Starmer ready for poll
IT is “unforgivable” the Tories did not follow through on their pledge to level up parts of the UK, Sir Keir Starmer said as he launched Labour’s local election campaign.
But the Labour leader would not commit to “turn the taps on” to help local councils fill their funding black holes.
Sir Keir suggested the local elections were a chance for voters to send “another message” to the Conservatives, as he urged Rishi Sunak to call a general election.
Ahead of the May 2 polls, the Labour leader touted his party’s “local growth plan”, and suggested he favoured longer-term funding deals for councils if his party were to win power at a general election.
At the launch alongside his deputy Angela Rayner, Sir Keir appeared to praise the sentiment behind the levelling up agenda, but suggested his party would drive a “fundamental shift” in politics through devolution.
He added: “My frustration of the past 14 years, but particularly since 2019, is that in saying levelling up, the Government was tapping into something real that people yearned for, but they didn’t have a viable plan. We intend to turn that around and make sure that we can make that connection real.”
Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove hit back at the Labour leader, telling broadcasters: “Keir Starmer couldn’t be more wrong. We are the party that’s been leading on levelling up for years now.”
The Government minister added that neglected areas had seen “an infusion of cash and a power surge” under the Tories and that Labour had “come with nothing new to say”.
The Local Government Association, which represents councils across England, has warned they face a £4 billion gap in their budgets over the next two years.
Pressed about whether Labour would seek to plug these shortfalls, Sir Keir said: “There is no playing political games on this, councils of all political stripes are struggling with the lack of funding ... and we need to turn that around.”
He said there was “scope for different kinds of funding settlements” pointing to longer threeyear deals for councils, rather than the current one-year settlements.
But he added: “I can’t pretend that we can turn the taps on, pretend that damage hasn’t been done to the economy, it has.”
Referring to the general election, the Labour leader said he had hoped to launched “a different election campaign here today, but the Prime Minister bottled it”.
“He wants one last drawn-out summer tour with his beloved helicopter. So we need to send him another message, show his party once again that their time is up, the dithering must stop, the date must be set,” he added.