{"id":21460,"date":"2025-02-03T22:17:50","date_gmt":"2025-02-03T23:17:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=21460"},"modified":"2025-02-03T23:30:24","modified_gmt":"2025-02-03T23:30:24","slug":"starmer-denies-breaking-covid-rules-with-voice-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=21460","title":{"rendered":"Starmer denies breaking Covid rules with voice coach"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><\/div>\n<div data-component=\"text-block\">\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Sir Keir Starmer has denied lockdown rules were broken when he had voice coaching lessons during the Covid 19 lockdown.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Leonie Miller was invited to coach the then-opposition leader on his response to  Boris Johnson&#8217;s Brexit deal, leading to accusations of a potential rule breach.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Ms Miller qualified for keyworker status and also wore a face mask during her visit to Labour headquarters on Christmas Eve in 2020, according to a book about the party&#8217;s rise to power.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">When questioned as he left a Nato press conference in Brussels, the prime minister told reporters &#8220;of course&#8221; he had not breached restrictions in place during the coronavirus pandemic. <!-- --><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div data-component=\"text-block\">\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Johnson <!-- --><a target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-politics-55435930\" class=\"sc-c9299ecf-0 bZUiKB\">announced his Brexit deal<!-- --><\/a> with the EU on 24 December 2020, the same week as he put London and the south-east into Tier 4 lockdown, forbidding households to mix indoors and effectively cancelling Christmas celebrations for many.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">A <!-- --><a target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-politics-67106804\" class=\"sc-c9299ecf-0 bZUiKB\">&#8220;jingle and mingle&#8221;<!-- --><\/a> Christmas party had been held at Conservative HQ and at least three drinks <!-- --><a target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-politics-59952395\" class=\"sc-c9299ecf-0 bZUiKB\">gatherings took place in Downing Street<!-- --><\/a> during those lockdown restrictions. <!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Details about the voice coach&#8217;s visit were revealed in excerpts of Get In, a book on Sir Keir&#8217;s leadership being serialised by the Sunday Times.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Tory former minister Richard Holden wrote to the prime minister to ask whether he thought it had breached the restrictions, insisting he had &#8220;serious questions&#8221; to answer.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Reporters, who had travelled to Belgium but were not among the three journalists selected to ask a question, shouted questions asking whether he had broken the rules as the PM left the podium.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">&#8220;Of course not,&#8221; he replied, as he walked away.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Back in London, the prime minister&#8217;s official spokesman had repeatedly refused to be drawn on the claims and, asked if Sir Keir considered the voice coach to be a key worker, said: &#8220;I&#8217;m not going to get into any matter to do with opposition.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">&#8220;The Prime Minister is focused on delivering on the Government&#8217;s priorities and the people&#8217;s priorities.&#8221;<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Asked if he still used a voice coach, the spokesman said: &#8220;Not that I&#8217;m aware of.&#8221;<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">In an interview with Times Radio, the minister for school standards, Catherine McKinnell, said the incident contrasted &#8220;quite sharply&#8221; with the lockdown parties being held in Downing Street and in Conservative HQ at the time.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">&#8220;As far as I&#8217;m aware there were no Covid rules broken,&#8221; she told Times Radio.<!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">&#8220;People were able to go to work and undertake really important roles and that was clearly a very important moment in Britain where an important public statement had to be made.&#8221; <!-- --><\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-eb7bd5f6-0 fYAfXe\">Sir Keir and deputy PM Angela Rayner were <!-- --><a target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-politics-62095955\" class=\"sc-c9299ecf-0 bZUiKB\">cleared of an alleged <!-- --><\/a>lockdown breach in April 2021.<!-- --><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sir Keir Starmer has denied lockdown rules were broken when he had voice coaching lessons during the Covid 19 lockdown.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21462,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21460"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21460\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21463,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21460\/revisions\/21463"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}