-
What spokes person isn't well briefed on party position on the biggest story of the day? Leaves you open to looking inept or like you don't have any position
-
You are basically shouting at a press release for not answering a question it wasn't written to answer
Exactly right. I've been a press officer before. If you step outside the briefing in front of the press then you get the Al Pachino speech from Glengarry Glen Ross
promptly afterward. -
Surely if Labour have made their position about the morality of the Rwanda deportations abundantly clear several times on television, this is not a difficult or controversial question to answer, briefed or not. This is the leader of the opposition's spokesman, not some lowly PR flunkie. He was giving a post-PMQ press conference in which he would undoubtedly have expected Rwanda to arise despite Starmer electing to avoid the issue at said questions. And would be fully aware of Labour's position on it and Starmer's view of it.
So either he intended to obfuscate in the press conference for the purposes of 'not giving the press ammunition' or Labour's position and Starmer's view of the deportations now differs from that aired frequently on television in the past. Whatever it is, the upshot is people are talking about Labour as a party with a leader unwilling to commit to reversing the policy or condemning it on moral grounds. Now that may or may not be true, but that's the impression.
You are reading a single comment by @Grumpy_Git and its replies.
Click here to read the full conversation.
greentricky
ReekBlefs
ketsbaia
@Grumpy_Git
No spokesperson worth their salt would answer that question without having had it explicitly given to them in the prebriefing before facing the press. It kind of shows up the limitations of spokespeople and how the system can be abused by asking questions the person is not allowed to answer. You are basically shouting at a press release for not answering a question it wasn't written to answer.