Stung over the revelation that his expensive specs were being paid for by a wealthy benefactor, Keir Starmer now apparently limits his freebies to football. So it was left to Kemi Badenoch to bestow some, er, Westminster glamour at the All England club at the weekend.
The Conservative leader was spotted at the women’s singles final, sitting alongside director Sam Mendes. She has since updated her entry in Parliament’s register of members’ interests to show her two tickets and hospitality, valued at £1,396, came courtesy of the All England Lawn Tennis Club itself.
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The outing is only the second freebie Badenoch has declared since being elected Conservative leader last year, and is considerably less controversial than the first: a £14,000 week-long “residential” in Gloucestershire with her family courtesy of the Tory donor Neil Record, who chairs a climate sceptic lobby group, Net Zero Watch. That trip was handily followed a month later with Badenoch u-turning on the Conservatives’ commitment to achieving net zero by 2050, saying it was “impossible” for the UK to meet the target.
While neither Starmer nor chancellor Rachel Reeves – criticised earlier this year for taking a family member to see warbler Sabrina Carpenter without paying – was at Centre Court, another senior Tory declared a gift of two tickets and hospitality worth £1,066. That was Stuart Andrew, who, you of course won’t need telling, is shadow culture secretary.
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