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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Politics
Rachel Wearmouth

Labour to bring 'clown' Tories 'back to reality' of bills crisis with aggressive ad spending

Tory MPs using public resources to attack Keir Starmer over "nonsense" fringe issues will be dragged "back to reality" with aggressive ad campaigns about the cost of living crisis facing their constituents.

Labour insiders say the party plans to triple spending on social media ads where "clown" Conservatives "desperate to run away from their record" use parliamentary resources to enflame division.

It comes as Boris Johnson's backbenchers flood the opposition leader's office with letters about the party's stance on Trident, former Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn, who now sits as as an independent, and trans rights.

It marks a step-up in campaign tactics from Starmer's team and follows Wolverhampton South West Conservative MP Stuart Anderson writing a two-page letter to the Labour leader claiming frontbench MPs are anti-NATO and have links to the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament - a protest group which last had prominence in the 1980s and is not proscribed by any political party.

Meanwhile, Chancellor Rishi Sunak's Spring Statement confirmed Brits face the biggest fall in living standards since the time of rationing, with the Government offering almost no help for Brits facing soaring energy bills and towering inflation.

A Labour source said: "When people up and down the country aren't using their heating because they're afraid of the size of their energy bills, are avoiding using their car because the price of fuel has rocketed, and are cutting back on supermarket shops because out of control inflation has sent prices soaring, for Tory MPs to be using their publicly-funded resources on nonsense letters entirely detached from the reality of what their constituents need and want, shows how deeply out of touch this government is, and how desperate they are to run away from their record.

"Labour is laser focused on tackling the cost of living crisis blighting people's lives."

It is understood Mr Anderson will be targeted for an aggressive ad campaign after the letter claimed a number of Labour frontbenchers, including shadow foreign secretary David Lammy, "may be members or supporters" of CND and falsely accused the Labour leader of being anti-NATO and maintaining links with CND himself.

CND's main aim is to campaign for the UK to scrap Trident, but it has made statements in recent days criticising NATO. It is not proscribed by political parties or considered a dangerous group by the police.

Labour has branded the letter "nonsense" and has said any MPs who try to inflate fringe issues during the cost-of-living crisis will see attack ad spending in their area trebled.

Another source said: “They want to talk about anything except the cost of living crisis, so we’ll bring the reality of it back to their constituency.

“Anyone who signs these nonsense CCHQ letters will see attack spend in their constituency trebled.

"At a time they are putting up tax on every working family in the country, this clown is more concerned about a protest group that were last in the news when Jennifer Rush was topping the charts."

Labour underlined the party has a strongly pro-NATO stance and that a Labour government helped to found the defensive alliance.

Mr Starmer forced 11 Labour MPs to perform a U-turn and remove their names from a Stop The War (a separate anti-NATO group) letter criticised what it claimed was the eastward expansion of NATO.

All 11 MPs removed their names and Mr Starmer has warned any MP or member drawing a "false equivalence" between NATO and Vladimir Putin's Russia will face expulsion.

The Mirror has contacted Mr Anderson for comment.

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