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Sir Keir Starmer fought back against claims he was relying on a “magic wand” of growth to solve the UK’s economic woes as he insisted that the limited election pledges Labour had made were a “downpayment” for future investment.
The Labour leader, who opinion polls suggest is likely to become prime minister on July 5, refused to say clearly that he would not cut the real-term budgets given to courts, prisons or councils, but repeated a previous statement that “we’re not going back to austerity”.
“I ran a public service during austerity, I know what that feels like, I know the damage that it did, and that’s been the legacy of the last 14 years,” the former director of public prosecutions told the BBC’s Panorama.
Starmer insisted that the pledges his party had put forward — including 6,500 new teachers and 2mn extra NHS appointments a year — were not “small”, but were “downpayments” for a much more ambitious programme of reform later down the line. The commitment on teachers equates to one teacher for every three schools.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Starmer have both been accused of grossly downplaying the scale of investment needed in public services, and for failing to be honest with the public that money will have to be raised either through taxes or borrowing.
Starmer launched Labour’s manifesto on Thursday, setting out £8.6bn in taxes, including a clampdown on tax avoidance and evasion and applying VAT to independent schools. The policy platform drew attacks from the right for being a “tax trap” and from the left for lacking ambition and failing to rise to the challenges facing the nation.
Accused of relying on a “magic wand” called growth, Starmer said on Friday evening “it’s not a wand, it’s a plan”, adding he was prepared to “make enemies” to improve economic efficiencies, including to progress with planning reform.
Starmer also suggested he would like to forge a new and more advantageous Brexit deal with the EU, though he said he would not seek to bring back freedom of movement.
“I do think we can do better than the botched deal that we got under Boris Johnson. I think every business thinks that. So if there are businesses that are watching this: I hear what you say about the barriers to trade, and we are going to do something about that,” he said.
But he said that rebuilding the UK’s relationship with the EU was not a “single silver bullet” that would improve the UK’s sluggish economic growth, arguing that issues with planning, industrial strategy and skills had existed before Brexit and had persisted afterwards.
Starmer also reiterated his position that he would not use private healthcare if he was placed on a waiting list for care — a claim that drew some scepticism when he made it during the first leaders’ debate last week.
But he said “I completely understand why people would go private”.
“I know people who have because they wanted to have an operation more quickly, to get back to work,” he said.
