“Keir Starmer’s frontbench considers intervention over alleged weight gain”

The Labor leader has always benefited from the rumor that he was the inspiration for the character Mark Darcy in Helen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary – a ‘dashing’ human rights lawyer with legions of female admirers.

But now Sir Keir Starmer is the subject of an unflattering whisper campaign by members of his frontbench, who are discussing whether to “stage an intervention” about a “few extra pounds” they believe he may have recently added. A source said: ‘It was fine when he faced Boris Johnson but Rishi is as thin as a rake and suddenly Keir looks a bit older and more dignified by comparison.’

Starmer, 60, has been trying to play soccer every week since childhood and describes himself as a “midfield general,” while 42-year-old Mr. Sunak prefers training on a Peloton exercise bike at 6 a.m. to digital instructor Cody Rigsby.

If Shadow Ministers manage to persuade Sir Keir to go on a diet, it could help win some critical votes. In 2020, the Economist magazine cited a study from France’s Montpellier Business School that found a correlation between the weight of politicians and their eligibility.

Will Sir Keir be questioned about his drug past as revenge for Rishi attacks?

By Glen Owen

Sir Keir Starmer risks opening himself up to personal attacks – including questions about whether he has taken drugs – by approving controversial attack ads on Rishi Sunak, senior Labor members warn.

Labor is divided over the new strategy, which was launched with a Twitter post accusing the Prime Minister of not wanting child sex offenders to go to prison.

It was labeled “gutter politics” by critics, with some internal Labor opponents fearing it could lead the Conservatives to launch a more personal campaign against their leader.

One possible line of attack could be whether Sir Keir has ever taken illegal drugs.

In a 2021 interview, Piers Morgan asked him 14 times if he’d ever taken drugs, only to get the answer, “We worked hard and played hard.”

Mr Morgan then urged Sir Keir to give a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer, saying: ‘In view of your obvious reluctance to give me a clear, simple answer, I am right in assuming from your answer that you’ve tried drugs but you didn’t really like them and didn’t want to take any more?’

Sir Keir said, “I didn’t say no.”

Red Knight, an unauthorized biography of Sir Keir by Lord Ashcroft, quotes an anonymous friend as saying that the Labor leader ‘was not averse to smoking weed on social occasions when he was a younger man’.

In contrast, when Sunak was asked during last summer’s Tory leadership contest if he had ever taken drugs, he answered with an unequivocal ‘no’.

We revealed earlier this month that the attack ads were hatched to neutralize headlines describing Sir Keir Starmer as ‘Sir Softy’ because of his crime record.

It sparked controversy within Labour, with former Home Secretary David Blunkett saying: ‘My party is better than this.’ But Sir Keir said he made “zero excuses” for the strategy.

It has already re-examined Sir Keir’s record on crime. In 2020, he campaigned against the deportation of Tajay Thompson back to Jamaica after serving half of a 15-month prison sentence for drug trafficking. After the 26-year-old’s flight was grounded by the legal challenge, Thompson punched two women.

The Prime Minister used the label ‘Sir Softy’ to attack the Labor leader in the House of Commons last week, saying he was ‘soft on crime, soft on criminals’.

Boris Johnson has previously admitted to smoking ‘quite a few spliffs’ in college, saying: ‘I think I got cocaine once but I sneezed and so it didn’t get up my nose. Maybe I even put powdered sugar.’

In February, Sir Keir said a new Labor government would crack down on drug trafficking by supporting neighborhood policing.

A Labor spokesperson declined to comment last night.