PM backs distressed Reeves as welfare chaos continues

Sir Keir Starmer backed Rachel Reeves last night after the chancellor appeared distressed during Prime Minister's Questions during an exchange between the PM and the leader of the Opposition.

- DAVID MADDOX POLITICAL EDITOR

The prime minister said Ms Reeves was doing a “fantastic job”, adding that it was “absolutely wrong” to suggest her tearful appearance in the Commons related to the welfare U-turn, he told BBC News.

Speaking to the podcast Political Thinking with Nick Robinson, Sir Keir said: “It’s got nothing to do with politics, nothing to do with what’s happened this week. It was a personal matter for her. I’m not going to intrude on her privacy by talking to you about that. It is a personal matter.”

Asked if Ms Reeves would remain in her post, the prime minister said: “She will be chancellor by the time this is broadcast, she will be chancellor for a very long time to come, because this project that we’ve been working on to change the Labour Party, to win the election, change the country, that is a project which the chancellor and I’ve been working on together.”

Earlier in the day at PMQs Sir Keir dodged a question over the future of Ms Reeves on a day when the government appeared to be spiralling out of control.

Following a damaging rebellion over welfare cuts by 49 Labour MPs, the prime minister floundered in the lower chamber and refused to rule out new taxes to pay for the £5bn funding gap created by his welfare U-turns.

A senior Labour figure said the backbench revolt — and the last-minute concessions that hollowed out the welfare bill - were “terminal” for the prime minister’s political prospects.