Cabinet ministers lashed out at “unprincipled” Keir Starmer and warned he is trying to trick voters into thinking he is more moderate than he is.

       In a brutal takedown, Penny Mordaunt accused the Labour leader of running “Operation Radish” to signalling that while his party is red on the outside “at its heart it isn’t really at all”.

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       The Commons leader said Labour’s decision to admit hard-right Natalie Elphicke “exposed” the way Sir Keir really operates.

       She said: “The leader of the Opposition is the decorator crab of these benches, desperate to show that he’s not really leading the Labour Party at all.

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       “He’s channelled Margaret Thatcher, his deputy has praised Boris (Johnson), he’s expelled the Member for Islington North - Jeremy Corbyn - with great fanfare, a man he was campaigning to be prime minister only moments before."

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       Ms Modaunt added: “His exterior shell is stuck over with St George’s flags, his Gunners season ticket and several programmes from the Last Night of the Proms.

       “What next: a photo op with a bulldog? A lecture on how misunderstood Enoch Powell was?”

       Ms Mordaunt said the shock defection of Ms Elphicke was part of a broad strategy to fool the public.

       She said: “This is Operation Radish: the concerted effort to convince the British public that while the Labour Party might look red on the outside, at its heart it isn’t really at all. However, even the defection from our benches of one Labour’s most sternest critics cannot disguise the fact that Operation Radish is not going well.”

       Foreign Secretary David Cameron criticised Sir Keir for admitting Ms Elphicke, warning: “If you don’t stand for anything you’ll fall for anything”

       Education Secretary Gillian Keegan questioned how Ms Elphicke could change her views “miraculously” overnight.

       She added: “Her principles and her policies, and her positions, have changed as often as Keir Starmer’s.

       “I don’t really know her, she’s much more on the right of the party. I think somebody said they couldn’t find anyone more right-wing than Natalie Elphicke.”

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       The defection has caused fury on Labour’s benches, with MPs unhappy that former leader Jeremy Corbyn and Diane Abbott have had the whip withdrawn but Ms Elphicke has been admitted.

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       Party chairwoman Anneliese Dodds said Ms Elphicke, who defected from the Tories, is a good fit for Labour and “people can change their minds”.

       She added: “Of course, they are just like the many Conservative voters – and indeed voters of other parties – who have realised that those parties cannot deliver on the issues that they care about, that they need instead to be backing a party that’s got a plan to deal with the cost-of-living crisis, to get our public services back off their knees and get them fit for the future.

       Related articles Lee Anderson slaps down Labour for suggesting Nigel Farage could defect to them Keir Starmer will win few friends with his embrace of Natalie Elphicke Farage slams Natalie Elphicke's 'utter rubbish' and reveals real reason she quit Keir Starmer risks major shadow cabinet split after accepting Tory MP defector

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