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Starmer breaks one of his ten pledges. Again.

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So, just what exactly does Keir Starmer stand for? In the latest wheeze to distract from the Sue Gray drama and prove that Labour is now a Serious Party of Government, the spin doctors at Labour HQ have opted to ditch the party’s long-standing pledge to abolish tuition fees. As recently as 2021 he was lambasting it as ‘a huge debt for young people that they carry around for a long time’ which is ‘why we rightly committed at the last election to get rid of tuition fees.’

Yet all that has now changed apparently, as the party seeks to embrace a new-found spirit of fiscal probity – an approach that doesn’t extend to Labour’s eye-watering Net Zero commitments. Starmer told Radio 4’s Today programme that: ‘We are likely to move on from that commitment because we do find ourselves in a different financial situation. But I don’t want that to be read as us accepting for a moment that the current system is fair or that it’s working.’

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Steerpike
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Steerpike

Steerpike is The Spectator's gossip columnist, serving up the latest tittle tattle from Westminster and beyond. Email tips to steerpike@spectator.co.uk or message @MrSteerpike

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