The UK “isn’t being governed” as the Conservative party fights among itself, Keir Starmer has told Rishi Sunak at the last prime minister’s questions of the year, challenging him in particular on rates of homelessness.
In exchanges that veered between brutal insults, Christmas greetings and occasional bad jokes, Starmer used the Tory divisions highlighted by Tuesday evening’s vote on the Rwanda deportations bill as a way to mock the prime minister.
“Christmas is a time of peace on earth and good will to all. Has anyone told the Tory party?” he began, promoting a jokey response from Sunak about the so-called “five families”, the five rightwing Tory factions who have united to try to change the Rwanda bill.
“Christmas is also a time for families, and under the Conservatives we do have a record number of them,” Sunak said to laughter.
After further ridicule in which Starmer cited some of the anonymous descriptions of Sunak by Conservative MPs given to newspapers, he turned to what he said was the impact on the country of a government riven by internal battles.
“While they fight amongst themselves there’s a country out here that isn’t being governed,” he said. “Doesn’t he think the government would be better off fixing the messes they’ve already made, rather than scrambling to create new ones?”
Starmer said 140,000 children would be homeless at Christmas, adding: “That is more than ever before. That’s a shocking state of affairs. And it should shame this government.”
He cited examples of this phenomenon, including an 11-year-old boy, Liam Walker, whose family is homeless, and whose Christmas wish was: “I don’t want any new toys. I just want all my old toys out of storage – I just want us to be happy again.”
Starmer castigated Sunak for what he called the neglect of such issues as he struggled with infighting: “Instead of more social housing, housebuilding is set to collapse. Instead of banning no-fault evictions, thousands of families are at risk of homelessness.
“Rather than indulging his backbenchers swanning around in their factions, their star chambers, pretending to be members of the mafia, when is he going to get a grip and focus on the country?”
Sunak responded by accusing Starmer of devoting some of his questions to “political tittle-tattle” and criticised the record of Labour-run Wales on education.
As is Starmer’s occasional habit at PMQs, he used his final question to make a consensual, cross-party point to try to blunt Sunak’s traditional final attack, in this case asking the prime minister to thank public servants and wish everyone a happy festive season.
Sunak nonetheless pressed ahead with his remarks, criticising Labour’s plan to invest in green infrastructure projects, saying this would push up taxes, and that in contrast his government was “getting on and delivering for working Britain”.
