Kemi Badenoch mocked Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer as she demanded action to cut the benefits bill. Speaking in Parliament, she focused her criticism on Labour’s inability to cut the UK’s ballooning welfare bill after it emerged senior Cabinet minister Pat McFadden was privately in despair about Labour MPs who only wanted to increase taxes.
And in a savage criticism of the Government’s record, she highlighted the fact that unemployment has risen every month since Labour came to power in July 2024. Mrs Badenoch said: “The fact is, despite his huge majority, the Prime Minister doesn’t have the votes to reform welfare.” Mocking Sir Keir, she said: “Everyone in this house knows that he is just a caretaker for the Mayor of Manchester.
“I’m glad to see the Prime Minister still has his sense of humour, given we all know he is losing his job soon. He has no authority, and we know why. His MPs will not let him do anything.”
Mrs Badenoch highlighted comments from Mr McFadden, the former Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and current Work and Pensions Secretary. In a text message exchange with Lord Mandelson, Mr McFadden said about Labour MPs: “Every meeting I have is ‘who can we tax in order to pay benefits to others’. They’re asking the wrong questions.”
The Conservative leader said: “The welfare secretary said in private what they won’t dare say in public.”
But Sir Keir said Mr McFadden wanted to help people into work instead of giving them benefits, and the Prime Minister said his colleague was “right about that”.
The Prime Minister added: “All the measures we are doing to reform welfare, all the measures we’re taking to get young people into work, are measures to reduce the cost and the numbers of people who are unemployed.”
He said: “They introduced the system that is broken. We’re reforming it.
“Did they vote to reform it with us? No, they voted to keep the broken system.”
Mrs Badenoch asked: “Benefits alone have risen by £20billion since he came to office. The Prime Minister has promised welfare reforms, we heard him say it just now. So, can he tell the House why was there no Bill in the King’s Speech to reform welfare?”
Sir Keir replied: “Welfare reform is balancing universal credit so it no longer pushes people away from work. That’s what we’re doing, they voted against it.
“Welfare reform is introducing a right to try to incentivise people to take up opportunities, that’s what we’re doing, they voted against it. Welfare reform is providing record funding on apprenticeships, that’s what we’re doing. Apprenticeship starts fell by 40% on their watch.
“She talks about the welfare bill, it soared by £88billion on their watch. Nearly three million people were written off, face-to-face assessment collapsed because of the contracts they agreed, and the person who signed off those contracts was the Shadow Chancellor.”