Penny Mordaunt drew inspiration from The Beatles as she branded Sir Keir Starmer a “nowhere man” while mocking his general election pledge card.
The Commons Leader referenced the song, from the band’s 1965 album Rubber Soul, after noting Sir Keir had been on “quite a journey”, starting at Islington North – a nod to former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn – with a “flexible principles ticket”.
She told the Commons: “There’s nothing there. There’s no vision, no plan, no principles on which to steer by, which is why this pledge card will go the same way of all the others.
“With apologies to The Beatles, this Leader of the Opposition is a nowhere man, sitting in his nowhere land, making all his nowhere plans for nobody.
“He doesn’t have a point of view, he’s no good for me or you, and judging by this latest pledge card he is nowhere near good enough for Britain.”
Ms Mordaunt earlier referenced the defection of Dover MP Natalie Elphicke from the Tories to Labour, saying of Labour leader Sir Keir: “He claims he is taking his party and us to Dover and Deal.
“However, it is becoming clear that due to industrial action – fewer trains under a Labour government – and running out of other people’s money, he’s going to have to join a rail replacement bus service terminating at Rayners Lane.
“I hope for the sake of those at Dover waiting on a promise of a train that is never going to arrive that there is a compensation scheme in place, perhaps a daily allowance in the other place (House of Lords).
“I don’t think the public who have long memories are going to fall for the stunt that is going on in parallel to business questions.”
Ms Mordaunt said voters would “not fall for today’s pledge card” as she criticised the Labour-led Welsh Government.
Shadow Commons leader Lucy Powell had earlier labelled future business in the House of Commons as “so light that it’s almost laughable”, adding: “But it’s actually not that funny.
“The country faces huge headwinds, families are in a cost-of-living crisis, millions linger on NHS waiting lists and communities are beset by problems, yet the Government of the day seems to have nothing they want to change, nothing they are in a hurry to sort out, nothing to bring to this House.
“These could, hopefully, be the last few months the Conservatives are in power for some years. Do they really have nothing they want to do with it?
“If they’ve got nothing they want to use their parliamentary majority for, why are they even bothering holding on to it?”
Related: Starmer’s pledge cards mark return to Blair-era campaigning