Keir Starmer has waded into the briefing row, claiming the practice of smaller briefings for some journalists is “damaging to democracy“.  He has written to the Cabinet Secretary to ask him to investigate, resting his case on the assumption that “David Frost is a civil service appointee.” In fact Frost isn’t a civil servant, he is a SpAd…

David Frost is listed as a politically appointed special adviser. Starmer argues access to a briefing by him “should not be determined by political favouritism.” Many of the outlets that were invited to the briefing can’t be said to be favourites of Number 10. The Guardian is hardly a bastion of Boris fans, ITV are in Downing Street’s bad books for election agitation and Cummings tried to sue them in 2016. Sky News is home to some of the most critical opponents of ‘Johnson’ in the business, and does anyone think that this is government with fans at the BBC? Still, these were among the outlets invited to the briefing…

Keir kicked-off his leadership campaign saying he wouldn’t speak to The Sun. Keir now says, completely hypocritically, that banning selected media from having access to briefings damages democracy.