Sir Keir Starmer declares gifts and freebies totalling more than £100,000 - the highest of any MP

[TealTraybake]

Perhaps the Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire needs his freebies because MPs aren’t paid enough. Or perhaps he’s just the knight commander of the most astonishing hypocrisy.

The issue for Labour is its all very predictable and totally avoidable.

Starmer promised a new broom, an end to Tory chaos, he didn't need to be accepting quite so many freebies as one pp put it.

There is a book scheduled for release in Feb next year which I think will shed some light on how Keir Starmer came to power, I can't imagine it will do much for his reputation. Here's the blurb about it:

The Fraud: Keir Starmer, Labour Together, and the Crisis of British Democracy

Using a cache of hitherto unseen documents and exclusive insider accounts, this sensational new book tells the story of how a shadowy group, Labour Together, came to the cusp of delivering Sir Keir Starmer to power in Britain. It reveals, for the first time, the way the project sabotaged Corbynism through covert plotting, propelled Starmer to Labour’s leadership and now, having crushed the left in the party, poses an imminent threat to British democracy as a whole.

The Fraud reveals the chilling nature of Labour Together. Established in 2015, the project was created by ‘eight brave MPs’ who engaged in secret planning to wrest control of Labour. They included people who are now among the most senior members of Keir Starmer’s Shadow Cabinet: Rachel Reeves, Wes Streeting, Shabana Mahmood and Steve Reed. Morgan McSweeney, the guiding light behind Labour Together, is today one of the most powerful people in the Party, a key figure in selecting future parliamentary candidates.

Holden describes how Labour Together pursued its objectives with a substantial pot of undeclared funding, which it used to secretly insert itself into the Labour Party’s ‘antisemitism crisis’ at a time when it was publicly maintaining a position of neutrality in the Party’s vicious factional-infighting.

In these pages we see how Labour Together selected Keir Starmer to be its frontman, helping him win Labour’s leadership with the most mendacious campaign in recent political history. The Party under Starmer has since embraced the ugliest forms of racism and Islamophobia, and shared information hacked from journalists critical of its allies. The Labour Together project has subsequently transformed the Party into an authoritarian machine entirely intolerant of dissent, rowing back on an ocean of previous commitments and propagating an agenda of reheated austerity.

Keep an eye on the Labour Party Conference where there may be a vote on proposals to change how leadership elections are conducted, some people are expressing concern that it will make it harder to get rid of Starmer if the party starts to think it necessary.

It is so depressing. This is the opposite of what I voted for.

G7 various EU meetings, now described as "Work Events" and comparable to the WAGs of the '00s

The one held down in Cornwall a while ago was packed full of the partners of PMs, Presidents etc etc

On supporting british designers, i believe Starmers wife did sport a dress provided by a UK fashion house.

Ah I didn't realise that, thank you.

I hate the new trend of claiming it's bots, PR or whatever else when people raise threads of differing opinions. Lots of people do hold Labour to a higher standard not because they like the Tories or think they're better, but because they support Labour and were hopeful that they'd be different. It's perfectly possible to criticise them without being fans of the opposition.

I think you are missing the point, the fact that partners traditionally turn up at these events does not mean it necessary or adding value. So if they don't need to be there then they won't need clothes to attend. You're assuming the necessity to justify accepting the freebies, I'm questioning the premise.

If our PM is attending events in his/her capacity as PM, their job, then how is attending a meeting of international leaders not a "work event"?

Yes, and Carrie Johnson hired her clothes.

He's my bit of 'Tory Propaganda', let's do something radical and ban gifts for all elected members of Parliament (so yes, the Tories too!). Surely if it works for the Civil Service, it could work for MPs too?
So no one 'forgetting the deadline' or 'misinterpreting the rules' or being 'advised incorrectly'. If we are to get the public to respect and trust our elected representatives rather than being continually disappointed by them, they ALL (Tories and Labour) need to be thinking of the electorate first and lead by example.

Disappointing

Was that for the Covid lockdown parties she attended?

No i'm not, these are international events & if you want them to be classed as work events (which i never said they were not) requiring certain dress codes, then its not unreasonable to make clothing a work expense for the PM.

I also didn't say the partners attending "add value" but is what so called world leaders do.

I agree it would be simpler to ban all gifts (though it appears some things claimed by Opposition MPs are for attendance at events the Government MPs they shadow don’t have to declare, rather than personal items) but can we get this in perspective?

Rishi managed it.

Lol yes looks exactly like the stands at a West Ham game doesn't it or it it a shortened shot of a segregated stand for the suits?

Okay, another one. Looks like a pretty normal stand to me.

I missed this @ApricotCrush .

What's all this I can't go stuff

Keir sounds so petulant with his response

Your post clearly mentioned events in questions. I quoted your post. It's very clear what I have in mind writing mine.

Deflecting now, are we?

Upholstered seats? & surrounded by suits, WAGs and a plethora of security guards.

But if you re going to compare to Sunak, at least Starmer scrapped the £8m private helicopter sunak had us all pay for.

He earned over 400k last year and you think he should receive tax payer funded suits or freebies? Who else earning that kind of money expects someone else to pay for their clothes?

If the partners are not adding value but turn up anyway and apparently need clothing for photo ops at such events then how are they not like WAG's? You seem stuck on the idea that because it's "what world leaders do" we should be OK with his wife receiving 20k worth of clothing paid for by a party donor. I don't think partners need to attend and therefore they don't need a wardrobe for it.

Bringing up Bojo's wife is the deflection.

I ve said on multiple posts Starmer is a fool and shouldn't have accepted almost all of these gifts, he may as well of put a target on his back.

I also agree with @EasternStandard his response is petulant, so i'm more than capable of criticising Starmer, unlike almost ALL Tory supporters who can never bring themselves to criticise any Tory.

You brought it up, you specifically Cornwall.

£400k isn't his PM salary is it?

So you wont Starmer to be the only one not to bring his wife/partner? ok & how will that be portrayed and what questions asked?

Mail headline "Starmers marriage on rocks.. we need to know"

Its a donation, a gift... taxpayer bill = £00.00 - totally unwise but there is nothing intrinsically wrong with what he has done.

& what has that to do with Carries dresses?

The headlines were, quite rightly, never ending and Starmer described Johnson as being "mired in sleaze".