EXCLUSIVE: Esther McVey has suggested that the Prime Minister will face a leadership challenge from MPs.
Rachel Reeves and Sir Keir Starmer could be faced with an early General Election as the country is “up in arms”, a Conservative MP has suggested on today’s edition of the Daily Expresso podcast. Commenting on the latest welfare statistics following Rachel Reeves’s Budget last week, Esther McVey said the country does not think the Chancellor’s measures are fair, as families are being “crucified” and “working morning, noon and night” to pay for people on benefits.
Data suggested last week that jobless families who take a raft of hand-outs would be £18,000 better off than neighbours on the national living wage. The Centre for Social Justice found that a three-child family in work needs £71,000 a year before tax to match an equivalent jobless family. Now, Ms McVey believes Labour MPs have “given up”. “They see these liars at the top of their party, they see themselves… crushed, and they’ve given up. It’s like they’ve got no fight in them. I see this Labour Government doing it to the public and to the people.
“Crushing us, taking out our very sort of life, getting rid of our money, getting rid of our fun, telling us what to do.”
Ms McVey then said Sir Keir Starmer could face a leadership challenge as Labour languishes in the polls.
She said: “He might say to his party: ‘You want to get rid of me as leader? Well, the public voted me in. Well, the public is going to vote me out and I’m going to go to a General Election, because you’re not getting rid of me, you’re not moving me out of No 10.’
“Such is the arrogance of the man.”
Ms McVey said she personally thinks there will be a General Election, as “an external fact” will force the PM’s hand, such as his own MPs “getting some guts back, getting that fight back, knowing it’s so bad they need him gone”.
Rachel Reeves is facing a backlash to her Budget (Image: Getty)
Sir Keir Starmer could face being ousted by his own MPs, Ms McVey suggested (Image: Getty)
The Tory MP then compared Labour’s large majority to that secured by Boris Johnson in the 2019 election.
“I said Boris had a big majority, and that caused big problems, because you’re promising so much to so many people.
“When they came in with a massive majority, I said massive problems.
“And they never told anybody clearly what they were going to do, and they all came in with different expectations, not what they got, and that was the problem.”
Markus Campbell-Savours, Labour MP for Penrith and Solway, was suspended from the Labour whip yesterday for rebelling against the Government’s change to inheritance tax on farm land.
