Nigel Jones

Reform are setting Labour’s agenda

Credit: Getty Images

No two politicians could be less alike than Sir Keir Starmer and Nigel Farage. But it looks as though the Prime Minister is transitioning into the Reform party’s rumbustuous leader –  or at least stealing his velvet collared clothes.

Consider the evidence.

Over the past few days and weeks, Labour has adopted a raft of the policies advocated by the right-wing insurgents. These include:

  • Abolishing NHS England, the bureaucratic quango that runs our failing health service
  • Announcing coming swingeing cuts to the ‘corrupt’ benefits system that Reform claims means that money is currently going to cheats and people who are not working.
  • Cosying up and toadying to Nigel Farage’s bestie, President Donald Trump, previously demonised by leading Labour figures as a racist and fascist.
  • Slashing  the budget of International Development Aid by half – causing the resignation of the department’s Minister Anneliese Dodds – and sending  the money saved to boost defence spending.

Labour’s dramatic rightward swerve in direction – doubtless prompted by Starmer’s policy guru Morgan McSweeney – is so radical that around half the cabinet’s ministers are reported to have expressed dismay and fears at their last meeting that the coming spending cuts will hit their departments.

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