Starmer must find it in himself to be a true leader

Times

8 hours ago

Prime ministerial authority can end with a spectacular tyre-shredding blowout, à la Liz Truss, or more usually a slow puncture. The latter begins with a series of stumbles, which early on are judged forgivable, but as time passes become less so. Once a prime minister is designated 'accident prone' recovery, in the eyes of the electorate, and his or her party, becomes steadily less likely. Irritation evolves into disillusionment, and disillusionment into contempt. From then on, defeat at the ballot box, or a pre-emptive strike from the men in grey suits, is a matter of time.
Sir Keir Starmer has not careered off the motorway trailing smoking rubber, like Ms Truss. But his every appearance is now accompanied by an ominous hiss. Labour's inaugural year was never going to be easy, given the legacy of the Conservative era, but the first anniversary of its general election win this coming Friday will be unusually downbeat.
Following a series of unforced errors, typified by this week's humiliating climbdown on welfare reform in the face of a mass uprising by Labour MPs, this government is already looking distinctly ragged. And responsibility for its sorry state must ultimately lie with the prime minister. By his failure to plan for power, by his lapses of judgment, by his lack of grip, Sir Keir has created this mess.
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The Labour leader was never going to be loved for his charisma. His selling point was lawyerly sobriety, his prosecutor's punctiliousness. Yet successive fiascos tell a different tale. Depriving pensioners of winter fuel payments, raising employers' national insurance, ditching the Rwanda scheme while not replacing it with a small boats deterrent, understating the harm of grooming gangs: these were the results of Sir Keir's failure to devise detailed plans for the economy and migration in opposition, to devise a coherent narrative explaining difficult choices, and to practise basic politics in spotting approaching danger.
Labour rebels, scenting blood, are looking for a scalp in Downing Street. Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, is the ideal prize for unreconstructed statists; or perhaps Morgan McSweeney, Sir Keir's chief of staff, whose brutal but effective silencing of Labour's left before the election inevitably made him enemies. The case against Ms Reeves, to whom Sir Keir appears to have ceded total control over economic policy, is more plausible than that against Mr McSweeney. Her national insurance hike dealt a huge blow to growth, while her winter fuel and working-age health benefits cuts appeared more the result of panic than part of a detailed strategy for reining in a bloated state.
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Yet, the chief culprit for Labour's malaise must be Sir Keir. Great prime ministers ultimately delegate to no one in central areas of policy like welfare reform, which must continue if the public finances are to be rescued. Equally, a leader who ignores ­his backbenchers, especially after a landslide has produced hordes of naive and ambitious new ones, is asking for trouble. In an interview marking his first year, Sir Keir admitted to presentational ­errors. But the problem runs deeper. This government increasingly comes across as inept: kneejerk rather than strategic in policy implementation, subject to panic and surrender at the first whiff of cordite. Some £4.5 billion has been shaved off its wafer-thin fiscal headroom by the welfare retreat. Autumn tax rises loom; bond markets grow sceptical; deeper unpopularity beckons.
Sir Keir handled Donald Trump well, and mended ties with Europe, but he will live or die on the domestic battlefield. Wage growth is forecast to stagnate; Reform would be the biggest party in an election tomorrow. To survive, Sir Keir must become a dominating personality not a bureaucrat, gripping policy, punishing failure, espousing a vision. He must become what he has never truly reconciled himself to being: a politician. If not, there's always someone else willing to have a go.