As Rishi Sunak emerged as the UK’s next prime minister this week, an experiment was taking place on the outskirts of Stevenage. Huddled around the fume cupboards and petri dishes of GlaxoSmithKline’s global research lab, two of Labour’s frontbench team were testing the water with big business.
On the face of it, Jonathan Reynolds, the shadow business secretary, and Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, had donned lab coats and safety specs at the Hertfordshire plant to learn more about Britain’s world-beating life sciences sector, with a tour from GSK’s chair, Sir Jonathan Symonds.
