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Starmer came out fighting and went on the attack – as Badenoch fails to pin him down

Sir Keir Starmer came out fighting and “went on the attack” at PMQs after what has been a testing few days, says our political editor Beth Rigby. 

She says she is surprised at Kemi Badenoch’s performance and thought the PM was “going to have a much sticker run in that PMQs”.

Beth explains: “I was surprised in a way that he didn’t seem to be pinned as effectively by Badenoch as she has in previous weeks, given, the volume of material she could have thrown at him. 

“I think what you saw there at PMQs was he came out fighting, like he really went on the attack with Badenoch when she criticised him.”

Where the Tory leader did manage to pin Starmer down on the selection of Matthew Doyle to become a peer, it was “very awkward”, Beth adds. 

She continues: “Maybe she should have just kept at that because we know with Keir Starmer, if you keep going at the thing that’s awkward for him, in the end it can cause him difficulties.”

Beth adds that the appointment of Doyle, and the matter of what Starmer knew when he did this, is “really deeply awkward for Keir Starmer”.

She concludes: “That was the stickiest moment for the prime minister. 

“But I am surprised, I mean, Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, called on Keir Starmer to resign this week and that wasn’t raised.”