'It's a bare-faced lie!' Wes Streeting grilled by Camilla Tominey on welfare U-turn in scathing takedown: 'Keir Starmer doesn't know what he's doing'

Starmer told The Sunday Times: "I’m putting this as context rather than excuse. I was heavily focused on what was happening with Nato and the Middle East all weekend.

"I turned my attention fully to it [the welfare bill] when I got back from Nato on Wednesday night."

Pressed on the U-turn, Camilla questioned Streeting on whether Starmer should "consider his own position" in Government, declaring the Prime Minister "doesn't really know what he's doing".

Streeting responded: "I don't agree with that. One of the things I respect and like about the guy is when things go wrong, when he makes mistakes, he's honest about it, takes responsibility for it, learns from it, and most importantly, puts it right, and that's what we've done on welfare.

"We're in a better place today than we were this time last week, and it hasn't all been plain sailing. I'm not going to pretend for a moment that we haven't made mistakes, nor does the Prime Minister. But there are also things we've gotten right in the first year of this Labour Government."

Grilling Streeting further on Labour's efforts to tackle the benefits bill, Camilla stressed that the Government are "not tackling it at all", highlighting that the benefits bill has "gone up by £86billion in a decade because of this U-turn".

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Streeting disagreed, telling GB News: "We are. One of the important ways we will be reducing the benefit bill is by getting people who can work and therefore should work back to work, whether through providing employment support or, in my case with the NHS, making sure that people who are off work, off sick, making sure that we're cutting waiting lists so they're not just back to health, they're also able to go back."

Interjecting Streeting, Camilla asked the Health Secretary to confirm that the benefits bill will be higher "at the end of this Parliament than it is now", claiming that any denial by Labour is a "bare-faced lie".

Streeting said: "That is a fact you've just stated, that we will be paying more for the welfare system at the end of this Parliament than we do today.

"It's one of the reasons why this Government is determined to reform the system, to make it sustainable. And that's the context in which we've been having this debate.

"Of course, we've got to tread carefully in this issue of support for disabled people, because there will be lots of people who, through no fault of their own, simply cannot work.

"Those people deserve and are entitled to a good level of income, and those people who can work should work, and that's okay. Those are the principles that lie at the heart of this system."

Streeting argued: "This week could have been smoother, I'm not going to make any bones about that, but are we in a better place having debated with each other, listened to each other, having found a way through? Yes.

"We are in a better position and there'll be lots of disabled people watching this morning, I suspect, on Pip, who've now got the peace of mind of knowing their situation is not going to be protected."

Grilling Streeting on certain claimants of the Pip benefit, including those with ADHD and "mild autism", Streeting assured GB News viewers: "We will be looking at those issues as we reform the welfare system and also are making inroads on mental health.

"We promised 8,500 more mental health workers at the general election already well on the way, delivering that at 6,500 at the moment, and there'll be more mental health support available."