It’s easy to dismiss Robert Jenrick’s fare-dodging stunt. But he understands something Keir Starmer doesn’t | Jonathan Freedland

The shadow justice secretary is eyeing Kemi Badenoch’s job – but he’s released a video that highlights a weakness in our technocratic PMThere is no shortage of reasons to dislike and dismiss Robert Jenrick. He is, after all, the former immigration minister who ordered that a centre for unaccompanied child asylum-seekers paint over its murals of cartoon characters, lest the child refugees got the wrong idea and thought they were being welcomed and had at last reached a place of safety.We certainly wouldn’t want to take lectures on law-breaking from Jenrick, given that the former housing secretary acted unlawfully in rushing through approval for a development by the Conservative donor Richard Desmond, thereby saving the onetime porn publisher more than £40m. Nor would he be our go-to guy on matters of ripping off the public, not after it was revealed in 2020 that he claimed £100,000 in expenses for a third home. To say nothing of his service in a Boris Johnson administration that happily funnelled at least £1bn of taxpayers’ money to assorted chancers lucky enough to have a friend in government, thereby securing for themselves a place in the VIP lane when it came to bidding for lucrative contracts making personal protective equipment or PPE.Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnistDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...