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Fleeting Streeting: Health Secretary’s Showdown With PM Lasts Barely 15 Minutes

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Labour leadership hopeful Wes Streeting’s big showdown meeting in Downing Street with Keir Starmer lasted barely 15 minutes.

The grim-faced health secretary said nothing to waiting reporters as he left No.10 shortly less than 20 minutes after walking in.

Both the prime minister’s and Streeting’s teams were remaining tight-lipped about the talks as they do not want to overshadow the King’s Speech later this morning.

Streeting had been expected to demand answers from the PM on how he plans to turn around Labour’s fortunes after the party suffered a drubbing in last week’s elections.

The health secretary has made no public comments since Starmer told his cabinet rivals to put up or shut up at their weekly meeting on Tuesday amid mounting speculation he was set to face a leadership challenge.

Starmer said: “The country expects us to get on with governing. That is what I am doing and what we must do as a cabinet.”

More than 80 Labour MPs have called on the PM to quit, and four of his ministers resigned on Tuesday.

They included junior health minister Zubir Ahmed, a former aide to Streeting.

On Radio 4′s Today programme this morning, he called on cabinet ministers to speak publicly about their true opinions of Starmer.

He said: “I think it’s very telling – just as ministers in the junior ministerial ranks have stepped forward to articulate their dissatisfaction, some of us publicly but more of us privately – that the whole of the cabinet has not, on this occasion, been able to articulate support for the prime minister in the full-throated way that would have perhaps had happen in the past.

“I think there is a responsibility on all of us in parliament and ministerial office to be honest with ourselves and the prime minister at this time.”

Cabinet Office minister Nick Thomas-Symonds, a close ally of the PM, told the same programme that none of Starmer’s rivals have the required amount ofd support from Labour MPs to challenge him.

He said: “The evidence of the last two days is there isn’t an alternative candidate with those 81 names.”

Subscribe to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.

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Christopher Nolan Defends The Odyssey After Historical Accuracy Concerns

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We’re still months away from Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey hitting cinemas, but that certainly hasn’t stopped people from sounding off about it on social media.

Since the first trailers for the big-screen epic debuted last year, people have been raising questions about its historical accuracy over everything from its costumes to the American accents used by its cast.

Indeed, during a new interview with Time magazine, it was pointed out that some critics had taken issue with the suit of armour worn by Benny Safdie as King Agamemnon, showcased in The Odyssey’s latest trailer, which was compared to Batman’s costumes in his Dark Knight trilogy.

Nolan insisted that research was thorough when putting together every aspect of his new movie, pointing out that our knowledge of the Bronze Age is based on “very fragmentary archeological records”.

Benny Safdie in The Odyssey
Benny Safdie in The Odyssey

As he put it: “There are Mycenaean daggers that are blackened bronze. The theory is they probably could have blackened bronze in those days. You take bronze, you add more gold and silver to it and then use sulfur.

“With Agamemnon, Ellen [Mirojnick], our costume designer, is trying to communicate how elevated he is relative to everyone else. You do that through materials that would be very expensive.”

The Oscar winner continued: “The oldest depictions of Homeric characters tend to be depicted in the manner of people living in Homer’s time.

“So there’s a pretty strong case there for portraying things that way because that’s the way the first audience received the story.”

Of the sceptics among classicists, he added: “Hopefully they’ll enjoy the film, even if they don’t agree with everything. We had a lot of scientists complain about Interstellar. But you just don’t want people to think that you took it on frivolously.”

The Odyssey is Nolan’s first film since the mammoth success of Oppenheimer, which was a box office smash as well as winning seven Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor for Cillian Murphy.

His adaptation of the ancient Greek story boasts an all-star cast including Nolan regulars Matt Damon, Anne Hathaway and Robert Pattinson, as well as Tom Holland, Zendaya and Oscar winners Charlize Theron and Lupita Nyong’o.

The Odyssey will hit cinemas worldwide on 17 July. Read Christopher Nolan’s full interview in Time here.

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Oddly Prophetic Group Photo Of Starmer On His First Day As An MP Resurfaces

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A photo posted by Keir Starmer almost exactly 11 years ago has stunned political pundits after it was unearthed this week.

The prime minister’s job is hanging by a thread as more than 80 MPs call for him to quit following Labour’s drubbing at the elections in England, Scotland and Wales last week.

Catherine West, a former foreign office minister, helped to galvanise the campaign to push Starmer out.

She offered to be a “stalking horse” candidate in a leadership challenge to the prime minister, meaning she would stand against him just to tempt other rivals out of the blocks.

While her bid ultimately failed – as did her subsequent attempt at a no confidence letter – she helped get the ball rolling this week by encouraging MPs to publicly announce they had lost faith in Starmer.

Meanwhile, health secretary Wes Streeting is thought to be one of the frontrunners in the next potential leadership race.

He has made his ambitions to be the next prime minister clear over several months and many of his allies in the Commons have already urged Starmer to resign.

So social media users were stunned when they found a photo of Starmer, Streeting and West together on their first day in the Commons after winning their seats in the 2015 general election.

The now-prime minister shared an image of himself with West and Streeting along with the caption: “Taking our seats for the 1st time.”

The image attracted a huge amount of interest – with many noting just how cruel a game politics can clearly be…

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this is like actually insane imagine showing them the newspaper from nearly exactly 10 years in the future 😭😭😭 https://t.co/YFoKoyeaZf

— autumn 💟 (@ambiguousdesire) May 11, 2026

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this is like actually insane imagine showing them the newspaper from nearly exactly 10 years in the future 😭😭😭 https://t.co/YFoKoyeaZf

— autumn 💟 (@ambiguousdesire) May 11, 2026

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Marcus Giunius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus with Julius Caesar in 2015. https://t.co/0P28oDv12c

— Filippo Carrettoni 🇪🇺🇨🇦🇬🇧🇦🇺🇫🇷🇮🇹 (@fillycarre) May 11, 2026

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Marcus Giunius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus with Julius Caesar in 2015. https://t.co/0P28oDv12c

— Filippo Carrettoni 🇪🇺🇨🇦🇬🇧🇦🇺🇫🇷🇮🇹 (@fillycarre) May 11, 2026