So who’s going to be top cat in Downing Street? - Vladimir McTavish

Larry the cat sits outside 10 Downing Street, London. Picture date: Tuesday April 27, 2021. PA Photo. See PA story POLITICS Cummings. Photo credit should read: Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire

Larry has seen various PMs come and go and is possibly the most photographed feline in the country. Larry has previously been chief pet to David Cameron, Teresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak, so it’s fair to assume he’s a Tory.

But Keir Starmer and his family have brought their own cat JoJo with them to Number Ten. JoJo is almost certainly a Labour supporter. Backs can arch and fur can fly when any two cats share a house. But if they also disagree politically, things could get very nasty.

Anyway, on with the actual politics. How much will genuinely change in the next five years? Quite a lot, judging from the PM’s programme for government which was put before parliament on Wednesday.

We were promised an end to no-fault evictions, nationalisation of the railways, an ambitious home-building programme, reforms to mental health care, a ban on zero-hours contracts and an end to hereditary peers. A fairly progressive wish-list for the government of a modern democracy.

So why is it still presented in the form of The King’s Speech? It’s yet another of those ridiculously archaic British political traditions whereby an unelected monarch reads from somebody else’s script, following a ridiculous amount of pantomime, pageantry and pomp It’s difficult to take the whole thing seriously.

Conspicuously missing from the King’s Speech was any reference to ending the two-child benefit cap, which many people claim to be the single-most vital lever to lifting kids out of poverty. The Treasury want to stay within spending limits, we are told.

Then why have this ridiculous mediaeval bunfight, costing millions? It would set the right tone if they were to scale it back next year, especially if it isn’t going to mention anything about child poverty.

Especially when the guy reading off the script has a son and daughter-in-law who have three children. To the best of my knowledge, all three of them are in receipt of state funding.

That will give Larry and JoJo plenty to argue about in the coming weeks.