Senior Labour figure says councillors ‘don’t want him near our voters’ Daily Telegraph 04/05/26 Sir Keir Starmer has been kept away from the local election campaign trail over his “toxic” image, The Telegraph has been told. The Prime Minister is playing a limited role in Labour’s attempts to get out the vote, taking part in fewer than a dozen visits since the beginning of March. Labour is forecast to surrender up to 2,000 council seats in England on Thursday, as well as ceding the Welsh Senedd and losing out to the SNP in Scotland. A challenge to Sir Keir’s leadership is then expected within days, with his own MPs and ministers already conceding in private that he cannot stay on in the long term. Sir Keir’s historic unpopularity is expected to cause Labour to shed votes in multiple directions, losing support to Reform UK on the Right and the Green Party on the Left. One senior Labour figure told The Telegraph: “He really is toxic. There’s a visceral loathing of him and it’s sp...
Rise revealed by Conservative analysis will provoke calls for overhaul of £155bn benefits budget Daily Telegraph 03/05/26 More than 600,000 households received more in benefits than the average worker’s salary, the first analysis of its kind has revealed. The figures show that 625,618 households were each given more than £32,200 in welfare payouts last year – the average annual salary of a British worker after tax – despite the introduction of a benefits cap. The analysis, by the Conservatives, also revealed that 16,000 of those households received more than £60,000 in welfare payments – almost twice the average annual take-home pay. The figures will provoke calls for an overhaul of the £155bn benefits budget and for reform of the welfare cap to ensure that “work always pays”. Sir Keir Starmer is under pressure to cut welfare spending in order to bolster Britain’s defence budget, with Labour preparing to unveil its defence investment plan “within weeks”. Neil O’Brien, the shad...