Starmer Blames ‘Snake Oil Populism’ for UK Riots, Refuses to Address Migration in Downing Street Speech

27/08/2024. London, United Kingdom. Prime Minister Keir Starmer gives his Inheritance spee
Simon Dawson / No 10 Downing Street via Flickr
Kurt Zindulka

In his first major address since the riots this month, Prime Minister Keir Starmer blamed the previous Tory government and the “snake oil of populism” for the unrest in the wake of a mass stabbing.

There is a “deep rot” within British society, according to Sir Keir Starmer, who pinned the blame for the violent uprising — in mostly Labour-controlled areas of the country — on his predecessors and the populist movement in the country.

“These riots didn’t happen in a vacuum, they exposed the state of our country, revealed a deeply unhealthy society, the cracks in our foundation laid bare, weakened by a decade of division and decline, infected by a spiral of populism, which fed off cycles of failure of the last government,” the leftist PM said from the rose garden of Downing Street.

“Every time they faced a difficult problem, they failed to be honest, they offered the snake oil of populism, which led to more failure,” he added.

In his address, Starmer did not mention immigration or the issues surrounding it, despite the riots breaking out in large part over anger against the reckless importation of millions of people into the country and the failure of political leaders of both stripes to put an end to the influx.

This anger reached a tipping point after the killing of three young girls at a ‘Taylor Swift’ dance party in Southport, allegedly at the hands of a second-generation migrant of Rwandan heritage.

Instead, the PM chose to focus on the supposed successes of his government, claiming to have done more for the country in seven weeks than the Tories did in seven years, and casting himself as a leader who would make the “tough” decisions to fix the country.

Starmer said that he “didn’t want to release prisoners early” but said that if he hadn’t made the move, the rioters would not have been able to be jailed. Similarly, the PM said that he didn’t want to make cuts to the winter fuel payment subsidy, but blamed the supposed “22 billion pound black hole in our finances” allegedly left by the former government.

While the Labour PM said that his top his government’s top priority will be economic growth and “wealth creation”, he appeared to suggest that tax hikes are indeed coming down the pike as Parliament comes back for the autumn, asking the public to “accept short term pain for long term good.”

However, the election of Labour — on the back of just over a third of voters — has reportedly already resulted in millionaires looking to park their money elsewhere, with a survey earlier this month suggesting that 47 per cent of people with over one million pounds in assets considering leaving the country for fear of likely Labour tax increases.

The study found that the most likely to leave were younger millionaires, between the ages of 18 and 35, sparking concerns that talented wealth creators may abandon Britain under Labour for more business-friendly destinations like Dubai, Singapore, or Switzerland.

Responding to Starmer’s speech, Tory leadership frontrunner and former Business Secretary, Kemi Badenoch said per GB News: “Keir Starmer is taking the British public for fools, but his dishonest analysis won’t wash. He campaigned on promises he couldn’t deliver and now he is being found out.

“At the election, Starmer and his Energy Secretary told us energy bills would go down under Labour – six weeks later they are going up. To make matters worse, he is removing the winter fuel payment many pensioners rely on to pay those bills.

“Of course, we made some mistakes in government. But remarkably, Labour are doubling down on those mistakes – from immigration to Net Zero policy. Worse still, they are prioritising the demands of their trade union paymasters over investment in public services.

“The truth is that Keir Starmer is managing voters’ expectations for a decade of decline.”

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