Labour more likely to win next election than Arsenal to win the Premier League, Sir Keir says in overconfidence warning

30 April 2023, 10:35 | Updated: 30 April 2023, 12:47

Sir Keir Starmer believes Labour are more likely to win the next election than his beloved Arsenal side are to win the Premier League.

He said his party, which has consistently polled well ahead of the Conservatives for a year now, should take a warning from the Gunners' recent woes.

The Labour leader said there is a lesson in overconfidence when you're ahead of a competitor after Arsenal look set to lose the initiative in the title race against Manchester City, having lost to the Blues last week.

"Having gone through what we went through in the game with Man City the other night, I'm afraid I think for this year, it's over for Arsenal but it's a brilliant squad for the future," he said.

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"There's a lesson there because at the beginning of every season people confidently predict who is going to win the league. In the end it comes to April before it really is decided.

"There's a lesson in there for politics - we've got to fight all the way into the next election. We've got to fight like we're five points behind and we've got make our positive case to the electorate."

Arsenal will go behind City if Pep Guardiola's team win their game in hand.

Speaking to Sky News, Sir Keir also addressed the attack ads against Rishi Sunak.

Labour controversially put out adverts saying Rishi Sunak saying he does not think adults who sexually assault children should go to prison, which was condemned by the Conservatives.

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Sir Keir was asked if that was wrong given racist tropes about Asian grooming gangs.

"No. The vast majority of child sex offences are not by people of Asian origin," he said.

Labour made the ad with the claim that 4,500 adults have not gone to jail after a child sex offence.

However, transport secretary Mark Harper insisted people would not believe the adverts.

"People remember it wasn't that long ago that the Prime Minister set up a taskforce specifically to deal with one aspect of that issue which is to do with grooming gangs, which is a subject that Labour doesn't even want to talk about," he said.

"I think if people judge the Prime Minister by his actions, they will see that the substance of that ad was nonsense."