IT was like Keir Starmer naively walked into a trap on Sunday’s Andrew Marr show. Did he know the once voice of Labour now the voice of SNP was lurking in the wings? Did he know, later on in the programme, like a lamb to slaughter, he was going to share a seat with the articulate Brian Cox?

WATCH: Starmer stunned as Brian Cox destroys Labour and makes case for independence

Prior to this embarrassment and awkwardness Sir Keir did manage to successfully criticize Boris’s corrupt and sleazy administration. However, his position over ridding the UK of the infamous unelected chamber, you know that place where you can buy a peerage for £3 million (15 of the last 16 Tory mega donors, now all peers!) seems to be wavering. He had previously said he would abolish the House of Lords or, as Pete Wishart has labelled it, the “receptacle for donors”, and replace it with an elected chamber of regions and nations.

All he said, when pressed, was that it “needs to be changed”... not quite the same. So here we go yet again more backtracking from a political leader who aspires to be PM.

Robin MacLean
Fort Augustus