If Andy Burnham is a “prime minister-in-waiting” he must answer questions from MPs before they leave Parliament for the summer, Kemi Badenoch has said.
The Conservative leader insisted that “silly season is not for the people running the country”, as she criticised the man now considered a prime minister-in-waiting for not having yet addressed defence and major global issues publicly.
At a rally in central London, Mrs Badenoch said Sir Keir Starmer was now “powerless” as he travelled to his final international engagement at the Nato summit in Turkey.
She then questioned Sir Keir’s likely successor’s record on defence so far, claiming he had issued no response to the close encounter between a Russian reconnaissance plane and the UK’s carrier strike group in the Arctic.
Mrs Badenoch said: “The RAF intercepted a Russian warplane.
“It was dropping sonar devices right next to a British aircraft carrier.
“What did Andy Burnham say? Nothing.”
She then challenged Mr Burnham to delay Parliament’s recess dates by a “day or two” so MPs can ask him questions about his agenda for Government ahead of the summer.
“I do think that he’s got some serious questions to answer.
“He should come to Parliament and answer those questions if he really is the prime minister-in-waiting, needs to start acting like it,” Mrs Badenoch said.
Elsewhere during the rally, Mrs Badenoch said: “Burnham wants a summer holiday, (Nigel) Farage is in hiding, Starmer is retiring.”
She added: “But all of this is happening right at the time when difficult decisions need to be made.
“Silly season is not for the people running the country.
“Britain needs some grown-ups in the room, but they don’t appear to be any outside the Conservative Party.”
As she took questions from reporters following the rally, Mrs Badenoch was probed about how the Conservatives would fund defence spending.
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She said the party would largely seek to make up shortfalls in spending through welfare cuts, but acknowledged other areas of spending would also need to be reprioritised.
Asked whether tax rises would be completely off the table to fund defence spending, Mrs Badenoch said: “If we tax so much that the businesses disappear, then we’re not going to have the money for defence.”