was in his last days in office and nothing really counted. She would save herself for the autumn when Andy Burnham was the opponent. She would need to up her game for him. Andy is nothing if not nimble-footed.<\/p>\n

This time round it was Keir who seemed to be in a bit of a strop. At the very least, much more disinhibited than usual. And far better for it. If we had seen more of this Keir in the previous 12 months, perhaps it wouldn\u2019t have come to this. Maybe we would have warmed to him. Rather than reaching for the off switch whenever he appeared on our TV screens. It certainly might have bought him a bit more time. We like it when our politicians appear human.<\/p>\n

Whatever it was, Starmer wasn\u2019t in the mood for taking prisoners. Call it demob happy. Or even demob unhappy. First he went for a Lib Dem MP who was moaning about a hospital in his constituency being built on a golf course. Then he went on to Kemi. He was definitely not going to take any attacks from a leader of a party that had hollowed out the armed forces during their 14 years in office and now had the cheek to moan about him not spending enough on defence<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Keir could take criticism from the military top brass and the Nato secretary general. But not from Kemi, who seemed to be suggesting the world had been completely safe during successive Tory governments and had only turned dangerous when Labour<\/a> won the election in 2024. Especially as he was spending far more than any Conservative defence secretary would have ever dreamed possible. All his lawyerly instincts were down. No more nasal drone warfare. Keir sounded genuinely pissed off.<\/p>\n

Having belatedly realised that maybe calling Labour\u2019s spending plans out was a step too far even for her, Kemi then turned her attention to how the government was planning to pay for the Dip. Specifically, the \u00a34.7bn \u2013 over four years \u2013 that had been earmarked for the next budget. Did Burnham know what he was letting himself in for?<\/p>\n

Now Starmer nearly lost it all over again. The Tories had left him a \u00a322bn black hole. He was only planning on leaving a \u00a34.7bn black hole. So that had to be an improvement, right? Besides, in the last budget he had left \u00a322bn of headroom. If Andy was short of ideas, he could take it out of that. No harm done.<\/p>\n

This rather suggested he thought you could borrow to pay for the Dip after all. Something he had said he wouldn\u2019t do the day before. But, he was angry and he no longer cared that much. It was all someone else\u2019s problem. Either Kemi hadn\u2019t realised Keir had contradicted himself or she didn\u2019t want to risk making him even angrier. For the first time in her life, she backed down from a fight. That may not happen again.<\/p>\n

Keir, though, was rather enjoying himself. He had a great deal more anger to displace and plenty of worthy targets. Not least Lee Anderson. He didn\u2019t even bother listening to the question, choosing to go on a long rant about Nigel Farage\u2019s financial arrangements. Wouldn\u2019t it be better if Reform investigated their leader\u2019s conflicts of interest? Lee shook his head. No one who wants to survive as a Reform MP even thinks about Nige\u2019s crypto and gold deals.<\/p>\n

As for Nige, he just smiled. You ain\u2019t seen nothing yet. Donald Trump had just made more than \u00a31bn during his first year in office. Nige was a long way off that. He\u2019s still trying to work out whether it will be easier to make money inside or outside frontline politics. Being prime minister could be just a lucrative side hustle.<\/p>\n

By the end, Starmer could almost bring himself to smile. This had been PMQs<\/a> as therapy. And it had felt good. Late in the day, he\u2019s found catharsis.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The search for the perfect present to welcome Andy Burnham to No 10 has been a worry for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":669094,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-669093","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669093","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=669093"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669093\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/669094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=669093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=669093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=669093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}