Although Keir Starmer refuses to say whether he harbours ambitions to be Labour leader, the shadow Brexit secretary did do his best to dazzle hacks this afternoon as the guest of honour at today’s press gallery lunch. Alas while Starmer was full of charm for the hacks, he was less willing to wax lyrical about the current Labour leadership. Referring to the Copeland by-election defeat, he said the loss was ‘really serious’ and could not just be blames on bad weather and New Labour:
‘The timing of this lunch could not be better from my point of view and you’re probably thinking that’s because it’s five days after Copeland and Stoke and I’ll get lots of questions about how my 17,000 majority is now reclassified as a long term marginal seat.
But it’s not that, it’s that we are now at the end of the meal, so it’s the time that Jeremy would say “this is the start of the real meal”.’
Starmer went on to make light of John McDonnell’s claim that a ‘soft coup’ is currently underway against the Corbynistas. ‘I’m
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