Deputy prime minister Angela Rayner was in the hot seat on Trevor Phillips’ Sky News programme on Sunday
Angela Rayner was skewered on Sky News (Image: Sky News)
Sky News host Trevor Phillips skewered deputy prime minister Angela Rayner on his Sunday morning programme – telling her to “speak plainly”. The pair were discussing prime minister Keir Starmer’s recent U-turn on Winter Fuel Allowance, which Nick Thomas-Symonds had denied was happening on the same show last week.
Trevor began the discussion by saying: “Let’s talk about one of the other issues in welfare benefits. Forgive me if I’m a bit aggrieved here – seven days ago, Nick Thomas-Symonds sat in that seat and I asked him, ‘is the Winter Fuel Allowance cut going to be reversed?’ And he said no. That remains the policy. He obviously had no idea that the prime minister was going to scrap it on Wednesday. When did you find out?”
Trevor Phillips ordered ‘Speak plainly!’ (Image: Sky News)
Rayner responded: “Well let me just be really clear, the prime minister didn’t say we’re going to scrap it. What the prime minister said on Wednesday is when economic conditions allow – and we’ve seen we’re the fastest growing economy in the G7 and we’ve already seen interest rates cut since the Chancellor took over – where those conditions allow, Keir Starmer says we want to do something around the eligibility for Winter Fuel Allowance, and that’s what he said. It will be the future fiscal event that we’ll be able to outline that.”
Phillips pushed: “You’re notoriously a plain speaker. Speak plainly to me. When will economic conditions allow, do you reckon?”
And Rayner replied: “Well I think that we’ve got the upcoming spending review and I’m sure the Chancellor [Rachel Reeves] will set it out at the first opportunity, Trevor, she will set out what we’re able to do.”
Phillips still wasn’t satisfied as he went on: “The spending review will be the first opportunity so we might hear some of those changes in a couple of weeks’ time?”
Laughing slightly, Rayner said: “I hope so, but I don’t know. I hope so! I mean the prime minister has announced it, so logically to me that indicates that the prime minister wants to do something in this area, and if the prime minister wants to do that I’m sure the Chancellor is going to look at how we can achieve that.”
