Veteran Labour MP Diane Abbott has hit out at her party’s leader and accused him of being "too much of a manager" to be able to understand the feelings of the public on the government’s proposed welfare cuts.
The prime minister insisted he will have a showdown with rebels over the cuts despite swirling rumours the government could pull the bill, telling reporters at the Nato summit in the Netherlands, "there’ll be a vote on Tuesday".
Asked if he has "failed to read the mood" among Labour MPs, Starmer said: "There’s a pretty united front that say we need reform… the question is how is that reform is carried out."
"I’m comfortable with reading the room and delivering the change the country needs," he told journalists at a press conference in The Hague.
"Is it tough going? Are there plenty of noises off? Yes, of course there always are, there always have been, there always will be", he insisted.
Deputy prime minister Angela Rayner told MPs the vote will go ahead on Tuesday when pressed by the Conservatives as she stood in for Starmer at Prime Minister’s Questions.
"We will go ahead on Tuesday," Rayner said.
Shadow chancellor Mel Stride labelled the bill "dangerously rushed and ill thought through".
"Many on the backbenches could be forgiven for thinking they have heard this before with the winter fuel payment where they were marched up the hill, and we all know where that story ended," Stride told MPs.
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