Sir Keir Starmer has ‘serious questions to answer’ after it emerged he met with a voice coach at the height of Covid restrictions, the Tories said last night.

On Christmas Eve 2020, while London was under ‘Tier 4 restrictions’, the Prime Minister sought the help of Leonie Mellinger to respond to Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal.

The actress and communications skills coach visited Labour’s headquarters to advise Sir Keir, and said she had ‘permission to travel as a key worker’, the Sunday Times revealed yesterday.

But at the time, London was under stringent ‘Stay At Home’ rules following a rapid rise in infections attributed to a new variant of the virus.

People were able to travel for work if they ‘cannot work from home’, but the Tories questioned yesterday whether it was ‘right for other members of the public to get acting lessons during tier 4 restrictions’.

In a letter to the Prime Minister, Tory former cabinet minister Richard Holden said Sir Keir has ‘serious questions to answer’.

‘There is a strong public interest into your conduct during the pandemic and it is clear from these revelations that not only have you misled the public but you had a casual disregard for the law at a time when so many people were making such difficult sacrifices all in the service of advancing your own political career.’ 

A Labour spokesman said: ‘The rules were followed.’

Ms Mellinger was recruited to work with Sir Keir on improving his public speaking in 2017, when he was serving in Jeremy Corbyn’s shadow cabinet.

It is not the first Covid-controversy Sir Keir has found himself in, after he and his deputy Angela Rayner escaped being fined by police in 2022 over ‘Beergate’.

Durham Constabulary agreed with the pair’s argument that a boozy curry they held indoors with 15 others in April 2021 was a ‘work event’.