Sir Keir Starmer has suggested he accepted £20,000 in donations for accommodation because his son needed somewhere to revise for his GCSEs while his family home was besieged by journalists during the General Election campaign. The Prime Minister defended his decision to take gifts from Labour peer Lord Alli amid criticism of the arrangement, saying he was 'not going to apologise for not doing anything wrong' and the freebies did not 'cost the taxpayer a penny'. But Sir Keir signalled he could continue to accept hospitality from donors, saying that it was a matter of 'judgment' for individual MPs whether they receive certain kinds of donations.
READ MORE: What it's really like to have Covid right now as 'distinctive' XEC variant symptoms spread In a series of broadcast interviews following his speech to the Labour Party annual conference, he also said the transition to Downing Street had been “really difficult” for his two children, who were previously raised in North London. Asked about the donations, Sir Keir said that around £20,000 he had declared from Lord Alli for unspecified accommodation was for his teenager to study for exams in a “peaceful” atmosphere while the then-Labour leader was overwhelmed with media attention in the run-up to the election. “My boy, 16, was in the middle of his GCSEs.
I made him a promise, a promise that he would be able to get to his school, do his exams, without being disturbed,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. The PM a.
