This live blog is now closed but coverage of UK politics continues on Wednesday’s blog:
Afternoon summary
- Labour has describe the 6 million NHS waiting list as a “Tory backlog”, not a Covid one. Speaking in the Commons, Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, said:
This isn’t a Covid backlog, this is a Tory backlog. We went into the pandemic with NHS waiting lists already at a record four and a half million and now 6 million people are waiting on NHS waiting lists, more than ever before.
More than a million are waiting for scans and tests used to diagnose cancer and the NHS itself is waiting, waiting for the government’s plan to deal with the backlog.
Labour has also dismissed cancer waiting list targets announced by No 10 today as either old or unrealistic. (See 3.53pm and 4pm.)
- Keir Starmer has been rescued by the police from a mob of angry anti-vaxx and anti-lockdown protesters. (See 5.36pm.) This is from the Mirror’s Rachel Wearmouth on the incident.
Understand protestors were shouting at Starmer about Jimmy Savile & had a noose. This is just days after @BorisJohnson repeated the false claim - regularly used by the far right - that the Labour leader failed to prosecute Savile when he was DPP https://t.co/8GPJpbevW8
— Rachel Wearmouth (@REWearmouth) February 7, 2022
The Labour MP Chris Bryant has linked what happened to Boris Johnson’s anti-Starmer Jimmy Savile smear in the Commons last week.
This is appalling. People were shouting all sorts at Keir, including “Jimmy Savile”.
— Chris Bryant (@RhonddaBryant) February 7, 2022
This is what happens when a prime minister descends into the gutter and recycles lies from hard-right conspiracy theorists. Political poison has an effect. Johnson has no moral compass. https://t.co/pC2msvYsZW
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