Rishi Sunak claims he's more statesmanlike than Keir Starmer despite marbles row
Rishi Sunak has brazenly denied being less "statesmanlike" than Keir Starmer after his petulant spat with the Greek government.
The Prime Minister will be meeting world leaders at the COP28 summit in Dubai today, where he will desperately try to claw back credibility after a bruising week. He sparked anger after calling off a meeting with Kyriakos Mitsotakis following his call for the Elgin Marbles to be returned from the British Museum.
Mr Starmer will also be in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and will claim that Britain "will be back on the world stage” under a Labour Government. He will accuse Mr Sunak of overseeing a string of diplomatic gaffes, as well as a willingness to break international law over the Rwanda scheme.
In a brutal PMQs session on Wednesday the Prime Minister looked rattled as Mr Starmer quipped he had "lost his marbles". Mr Sunak accused the Greek PM of "grandstanding" in a row over the 2,500 year old statues.
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Asked if he's worried the Labour leader - who did hold a meeting with Mr Mitsotakis on Monday - appears more statesmanlike, Mr Sunak responded: "No. If you look at the track record of my global diplomacy over the last year since I’ve had this job what have we done? We’ve got the Windsor Framework agreed, we’ve got the Aukus partnership with Australia and America, we’ve got Gcap which is the next generation of fighter jets with Japan and Italy."
He added that the UK is working with Albania, Turkey, Bulgaria, France, Italy and multiple others on illegal migration, adding: "So I feel pretty good about how we’ve conducted our foreign policy and engaged all our partners and allies around the world over the past year and delivered real benefits for the British people at home in investment and jobs and better security. And that’s what we’ll continue to do."
He faces a tough audience after weakening green pledges. Former Cabinet member Lord Goldsmith told Sky News that there's "no doubt our standing has diminished considerably in recent months". The Tory peer continued: "The UK is just not seen by our allies - big and also small island members of the commonwealth- as a reliable or serious partner."
Mr Sunak replied: "What l'd say first and foremost is we've got a better track record than any other major economy in decarbonising. Those are the facts." He said he would walk around "very proudly" and said he is excited to be announcing £1.6billion of funding for forest and fuel and finance projects."
Defending the decision to award new licenses to drill for oil and gas in the North Sea, he said: "In any reasonable scenario of the future, we are still going to need fossil fuels at 2050 and that’s even the projections of our independent committee for climate change which also contains respectable and independent scientists. The question you should ask yourself is given we’re going to need some of them, are we better off getting them from home or shipping them in from overseas which is a) bad for our security, rather not rely on unreliable foreign sources but also not good for the economy because it supports 200,000 jobs and lots of tax revenue and also most importantly not good for the environment."
Questioned whether he had discussed the summit with his daughters, he said: "Totally honest, I didn’t discuss it with her. Only one of them is at home at the moment and she was busy running around the Christmas market with me, hoovering up as much pasta and popcorn as she could earlier in Downing Street."
He went on: "It’s not just about my kids, I think it’s a very strong Conservative instinct to protect what we have for future generations."
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