Nigel Farage has given a damming verdict on Sir Keir Starmer’s speech announcing his “Plan For Change”
The Reform UK leader was speaking as the Prime Minister announced the six milestones, including plans to build 1.5 million new homes and to put “more police on the beat, stamping out anti-social behaviour in every community.”
The Clacton MP wrote on social media: “Keir Starmer’s milestones for government don’t include immigration or the exploding population. This reset offers no change and guarantees economic failure.”
Meanwhile Rupert Lowe, Reform MP for Great Yarmouth, said: “As someone who cares so passionately about our country, and desperately wants Britain to succeed – I am sorry to say, but Keir Starmer is simply not up to the job of Prime Minister. A man seriously out of his depth.”
The Reform UK has said Starmer’s speech ‘guarantees economic failure’
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The Prime Minister listed his six milestones after saying that a “strong foundation” of economic stability, and security measures had now allowed Labour to look ahead.
The first milestone to reach by the end of the Parliament is “higher living standards in every region of the country” with Sir Keir Starmer added the UK was aiming for the “highest sustained growth in the G7, so working people have more money in their pocket.”
The second is to build 1.5 million new homes, and the third to put “more police on the beat, stamping out anti-social behaviour in every community.”
Starmer’s fourth milestone is to give every child the “best start in life” with a record number of five-year-olds entering school “ready to learn.”
His fifth milestone is clean power by 2030, “so never again can a tyrant like Putin attack the living standards of working people.” The sixth and final milestone was to cut NHS waiting lists to 18 weeks between referral and treatment.
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Green Party co-leader Adrian Ramsay slammed the speech, saying it was “overlooking the damage.” The MP for Waveney Valley wrote on social media: “Starmer’s milestones don’t provide route to real change.
“Today’s listicle, while pointing in right direction on some issues, is missing wholesale ambition that a govt elected on a change agenda needs and it overlooks the damage of policies like cutting winter fuel allowance.”
Meanwhile, the Tories claimed Sir Keir Starmer’s “emergency list of priorities” is a sign that the Government is feeling “pretty unstable.”
Shadow Cabinet Office minister Alex Burghart said: “The missions only mean anything if the Government is honest about what it is doing, about the milestones it is hitting or not hitting, and also why it has downgraded certain other priorities.
“Like, how has it chosen these six issues, over immigration, over GP surgeries, over A&E, over defence, over the £300 energy bill reduction target, over becoming the fastest growing economy in the G7. Why has the Government chosen the priorities it has? “
Sir Keir Starmer insisted his milestones were not a reset of his priorities or confusing for the public to understand.
The Prime Minister told reporters: “I announced the missions two years ago as our five national missions to give a sense of purpose-driven Government, and like all of the strategies I have set down since I became Labour leader… we have had a strategy, we have had a plan and we have stuck to it.
“So those missions went down two years ago, we have stuck to them, I have just reiterated them now.”
He added: “We set out the milestones so that people can measure are we making proper progress on our missions, back to what we said two years ago and what will it feel like for me? Will I have more money in my pocket? Will I be able to get an appointment at the NHS if I need it?”
“These are, if you like, something for the public to use to hold us to account on what we say we can achieve on the missions in the first five years.
“And I will be absolutely straight about it, it is also designed to push and drive the reform that we are going to need if we are going to ensure that we bring about the change that is so desperately needed.”