Reeves will remain Chancellor until next election, No. 10 insists

Another day, another Labour drama. Rachel Reeves has returned from her weekend China trip to a rather uncomfortable atmosphere back home after last week’s bond market turmoil – with the Labour lot facing surging borrowing costs while Whitehall departments fear further spending cuts. So perhaps it’s not all that surprising that the question of how long Reeves can hold onto her job keeps cropping up…

Taking questions from journalists after his speech on AI this morning, Sir Keir Starmer got the Westminster rumour mill running after he refused to confirm whether Reeves would still be Chancellor of the Exchequer by the next general election. Eyebrows were raised when the PM ducked out of saying whether Reeves would stay on in the job – not least given Starmer was rather quick off the mark to assure reporters last year that Foreign Secretary David Lammy would remain in post for the duration of Labour’s five-year term, following some rather controversial posts about Donald Trump.