Keir Starmer was taken to task by Conservative MP Matt Vickers at PMQs [Prime Minister’s Questions] over the plight of Britain’s watering holes.
In a feisty exchange, the Prime Minister was forced to defend Labour tax changes which Vickers says has forced the hands of many.
“Last week, I was talking to Jason, a pub landlord. He’s told me: ‘I’ve heard a rumour about the prime minister’”, Vickers told MPs.
“He’s heard that there’s a reason why the prime minister hates Britain’s pubs.
“If he doesn’t, why is he taxing them all into oblivion?”
The prime minister responded by claiming “nobody likes pubs more than me”.
He continued: “We support them. It’s the same old nonsense. They [Conservatives] say they don’t want the National Insurance rise, but they don’t have the courage to say if they would reverse it.
“They know if they said that, they wouldn’t be able to say where the money would come from.
“That’s how we got into this problem in the first place.”