Sir Keir Starmer today insisted ‘nobody is targeting the Prime Minister’s wife’, hours after Labour published an election advert critics said was targeting the Prime Minister’s wife.
The Opposition leader said that a series of highly personal ads the party has released this week were ‘highlighting the failures’ of the Tory Government.
It comes after Labour MPs and high-profile supporters questioned the wisdom of the line of attack.
Previous ads in the series accused the PM of being soft on sentencing child sex attackers and gun crime.
The most recent ad, posted yesterday, said: ‘Do you think it’s right to raise taxes for working people when your family benefitted from a tax loophole? Rishi Sunak does.’
Featuring a picture of Mr Sunak in the same style as the earlier ads, it said the Conservatives ‘have raised taxes 24 times since 2019’ while refusing to ‘close the non-dom tax loophole’ for foreign residents in the UK.
Ms Murty was revealed last year to hold the special tax status, reportedly saving her millions, but has since said she will pay UK taxes on all her worldwide income.
During a visit to Great Yarmouth in Norfolk on Wednesday, Sir Keir said: ‘Nobody is targeting the Prime Minister’s wife.
Sir Keir Starmer’s latest attack advert blasted Akshata Murty’s use of non-dom tax status while living in Downing Street at the same time millions of Britons were struggling with a cost-of-living crisis.
Ms Murty, whose father is an Indian billionaire, sparked uproar last year when it was revealed that she legally held non-dom tax status while living with the then Chancellor in No11. She later agreed to start paying full UK taxes.
The Opposition leader (pictured today with Rachel Reeves in Great Yarmouth) said that a series of highly personal ads the party has released this week were ‘highlighting the failures’ of the Tory Government.
‘Behind these adverts is a basic truth – that they have broken our criminal justice system, broken our NHS, and broken our economy.’
The Labour leader has stood firmly behind the campaign despite criticism from senior figures in his party and accusations of ‘gutter politics’.
During a visit to Great Yarmouth in Norfolk on Wednesday, Sir Keir said: ‘I make no apologies for highlighting the failures of this Government.
‘They’ve broken our NHS, they’ve broken our economy. And this argument that because they’ve changed prime minister five times, that somehow the prime minister doesn’t bear responsibility for 13 years of grief for many, many people, I just don’t think stacks up.’
Ms Murty, whose father is an Indian billionaire, sparked uproar last year when it was revealed that she legally held non-dom tax status while living with the then Chancellor in No11. She later agreed to start paying full UK taxes.
The initial ad, which accused the Prime Minister of not wanting child sex abusers to go to prison, caused unease among the shadow Cabinet.
Labour is hoping to benefit in England’s May 4 local elections as the Tories continue to lag far behind in national polls.
But the Tories hit back over the ad, accusing Labour of ‘the height of hypocrisy’ amid questions over Sir Keir’s pension from his time as Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).
Last month it was revealed Sir Keir has a unique pension deal that allows him to avoid tax on his savings, despite being a vocal critic of the Government’s pensions shake-up for big earners.
Sir Keir criticised Chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s Budget plan to abolish the tax-free limit on pensions savings, which had stood at £1.07 million, describing it as a ‘huge giveaway to some of the very wealthiest’.
But he was himself exempt from tax rules he would apply to other workers who save more than £1 million, under a special arrangement with the Government from his time as Director of Public Prosecutions for England and Wales between 2008 and 2013. He has vowed to remove his own exemption if he comes to power.
The initial ad, which accused the Prime Minister of not wanting child sex abusers to go to prison, caused unease among the shadow Cabinet.
The Twitter post highlighted analysis of official data and said that, under the Tories, ‘4,500 adults convicted of sexually assaulting children under-16 served no prison time’.
It shared a photo of the Prime Minister alongside the words: ‘Do you think adults convicted of sexually assaulting children should go to prison? Rishi Sunak doesn’t.’
Senior figures including former home secretary Lord David Blunkett called for it to be withdrawn, saying Labour is better than ‘gutter’ politics.
