Let’s start this week’s PMQs review by outlining what Kemi Badenoch was trying to do in her head-to-head with Keir Starmer, and then take a look at what she managed to achieve.
The general theme was immigration, which has been a focus for both Labour and the Tories over the past week. Or was it? Badenoch hooked her questions on one immigration case in particular: the story of a family of six from Gaza who have won the right to live in the UK via (confusingly) the Ukraine family scheme. She wanted to know if the Prime Minister would appeal the decision. But really, she wanted to remind the House – and the country – of the awkwardness for Starmer with how the law interacts with politics.
This is an increasingly potent line of attack against the Labour government, and against Starmer, as a former lawyer, in particular. Badenoch’s implication was that the PM is too quick to cede authority to judges – whether in this immigration case (in which a British judge ruled that the Home Office’s rejection of the family’s claim breached their human rights), or in the thorny matter of the Chagos Islands (more on that in a moment), or to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) in general.
Key to this accusation is Richard Hermer, a friend of Starmer’s, whom the Prime Minister elevated to the House of Lords specifically in order to appoint him as Attorney General. Hermer, whether for his past representation of clients against the British state such as Gerry Adams or his focus since becoming Attorney General on privileging the UK’s international law and human rights commitments over domestic politics, has become one of the most controversial members of the cabinet. A particularly visceral red-on-red criticism of him came this week from the Labour peer Maurice Glasman, who told the New Statesman’s own George Eaton that Hermer was “the absolute archetype of an arrogant, progressive fool who thinks that law is a replacement for politics”. (Badenoch seized on that quote later in her questioning – it’s always nice to know her team is reading the New Statesman.)
The row over Hermer adds weight to the Conservatives’ argument that Starmer is too enmeshed in the international law scene to be clear-headed over the issues facing the country. Badenoch tried to draw this together with the book Starmer wrote about the ECHR way back in 1999 (a decade and a half before he entered politics, but whatever) and link it to the judgement about the Gazan family, with the implication that the Prime Minister wasn’t fighting back hard enough. Would he “put our national interest before the ECHR?” she asked at one point. Later: “He’s not listening, he’s too busy defending the international law framework.”
The problem was that, once again, she fluffed it. Starmer had a comeback ready on three questions about the immigration case: he believed the judgement was wrong, the Home Secretary was already looking into how to close the “loophole” in the law – but more importantly Badenoch “hasn’t quite done her homework”, because the decision had been taken under the last Conservative government.
This restarted what is becoming a weekly spat between Starmer and Badenoch about who is lazier. And it’s a spat that Starmer wins every time. As I’ve written before, there are many criticisms one can hurl at the Prime Minister, but not being prepared just isn’t one of them. Badenoch’s line that “if the Prime Minister was on top of his brief, he might be able to answer some questions” doesn’t feel credible; Starmer’s counter that “her script doesn’t allow her to listen to the answer” does.
Then Badenoch embarrassed herself further by using her last question on a topic plucked straight from the Daily Mail’s front page, about the government’s pick for chief inspector of borders and immigration wanting to work from home in Finland. Starmer could barely conceal his glee as he set her straight: “The individual in question was appointed in 2019 by the last government for a senior position. He did work for five years from Finland. We’ve changed that, and he’s now going to be working from the United Kingdom full-time.” A lesson to whoever is selecting Badenoch’s questions from the tabloids. Starmer: one; Badenoch: nil.
This doesn’t mean the Hermer issue is going away any time soon. Several Tory MPs raised it later in the session. Starmer’s response to one was to repeat his offer of a security briefing on the Chagos Islands for Badenoch (“she still hasn’t taken me up on that briefing,” he said sadly – the Tory leader might consider requesting it, if only to neutralise the sense she can’t be bothered to find out what’s going on). On another question the PM went off on a rant about the principle that everyone deserves legal representation and that if lawyers weren’t sometimes required to represent clients they disagreed with then rapists would end up cross-examining their own victims in court. It was a rather tangential response, and one of the rare occasions of Starmer visibly losing his temper in the chamber. The attacks on Hermer – who is, again, a personal friend of the Prime Minister – are perhaps getting to him. And those attacks are only going to intensify.
The only other moment Starmer appeared rattled was when facing Ed Davey (and yes, this is also becoming a PMQs theme). Davey was out to cement the Lib Dems’ reputation as the boldest anti-Trump party in parliament, with a reminder (as if we could forget) that the president has betrayed America’s long-standing allies, Canada and Britain, by announcing tariffs on steel and aluminium. Would the UK consider a plan for retaliatory tariffs in response, perhaps on electric cars from the US? Starmer continued with the balancing act of attempting to stand up for British interests without saying anything that might antagonise Trump. Those hoping for a Hugh Grant Love Actually moment will be disappointed. As usual.
[See also: The Reform-Tory split is a gift to Labour]
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