Victoria Derbyshire was instantly all over that Tory ‘£2k Labour tax rise’ nonsense and had the entire internet cheering

John Plunkett. Updated June 5th, 2024

You might have seen by now that Rishi Sunak’s claim that ‘independent Treasure officials’ were behind claims that a Labour government would increase taxes by £2,000 was completed nonsense.

Not only that, a senior Treasury official warned Tory ministers not to say civil servants were behind the controversial claim, which the PM repeated ad nauseam during Tuesday night’s election leader debate with Keir Starmer.

EXCLUSIVE

The chief Treasury civil servant wrote to Labour two days ago saying that the £38 billion/£2,000 tax attack “should not be presented as having been produced by the civil service”

He said he had reminded ministers of this pic.twitter.com/s00XBfbvAj

— Henry Zeffman (@hzeffman) June 5, 2024

Now Labour is calling on Sunak to apologise for lying 12 times about it during the debate (although it’s also a bit of a head-scratcher why Starmer didn’t leap on it a bit more enthusiastically during their head to head).

And we mention it again because Newsnight presenter Victoria Derbyshire was all over this in the immediate aftermath of the debate, taking precisely zero nonsense from Cabinet minister Claire Coutinho who obviously didn’t read that Treasury memo.

And it had the whole internet cheering.

Victoria Derbyshire pulls apart Sunak’s claim that a Labour govt will raise taxes by £2000

“I’m going to pull you up on that Claire Coutinho. The calculations are made by Tory SpAds, they’re political appointees & that is misleading to voters and very disrespectful”#newsnight pic.twitter.com/IhaG3qOWZP

— David (@Zero_4) June 4, 2024

Amen to that.

Here is a slightly longer clip.

Victoria Derbyshire, “Claire Coutinho, where did you get the £2,000 figure from because its not an impartial independent figure, it’s your own Tory special advisers”

Claire Coutinho, “No no, not at all. They are independent impartial civil servants”

Liz Kendall, “If you put… pic.twitter.com/1zU7u0iLGy

— Farrukh (@implausibleblog) June 4, 2024

And just a bit of the love people had for that.

I just love Victoria Derbyshire, not a thing gets past her. To tell Coutinho that it’s disrespectful to voters is a proper telling off. More of this please.

— Martin Found (@MartinFound1) June 4, 2024

Conservatives seem delighted to have this figure out there. My prediction, every single Tory doing every single programme for the next three days will be pulled up on it and the polls with widen instead of narrowing (except yougov which is changing its methodology). ~AA https://t.co/CewbHun8pE

— Best for Britain (@BestForBritain) June 4, 2024

Instead of a “debate” with 45 seconds for each leader to make a point they should have Victoria Derbyshire question them in turn for 30 minutes.

— Barry Ellis (@ellis_barry) June 4, 2024

Julie Etchingham just let Sunak repeat that lie over and over in the debate, even after Starmer explained it was rubbish.
Well done Victoria Derbyshire

— GillyHx (@GillyHx3) June 4, 2024

Please can Victoria Derbyshire host everything https://t.co/Q85l90GaRH

— Carl Morrell (@carlrmorrell) June 4, 2024

To conclude …

So, no then… pic.twitter.com/WLVRKDxL8q

— The Purple Pimpernel (@Eyeswideopen69) June 4, 2024

Source @Zero_4