Keir Starmer has attacked Kemi Badenoch and Nigel Farage over their stance on the war in Iran, accusing both of U-turning on their support for Donald Trump. At a raucous prime minister’s questions, Starmer accused the leader of the opposition of making the “mother of all U-turns” after she denied calling for the UK to join the US president’s war on Iran, despite previously urging Starmer to do more to “stop the people who are attacking us”.
Last week Badenoch repeatedly pressed Starmer on his decision not to launch offensive strikes to destroy missile bases. On Wednesday, Starmer said: “If I’d asked her last week, her position would be, we support the initial strikes and we want to join the war. This week, she says, we don’t want to join the war. That is the mother of all U-turns on the single most important decision a prime minister ever has to take.”
Starmer told MPs that the UK’s armed forces were “working day and night to protect British lives and British interests in the Middle East”, adding that the RAF had flown more than 230 hours of defensive operations and shot down multiple drones. He accused Badenoch of insulting RAF personnel by saying they were “just hanging about” during an interview, and said: “If she had any decency, she’d get up and she would apologise.”
Badenoch’s spokesperson later argued that she had never called for the UK to join the war, but had supported allowing the US to use British bases. Asked if this was not the same as joining the war, he said: “We are at war. The difference is, we’re not joining the war. We’re in the war.” On Farage, Starmer noted that the Reform leader had previously said the “gloves need to come off” with Iran and backed “regime change”, but on Tuesday said the UK should “not get ourselves involved in another foreign war”.
The Liberal Democrat leader, Ed Davey, said families were seeing petrol prices increase, mortgage rates go up and fixed energy deals get more expensive “all because of a war they did not start and do not support”. Turning his criticism to the Tories and Reform, he said: “The leader of the Conservatives has been competing with [Nigel Farage] to be Donald Trump’s biggest cheerleader, and the prime minister was right to reject their costly warmongering.”
Starmer said Davey was right, adding of Badenoch and Farage: “Last week, they were urging us to join. If they had been leading the country, we’d be at war.” The prime minister denied that the government was increasing the cost of petrol, saying fuel duty would remain frozen until September.
