The Economist: Sir Keir Starmer is on the way out. Pity his successor
Rank-and-file Labour Party members—a peculiar gang of retired teachers, civil servants and trade unionists — face the rare prospect of voting for PM.
Sir Keir Starmer has pledged to fight on.
By Tuesday morning (UK time) close to 100 Labour MPs, including ministers, had called for the prime minister to quit. Figures in cabinet, such as Shabana Mahmood, the home secretary, have done the same privately.
Few expect him to remain in office for long.
Sign up to The Nightly's newsletters.
Get the first look at the digital newspaper, curated daily stories and breaking headlines delivered to your inbox.
By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.It is a remarkable fall for a prime minister who — in less than two years — has squandered the second-biggest majority in Parliament since the second world war.
The PM’s latest struggles began on Friday, after local elections turned out to be as bad as expected. Labour bled support in northern, Brexit-supporting seats and in liberal, diverse cities.
Councils in places such as Wigan, a former mining town in the north-west, crumbled along with Westminster, one of the most prosperous places in Britain.
A grinning Nigel Farage, whose populist-right Reform UK party came first, took centre stage.
By that point, Labour MPs had had enough.
The trickle calling for the prime minister to leave became a flood. Ambitious young MPs who fear losing their jobs joined the usual suspects in demanding the prime minister’s head.
On Monday night (UK time) cabinet ministers began to lean on the Prime Minister to depart. Come Tuesday morning junior ministers were publicly seeking the same. Sir Keir has endured torrid ratings, becoming one of the least popular prime ministers on record.
He is—for now—pledging to fight, which makes replacing him even messier. Any challenger would need to secure the nominations of 81 Labour MPs (a fifth of the parliamentary party) to trigger a leadership election.
If Sir Keir chose to stand, he would automatically be nominated. Alternatively, if only one rival stood, they would become leader by default, as happened with Gordon Brown in 2007.
If there is a contest, the next prime minister will be determined by 300,000 or so members of the Labour Party. Recent leadership elections have taken months. None has taken place with Labour in government. Rank-and-file party members—a peculiar gang of retired teachers, civil servants and trade unionists — have never been asked to vote for a prime minister.
Should Sir Keir go, they will become the most important voters in the country.
Each contender has flaws.
Andy Burnham, mayor of Manchester and Labour’s “king across the water”, is not an MP.
Angela Rayner, the left-wing former deputy prime minister, is awaiting the outcome of an investigation into her tax affairs. Ed Miliband, the energy secretary, is popular in the party, but has already lost a general election as Labour leader, in 2015.
Wes Streeting, the ambitious health secretary, is popular among the Labour right but despised by colleagues to his left. Longstanding Labour figures, such as Yvette Cooper or David Lammy, may fancy a go—prompting a fight to secure the nominations to get on the ballot of Britain’s strangest election.
Political instability has worsened an already tricky economic situation. Britain suffers from the same malaise of high debt and low growth that infects the rest of Europe.
Now its governing party is embroiled in civil war. Yields on gilts have jumped to their highest in 30 years, in part driven by concerns that Sir Keir’s successor will borrow more. Whoever emerges as prime minister faces misery.
For now, all British voters can do is watch the familiar sight of a prime minister fighting for his life.
