The Prime Minister is surrounded by ‘lads’ and has ‘a problem with women’, Rosie Duffield claimed yesterday.
MP Ms Duffield stepped up her attack on Sir Keir Starmer after resigning from the Labour Party on Saturday amid the row over freebies which is engulfing his premiership.
She also blasted the PM for being more interested in ‘greed and power’ than ‘making a difference’ after it emerged he accepted £32,000 worth of clothes from Labour donor Lord Alli – double the amount he had previously declared.
Asked whether she thought Sir Keir had a problem with women, she told the BBC: ‘I’m afraid I do, yes.
‘I mean, I have experienced it myself. Most backbenchers I am friends with are women and most of us refer to the men that surround him, the young men, as “the lads” and it’s very clear that the lads are in charge.
MP Rose Duffield (Pictured in Canterbury in 2019) has accused Sir Keir Starmer of liking to be surrounded by ‘lads’ and having ‘a problem with women’
The MP for Canterbury recently resigned from the Labour party amid the row concerning ‘freebies’ from donors (Pictured: Rachel Reeves clapped by the PM and other members of cabinet)
‘They have now got their Downing Street passes, they are the same lads who were briefing against me in the papers and other prominent female MPs and I was really hoping for better but it wasn’t to be.’
The accusation of sexism comes after repeated negative briefings to the media about Sir Keir’s chief of staff, Sue Gray – with men, including the PM’s political strategist Morgan McSweeney, said to be behind them.
On Friday, it emerged that Sir Keir was given another £16,000 worth of clothes by Lord Alli after Downing Street recategorised what the money was for.
The total accepted by him from the Labour peer for clothing in recent months now stands at £32,000.
Sir Keir also accepted more than £2,400 for several pairs of glasses and £20,437 worth of accommodation. This was for a stay of nearly seven weeks for Sir Keir and his family at Lord Alli’s £18million penthouse in central London during the general election.
Ms Duffield, appearing on the Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg show, said: ‘We’ve always held ourselves up as this, you know, a party that’s better, that will do better, that will clear out the rot.
‘And, here we are, and it’s daily revelations of hypocrisy and grubby kind of presents and things.’
The now-Independent MP for Canterbury, added: ‘Why would someone on so much more money than most people take free gifts? Why? He can absolutely afford his own clothes.
The accusation of sexism comes after repeated negative briefings to the media about Sir Keir’s chief of staff, Sue Gray (Pictured as the 79th United Nations General Assembly in New York) – with men said to be behind them
Among the men behind the negative briefings about the chief of staff is reportedly PM’s political strategist Morgan McSweeney (Pictured in Downing Street in July)
This comes shortly after it emerged the Prime Minister (Pictured at the annual Labour Party conference) was given £16,000 worth of clothes by Lord Alli
‘And I’ve seen journalists asking him and he hasn’t answered. He hasn’t actually explained… it’s just mass hypocrisy.
‘I can’t be a part of that. It’s more about greed and power than it is about making a difference.’
In an interview with LBC radio, Ms Duffield criticised Sir Keir for accepting the gifts while stripping 10million pensioners of their winter fuel payments.
She said: ‘In whose service is taking £32,000 worth of clothes while cutting the winter fuel allowance for people who are earning £12,000 or £13,000 a year? It’s not OK.’
Ms Duffield’s comments followed her letter announcing her decision to resign in which she said ‘the sleaze, nepotism and apparent avarice’ of Sir Keir’s administration were ‘off the scale’.
She has had a testy relationship with the Labour leadership after being investigated by the party over allegations of transphobia.
Ms Duffield was cleared over the claims in January but has spoken of feeling frozen out by the party despite being exonerated.
Labour MP Nadia Whittome attacked Ms Duffield after she resigned – accusing her on X of ‘dehumanising one of the most marginalised groups [trans people] in society’ and saying that she should have lost the whip ‘long ago’.
The former Labour MP also spoke out against the Prime Minister on LBC for accepting gifts whilst slashing winter payments for millions of pensioners
Harry Potter author JK Rowling (Pictured), who is a friend of Ms Duffield, said she was ‘one of the few female Labour politicians with the gust to stand up for vulnerable women and girls’
But Harry Potter author JK Rowling, a friend of Ms Duffield, replied: ‘Rosie Duffield was one of the few female Labour politicians with the guts to stand up for vulnerable women and girls, while self-satisfied numbskulls like you fought to give away their rights and spaces.’
Cabinet minister Pat McFadden, who has accepted thousands of pounds worth of tickets to shows and football matches, tried to justify the freebies accepted by Sir Keir, saying that they were ‘in effect, campaign donations’.
He added: ‘And presentation [looking smart], whether we like it or not, is part of a campaign. ‘I am grateful to [Lord] Waheed Alli for the support he has shown Labour.’
Last night, attendees at a fringe event on sex, gender and safeguarding children at the Conservative Party conference in
Birmingham applauded Ms Duffield, who is a staunch defender of single-sex spaces for women, for leaving Labour.
