Keir Starmer’s promises on crime will come back to bite him

The Labour leader is a surprisingly unconvincing crusader on law and order, writes John Rentoul

Rishi Sunak is keen to paint Kier Starmer as the north London liberal lawyer that he is (PA)

Keir Starmer had a good moment at Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday. Rishi Sunak accused Labour of being soft on crime, and Starmer retorted: “The only criminal investigation that the prime minister has ever been involved in is the one that found him guilty of breaking the law.”

It was an effective shot across the despatch boxes, but there are risks for Starmer in personalising the issue. He secured a victory last year by promising to resign if he were fined by the police for breaking lockdown law. Unlike Boris Johnson and Sunak, he wasn’t fined, as he boasted in his speech today: “If I’d broken those same rules, I just couldn’t have looked the British people in the eye and asked for their trust.”

But there are dangers for a politician in claiming to be “purer than pure” – a phrase Tony Blair once used that was wrapped round his neck, usually misquoted as “whiter than white”, ever after.