Starmer struggles on the coalition question

With gains of 643 councillors and 22 authorities, Labour clearly had a good result in Thursday’s local elections. Yet with the BBC and Sky both publishing vote share projections which show the party falling short of an overall majority – winning just shy of 300 seats rather than the necessary 326 – the spectre of a hung parliament looms large over British politics once more.

It was that subject which dominated Sir Keir Starmer’s broadcast round this afternoon. The Labour leader refused seven times in an interview with Sky to rule out a deal with the Liberal Democrats if his party found themselves short of a majority, insisting that he is ‘not answering hypotheticals.’ And while he told the BBC that there would be ‘no deal with the SNP’, he was far less firm when pressed again on the Liberal Democrat question. ‘I want to press on for a Labour majority, that’s what we’re aiming for,’ he said ‘This is a hypothetical question.