You might have heard of people who look like their dogs. But what about politicians who govern like their pets?
Perhaps in need of a positive story to offer some much needed “little more hope”, Sir Keir Starmer has said his family has bought a Siberian kitten.
But as an announcement to offset the “painful” Budget decisions in store, this one landed about as well with me as the time Boris Johnson tried to distract the nation by buying a dog.
Instead, my initial feeling upon reporting on this was to feel sorry for Larry, the existing chief mouser of No. 10. Not only has Downing Street said that they have a plan to announce his death — but now Larry finds himself in danger of being replaced and usurped by a younger rival.
Larry, however, is still very much alive and this all feels a bit like a real life version of a Family Guy episode where the Griffin family replace their dog, Brian. Poor Larry.
Credit to Starmer, though, he did at least send himself up when he discussed how he lighted upon a rival to Larry.
"There's been a long summer of negotiations, back and forth,” the PM told BBC Radio 5 Live’s Matt Chorley.
"But now we've gone for — and this is agreed after long negotiations — I said we'd get in the room and sort it out — we are now getting a kitten instead of a dog.
"This is a Siberian kitten, which is being picked up today by my daughter, and so that's where it ended up."
Still, though he was joking, I couldn’t help but raise an eye. How much of the real Keir Starmer are we seeing here?
The cat was the product of long negotiations and was chosen above a dog as a safer option, something unlikely to cause offence. Siberian cats don’t even trigger allergies — how boring.
Then there is the nature of the breed of cat. “Siberian cats are typically cool, calm, and confident,” says Better Pet. It makes it sound like the type of feline who could bring you bad news; you could trust with money; which wouldn’t embarrass itself too much. It definitely wouldn’t hold a party with its cat friends after you announced on TV that having a party with cat friends is not allowed. It’s a cat that might blend in rather than set pulses racing.
Ultimately, the Siberian kitten just feels like the least bad option. It makes me wonder if Sir Keir sealed the deal by telling his children, ‘Imagine waking up to FIVE MORE YEARS of a German Shepherd’.
Don’t tell me that tactic hasn’t worked for Labour.
