Wes Streeting has accused a Sky News presenter of not wanting to hear Labour’s plans in a tense TV exchange.
The Shadow Health Secretary hit out at Trevor Phillips after he suggested the party’s manifesto did not back up Labour‘s slogan to “change” lives in the UK. The Sky presenter grilled Mr Streeting on Labour “making a choice” to give more support to pensioners, than the rest of the public, which Mr Phillips said was not a “change” from the Tories’ current prioritisation.
Mr Streeting attempted to list Labour’s pledges such as creating more NHS appointments, recruiting more police officers and putting more mental health support in schools. But Mr Phillips interrupted and said he was “repeating himself”.
The Labour frontbencher responded: “I’m sorry Trevor, You can’t say there’s no change and then not give me a chance to set the change out…. I can go into even more of our policies in the manifesto.” Mr Phillips interjected: “Please don’t.”
Mr Streeting continued: “But this is the thing though… this is the wall of cynicism the Labour party has to overcome in the run up to the General Election, this complacency that there’s no change but when we set it out, you don’t want to hear it.”
Explaining Labour’s plans for change, he earlier laid out: “If we have free primary breakfast clubs in every primary school, as Labour is committed to and has funded, that is real change for kids who are turning up to school with hungry bellies rather than hungry minds. That’s real change for those kids.
“If those kids are in science and maths lessons being taught by PE teachers because the teachers aren’t there, Labour’s 6,500 more teachers to plug the shortage is real change.” He also listed Labour’s plan to create a child poverty strategy.
But Mr Streeting admitted Labour “would like to go further on so many fronts”, adding: “But we are dealing with a fundamentally weak economy and public finances that are an absolute state I just warn people, against this backdrop of breath-taking complacency in the media about the opinion polls, do not give the matches back to the arsonist to finish the job.”