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Good morning. Before Christmas, Keir Starmer had planned to use the first week back after the holiday recess to focus on government efforts to reduce the cost of living. He outlined this case yesterday in a piece where he referenced measures including proposals to cut utility costs. However, his cost of living PR blitz has been blown out of the headlines by the former US president, and his distinct approach to ensuring his voters receive cheap energy.

Not a single figure in British political life appears particularly eager on embracing the American method – which is likely good news for other nations.

But there is an intense debate under way about what the UK government should be willing to say about the American action to abduct the Venezuelan president, and replace him with someone anticipated to be more compliant with American interests, particularly in relation to the nation's petroleum sector.

Keir Starmer has refused to criticise the American intervention, and the administration has avoided questions about whether or not it considered what happened as legal. Recently, all EU states apart from one nation issued a joint statement which, while not explicitly condemning, did stress the importance of international law, and by inference suggest Trump of ignoring it. It said:

The European Union call for calm and restraint by all actors, to prevent escalation and to secure a peaceful solution to the situation.

The Union reiterates that, under any conditions, the principles of international law and the United Nations charter must be upheld. Permanent members of the United Nations Security Council have a particular responsibility to uphold those principles, as a pillar of the international security architecture.

Mike Tapp, was doing an series of media appearances this morning and, when asked if Starmer was declining to say the Venezuelan leader's removal broke global statutes because he was worried of upsetting Trump, Tapp replied:

Not at all. The British government is, and will, be in conversations with the Americans. And it’s for the United States to lay out the juridical rationale for the action that they’ve undertaken. And we’re also talking with close allies examining the juridical dimension of this.

But last night, in an interview on the BBC, the chair of the Commons foreign affairs committee (and a ex- shadow attorney general), said she was very concerned about the way Trump seems to think, like the Russian leader and China’s Xi Jinping, that he could do what he wanted in his area of control.

Asked about Starmer refusing to say that Trump was in breach of international law, Thornberry said, because the PM was in government, he had to balance “a number of considerations”. But she was in a different position because she was not a government member, she said. She added:

Ultimately there is no escaping the fact. This is not a legal action.

[Starmer] may well want to hear what the reasoning is from the US administration. I can get in front of everyone and say I literally think of anything that could be a proper justification.

Here is the schedule for the day.

10am: John Swinney, gives a speech in Glasgow. The Scottish opposition leader, and Scottish Tory leader, are also giving speeches, at 10.30am and lunchtime respectively. All the party heads are gearing up to the Holyrood elections in May.

Morning: The Prime Minister is on a visit in Berkshire where he is scheduled to speak to the press.

11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.

2.30pm: Shabana Mahmood, takes queries in the Commons.

After 3.30pm: Yvette Cooper, is expected to give a update to MPs about the ongoing situation.