Is Badenoch getting better, or is Starmer getting worse?

Coffee House Shots

The Spectator

News, Politics, Government, Daily News

4.4 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 14 May 2025

⏱️ 12 minutes

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Summary

Prime Minister’s Questions today, and there was lots on the agenda. It is often a fool’s game to guess what the leader of the opposition will lead on, but today she had a wide choice of ammunition – from unemployment to welfare to the government’s new stance on migration to the war in Gaza. Kemi Badenoch looked assured when holding Keir Starmer to account on the Chancellor’s ‘jobs tax’ and on funding for children’s hospices. But can we attribute her performance to growing confidence in the role – or is the news just getting worse for Keir Starmer?

There were a couple of notable moments from the Prime Minister, including an attack on Reform and his response to Liz Saville-Roberts, leader of Plaid Cymru, when she ‘called him out’ on his use of the phrase ‘island of strangers’ earlier this week. Keir Starmer appeared tetchy – is he taking a leaf out of Rishi Sunak’s book?

Lucy Dunn speaks to James Heale and Isabel Hardman.

Produced by Oscar Edmondson.

Transcript

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0:00.0	On Thursday, the 15th of May, the Spectator is hosting a live book club event.
0:05.5	Sam Leith will be joined by former Telegraph Editor-in-Chief and military historian Max Hastings.
0:11.1	It will be an opportunity to talk about Max's new book, Sword, D-Day, trial by battle,
0:16.4	as well as mark the 80th anniversary of VE Day.
0:19.6	The full details are as follows. 730 on Thursday
0:22.8	15th of May at the Shaw Theatre in Houston, London, and tickets start from £27.50, although I
0:29.3	believe there are ticket options that include a signed copy of the book. For those tickets,
0:34.1	go to www.spector.com.com.com.com.com. Books Live. We look forward to seeing you there.
0:44.2	Hello and welcome to Coffee House Shots. I'm Lucy Dunn and today I'm joined by James Heel and
0:48.2	Isabel Hardman. We've just watched Prime Minister's Questions where Kearse Armour was quizzed on
0:52.7	everything from unemployment to immigration to the war in Gaza. But first, it was the leader of the opposition,
0:57.9	Kemi Badnock, who was up. Isabel, Kemi's been criticised in the past on her performance at PMQ's.
1:03.1	How do you think she got on today? I think she did better, or at least it was a harder session for the
1:09.1	Prime Minister because she now has data that she can waver at him saying,
1:15.8	look, your economic plan is not working.
1:17.9	Unemployment figures, which she really hammered him on in terms of the Chancellor's jobs tax.
1:25.6	And she returned to a point that I think is really worth her continuing
1:31.4	to make about the impact of the national insurance contributions rise on hospices. And she also was
1:41.1	ready for the Prime Minister's answer on that, which was that he basically
1:46.8	talked about some capital funding for, I think it's just children's hospices. And they'd
1:53.9	not basically pounced on him as a result of that and pointed out that, you know, they'd been
1:58.4	through this before. He was talking about a different
	...

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