Revealed: Labour’s tactics to deal with Truss

Keir Starmer tonight told the weekly parliamentary Labour party meeting that ‘we will never underestimate Liz Truss’. The Labour leader added that ‘she is a talented politician who has got to the top through hard work and determination’ and that ‘she will do whatever it takes to keep them in power’. He warned that ‘the polls might tighten and her plans might create some buzz’. It was a reminder to the party, which often struggles to accept female Tory leaders, not to fall into the trap of mocking Truss or feasting too much on the Tory civil war.

How will Labour approach the new PM? Starmer will be asking her questions on Wednesday at her first Prime Minister’s Questions, and will have spent the past few weeks working on his strategy for that. He clearly doesn’t want to insult her intelligence – as some of her own party colleagues have. He does, however, want to link her back to the previous administration – and those before too.