Rishi and Keir launch festive charm offensives

It’s a Christmas tradition as old as the nativity itself: the annual lobby drinks party. Each year, the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition host rival shindigs to entertain Westminster’s press pack with their best quips and warmest wine. First, it was Sir Keir Starmer’s turn to roast the lobby, having neatly skewered Andy Burnham at the same event last year. He joked that some of the hacks in the room ‘were lucky enough to be the only people this government has actually managed to fly to Rwanda’ and jibed that he had designed a policy to ‘really hit [journalists] where it hurts – putting VAT on private schools.’

Then last night, it was the turn of the Prime Minister. The great-and-the-good of the parliamentary press gallery crammed into No. 10 for a smorgasbord of canapés and cabinet ministers. Taking to the stage, Rishi Sunak joked that while ‘it has been a pretty hectic run in to Christmas,’ his team had still found time to sing some carols, with suggested song titles including ‘Away in a star chamber’, ‘Oh come Tory faithful’ and ‘I saw some three ships come sailing in… well not on my watch!’ he quipped.