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Labor have condemned the government for using taxpayer money to produce a documentary about the vaccine launch titled “A Beacon of Hope” as party strategists fear the Conservatives will benefit from a “vaccine rebound.” in the local elections in May.
Downing Street tweeted a short video Wednesday, featuring clips from interviews with Chris Whitty and Jonathan Van-Tam, as well as Boris Johnson and Matt Hancock.
The motto read: “Extraordinary. Unexpected. Fantastic. A Beacon of Hope: The History of Vaccines in the UK. Coming soon.”
With a series of special elections to be held on May 6, the Labor Party suspects that the government is trying to turn the welfare factor of the vaccination program and lifting lockdown restrictions to its political gain.
“The government needs to clarify how much taxpayer money was spent making this ‘documentary’ and for what purpose,” said Deputy Labor Leader Angela Rayner.
“Sorry for the saboteur, but we already know that the plot twist will be for the prime minister to choose to cut the pay of the same nurses who deliver the vaccine to the British people, while handing out billions in contracts to donors and Conservative party cronies. “.
A 10th source admitted that the movie was funded by taxpayers, but emphasized that it was made internally, as a thank you to those involved in the hit show, which has seen 22.8 million people get their first dose.
The “Purdah” rules prevent the government from using official resources to produce party political material during pre-election periods. The government has yet to announce when that period will begin in relation to local elections, but it is expected to be late this month or early April.
The dispute over the glossy video came as Keir Starmer prepares to launch the Labor campaign for the May elections, using the government’s plan for a 1% pay raise from the NHS as a political dividing line.
The SNP hopes to secure a pro-independence majority in Holyrood in the May 6 elections, while all 60 Welsh Senedd seats are up for grabs, as well as a number of metropolitan mayors and local councils in England.
Starmer will launch the Labor campaign at a virtual event on Thursday where he will speak alongside new Scottish Labor leader Anas Sarwar, Welsh Prime Minister Mark Drakeford, and other leading party figures.
His team believes that the government’s recommendation that only a 1% pay increase for NHS workers in England is affordable is a damaging misinterpretation of the public’s mood in the wake of the pandemic.
Although local government has no role in setting nurses’ pay, and health is delegated to Scotland and Wales, Starmer will highlight the issue as evidence that conservatives are offering ‘more of the same’.
In a speech at the campaign launch event, Starmer will say: “These elections are about how Britain recovers. How our communities and public services are run and how we reward our frontline workers.
“We have a simple choice ahead: change or go back to more of the same.”
His team hopes the pre-election broadcast fairness rules that take effect later this month will help them gain a wider audience, after many months in which, understandably, public health messages from government ministers have filled the radio waves.
“Our priorities are your priorities: securing the economy, protecting the NHS, rebuilding Britain,” Starmer will say. “So if you want to support our nurses, rebuild social care and reward our key workers, then vote Labor.”
With Labor eager to regain ground in Scotland, it will also attack the SNP, accusing it of being “too busy fighting each other to fight for the Scottish people”, in the wake of high-profile clashes between Nicola Sturgeon and Alex Salmond of late . weeks.
Meanwhile, Labor wrote to Johnson on Wednesday, asking him to correct the record after Downing Street repeatedly refused to acknowledge that the prime minister was wrong when he said the Labor party had voted against an NHS wage deal.
When asked about Johnson’s claim in the Prime Minister’s questions Wednesday that Keir Starmer and his party had blocked an NHS budget bill, Allegra Stratton, the 10th press secretary, refused 12 times to accept that they were wrong and indicated that they did not feel the need to correct the record.
