Ryan Bridge: I'm not against publicly funding our politicians' wardrobes

Over in the UK, Labour's leader was using private donations to pay for his wife's wardrobe.

She had personal shoppers, clothes and alterations for campaign events and after the campaign as well. Keir Starmer's wife, Victoria, was dressed to the nines, apparently.

It wasn't declared as a donation, but has now been declared as a donation.

David Lammy, the foreign secretary, has been wheeled out to explain it.

"In our country, there isn't a budget for the Prime Minister's clothes, or his wife's clothes. In some countries, there's a substantial budget. I've just come back from America, where there is a substantial budget to ensure that the US President and the First Lady, their appearance, can never be challenged."

I think we should publicly fund our leaders wardrobes. I'm just going to put it out there, I think we should.

It's important how we look on the world stage.

In the world of geopolitics and diplomacy you need to look good. You need to look sharp and you need to need to look smart.

We don't want to be looking like some crackpot banana republic when we're going to these events, do we?

I think it should be publicly funded, and the rules for politicians at the moment aren't really clear on on whether you are allowed to use your allowance for clothing or not.

I think just as a they're representing us, we need to look good.

I'm not against publicly funding their wardrobes.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Over in the UK, Labour's leader was using donations private
donations to pay for his wife's wardrobe. All of this
has come out overnight, personal shoppers, clothes alterations. This for
campaign events and after the campaign as Weldcare Starmer's wife
Victoria was dressed to the nines. Apparently wasn't declared as

(00:21):
a donation, wasn't declared, has now been declared as a donation.
This is from labor donor Wahid Ali and David Lamy.
The Foreign Secretary has been willed out to explain it.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
In our country, there isn't a budget for the Prime
minister's clothes or his wife's clothes. In some countries there's
a substantial budget. I've just come back from America, where
there is a substantial budget to ensure that the US
President and the first Lady their appearance can never be challenged.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
I think we should publicly fund our leader's wardrobes. I'm
just going to put it out there. I think we should.
It's important how we look on the world stage. If
you're going to in the world of geopolitics and diplomacy,
you need to look good, you need to look sharp,
and you need to look smart. You know, we don't
want to be looking like some crack pot banana Republic

(01:12):
in a moomoo, do we when we go into these events.
I think we should be publicly funded. And the rules
at the moment don't X aren't really clear on whether
you are allowed to use your allowance for clothing or not.
This is the politicians allowances, So I'll tell you what
the rules say in just a couple of minutes. But
I think, just as a they're representing us, we need

(01:36):
to look good. I'm not against publicly funding their wardrobes.
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