PM taking on claims of 'cover-up' in address to nation over Southport attack

PM warns of 'new and different' form of terrorism

The prime minister has warned of a "new and different" form of terrorism emerging. 

Sir Keir Starmer says the Southport attack was an "extreme violence clearly intended to terrorise" that doesn't necessarily fit within the framework of terrorism offences. 

Answering a question from a Daily Mail reporter, he compares the attack to "some of the mass shootings in schools" in America. 

"It is not an isolated ghastly example, it is in my view an example of a different kind of threat," he adds.

"That is my concern. That is my thinking that this is a new threat, individualised extreme violence, obsessive often following online material from all sorts of different sources. 

"It is not a one-off. It is something that we all need to understand."

Does the PM regret blaming the far-right for riots?

Next, Sir Keir Starmer is asked whether he regrets blaming the far-right for riots that erupted in the wake of the Southport attack last summer.

The prime minister says "responsibility for the violence lies with those who perpetrated it".

"I was in Southport the day after these terrible murders, I was acknowledging and thanking the front line police officers and ambulance who had been at the scene.

"You can imagine what they had been through. They were back at work the next day, they were saying it was just their job.

"I could see in their eyes what they had to deal with, what they had to see, how they endured that."

PM: You can't justify riots

He notes that as he arrived back in London, those same officers were putting their riot gear on and having bricks thrown at them.

"I don't think anybody can justify that - nor should they attempt to."

PM presents himself as radical reformer in surprisingly bold approach

This is a surprisingly bold approach from the prime minister in response to the case of Axel Rudakubana.

In this speech, he takes head on a justice system that has been under pressure over the way it responded to the Southport stabbings.

At the centre is the promise of a wide-ranging inquiry, in which "nothing is off the table" and things will change, including, if necessary, the law.

It's all designed to take back the narrative, and to present himself not just as a dedicated upholder of the law but someone who is prepared to radically reform it too.

'Is it true you withheld information, prime minister?'

Our political editor Beth Rigby is next to put a question to the prime minister, asking him if it is true that he withheld information about the Southport case. 

Sir Keir Starmer replies by saying that he knew details of the attacker, Axel Rudakubana, as they were emerging, but it "would not have been right to disclose" them. 

"There has been a failure here, and I do not intend to let any institution of the state deflect from their failures," he says. 

"The only losers if the details had been disclosed would be the victims and the families because it runs the risk the trial would collapse. I'm never going to do that because they deserve that justice." 

He adds that it's not only a choice he made, it's also the "law of the land". 

'We shouldn't wait until end of inquiry to start change'

Sir Keir Starmer is now taking questions from the media.

He is asked if the government really needs a public inquiry to tell ministers that the system needs to change - and whether a delay could lead to other missed cases.

The prime minister says an inquiry is needed so that "all of the questions" that the country have about this case can be answered, and every failure can be dealt with.

He notes that we are dealing with a new type of threat, and "we have to have the laws and framework in place to deal with it".

But Sir Keir agrees "we shouldn't wait until the end of the inquiry before we start the change".

He says this is why there will be a review of what happened with the Southport attacker's Prevent referrals, "so that the mistakes made then will not be made today".

PM 'profoundly moved' by community spirit

Following the Southport attack last year, riots and violence broke out in the area and across different parts of the country. 

The prime minister says he was "profoundly moved" by communities coming together in the aftermath to "pick up the pieces of their lives". 

"Even as that community faced an unimaginable evil, even as they had to endure mindless violence, bricks, and bottles thrown at their community, their businesses, their mosques, police offices attacked.... despite all that they chose to come together," Sir Keir Starmer says. 

"They chose to pick up the pieces of their lives. They chose to rebuild brick by brick, side by side." 

He adds that people need to follow their example in times of "darkness and tragedy". 

"Wherever this inquiry goes, we will follow it, no matter the boats it will rock, no matter the vested interests it will threaten. We won't hide," he says, as he vows to make changes that the families of Southport deserve. 

'I'm angry about it': Starmer vows inquiry 'will lead to change'

Sir Keir Starmer dismisses the idea that attacks of this nature are "all because of immigration or all because of funding cuts".

Instead, he says, "neither tells us anything like the full story or explains this case properly".

"No, this goes deeper," the prime minister explains.

"A growing sense that the rights and responsibilities that we owe to one another, the set of unwritten rules that hold a nation together, have in recent years been ripped apart.

"Children who've stopped going to school since the pandemic, young people who've opted out of work or education. 

"More and more people retreating into parallel lives, whether through failures of integration or just a country slowly turning away from itself, wounds that politics for all that it may have contributed, must try to heal."

'Southport must be a line in the sand'

He also notes there are "questions about the accountability of the Whitehall and Westminster system".

Sir Keir says this system is "far too often driven by circling the institutional wagon, that does not react until justice is either hard won by campaigners, or until appalling tragedies like this finally spur a degree of action". 

He adds: "Time and again we see this pattern and people are right to be angry about it. I'm angry about it. 

"Southport must be a line in the sand, but nothing will be off the table in this inquiry. Nothing."

The prime minister insists it "will lead to change".

Government will review 'entire counterterrorism system'

The government will review the country's "entire counterterrorism system", the prime minister says. 

Sir Keir Starmer says attackers are "becoming harder to spot" and the UK cannot have a system that fails to tackle people who are a danger to others. 

"We have to be ready to face every threat," he adds. 

"If the law needs to change to recognise this new and dangerous threat, then we will change it, and quickly." 

He says that children need to be protected from the "tidal wave" of violence available online. 

'It is now time for those questions'

Sir Keir Starmer goes on to address criticism of the government for not disclosing details of Axel Rudakubana's past before yesterday.

He says: "The law of this country forbade me or anyone else for disclosing details sooner."

The prime minister adds that "nonetheless, it is now time for those questions".

"And the first of those is whether this was a terrorist attack," he says.

"The blunt truth here is that this case is a sign Britain now faces a new threat. Terrorism has changed. 

"In the past, the predominant threat was highly organised groups with clear political intent. Groups like Al-Qaeda. 

"That threat, of course, remains. 

"But now, alongside that, we also see acts of extreme violence perpetrated by loners, misfits, young men in their bedroom accessing all manner of material online, desperate for notoriety, sometimes inspired by traditional terrorist groups, but fixated on that extreme violence seeming only for its own sake."

No institution will be allowed to 'deflect from their failure', says PM

Sir Keir Starmer says difficult questions need to be answered over the Southport attack, and they should not be "burdened by cultural or institutional sensitivities". 

The prime minister vows not to let any "institution of the state deflect from their failure", which he says "leaps off the page". 

He says the perpetrator, Axel Rudakubana, had been referred to the Prevent programme three times, but on each occasion a judgement was made that he did not require intervention. 

He says the judgement was "clearly wrong" and failed the families of the victims. 

"If this trial had collapsed because I or anyone else had revealed crucial details while the police were investigating, while the case was being built, while we were awaiting a verdict, the vile individual would have walked away a free man," he adds.

Southport attack has taken UK politics into new frontier - and out of PM's comfort zone

It presented Sir Keir Starmer with his first big challenge in office, and the Southport stabbings - followed by riots - look set to colour the early stages of his premiership.

He dealt with the immediate aftermath by successfully mobilising the justice system and fast-tracking offenders through it - a throwback to his days as head of the CPS.

But the longer-term problem this horrendous crime poses will take him very far from his comfort zone.

Today, he tackles the failures of public institutions in dealing with what was a known threat from Axel Rudakubana, who was referred to the anti-terror body Prevent three times.

The threat of conspiracy theories

More pernicious though are the baseless but corrosive accusations of a cover-up which started online and have high-profile champions in the Commons, with Nigel Farage and Robert Jenrick repeating the conspiracy theories.

This represents the new frontier of British politics, in which misinformation has become mainstream and threatens to destabilise our political system from the inside.

This morning's speech from Downing Street will show us how this still new government plans to take it on.

PM: Southport attack was 'devastating moment in our history'

Sir Keir Starmer is delivering a statement from Downing Street on last summer's knife attack in Southport, which left three young girls dead.

He begins by describing the attack as a "devastating moment in our history".

"No words come anywhere close to expressing the brutality and horror in this case. Every parent in Britain will have had the same thought - it could have been anywhere. 

"It could have been our children. But it was Southport."

'We must ask and answer difficult questions'

The prime minister says yesterday "thankfully, a measure of justice was done - but it won't bring those girls back to their families, and it won't remove the trauma from the lives of those who were injured".

"Their lives will never be the same," he adds.

Sir Keir insists the tragedy "must be a line in the sand for Britain".

"We must make sure the names of those three young girls are not associated with the vile perpetrator, but instead with a fundamental change in how Britain protects its citizens and its children."

But, in order to do that, "we must ask and answer difficult questions".

"Questions that should be far-reaching, unburdened by cultural or institutional sensitivities and driven only by the pursuit of justice."

-SKY NEWS