‘Report mysterious men from the East bearing gifts,’ Starmer warns Reform

Sir Keir Starmer used his final Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) appearance this year to attack Reform UK, as he said Tory defections make politics look like the Muppets Christmas Carol.

The Prime Minister suggested members of Nigel Farage’s party should tell the police “if mysterious men from the East appear bearing gifts”, in a festive joke.

Reform UK’s former leader in Wales, Nathan Gill, 52, admitted taking bribes to make pro-Russian statements in the European Parliament, where he was originally elected as a UK Independence Party member.

He was jailed for 10-and-a-half years.

Sir Keir also said Sarah Pochin, who toppled Labour’s majority of more than 14,000 in a Runcorn and Helsby by-election earlier this year, was “clearly dreaming of a White Christmas”.

At the despatch box, Sir Keir told the Commons: “May I also take this opportunity to wish you (Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle), all the staff in Parliament, every member and their families across the House a very happy Christmas.”

To cheers from Labour and Conservative MPs, the Prime Minister continued: “And a little festive advice to those in Reform – if mysterious men from the East appear bearing gifts, this time report it to the police.”

Mr Farage laughed from his seat in a side gallery, where he was watching PMQs, as Sir Keir spoke.

In his exchange with Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch, the Prime Minister said she had “broken her own record since last week” on defections to Reform UK.

“She has broken that record because this week it has gone to 22,” he said.

Ben Bradley, the former Nottinghamshire County Council leader who lost his Mansfield parliamentary seat last year, has taken on a role as Reform’s “head of local government action” to help cut council spending.

Mrs Badenoch lost a sitting MP to Reform earlier this year when shadow work and pensions minister Danny Kruger left to join Mr Farage’s team in Westminster.

Sir Keir later said: “We’ve got the Muppets Christmas Carol here.

“The defections are happening so fast that at Christmas the leader of the Opposition is going to be left ‘Home Alone’, and the member for Runcorn (and Helsby, Ms Pochin) is clearly dreaming of a White Christmas.”

Ms Pochin won the Cheshire poll with a majority of six after the resignation of former Labour MP Mike Amesbury, who admitted punching a man during a late-night dispute.

Apologise

The Prime Minister told Mr Farage it is “never too late to apologise to former classmates”, amid allegations the Essex MP demonstrated “racist and antisemitic behaviour” when he was a schoolboy at Dulwich College.

The Reform leader has previously insisted he never made the remarks in a “malicious or nasty way”, following the reports.

Linsey Farnsworth, the Labour MP for Amber Valley, asked: “Does the Prime Minister agree with me that when Reform talk about Doge (US Department of Government Efficiency), what they’re actually talking about is cutting vital public services?”

In his reply, Sir Keir said: “Let me say to the member for Clacton, relaxing in the lounge – Christmas is a time for forgiveness. It’s never too late to apologise to former classmates.”

Mr Farage was not sitting with his Reform UK colleagues for Wednesday’s exchanges.

“PMQs today will be rigged again by the Labour Party,” he wrote on X in the moments before the session began.

“I will sit in the gallery.”