Make no mistake: it was a historic night for the Labour party, a triumph for the campaign strategists behind the party’s ‘efficient’ campaign, and a fine political achievement for Keir Starmer, who many still think isn’t a natural politician.
The big question this morning is whether this shallow but broad landslide – with a vote share lower than that of Blair or Corbyn going to Starmer – gives the new Prime Minister as strong a hand as he wanted.
When Starmer sat down with City A.M. at the end of last year, he told us he was willing to be “unpopular.”
The context then was planning reform. Would he really be willing to take the political hit that comes with building? With telling some local communities that they’re getting new homes and a bypass whether they want it or not?
He assured us then that he would. Just as he has similarly made the case on NHS and public sector reform.
There has, thus, been an argument that the very technocratic vision for government that Keir Starmer has would be most effective – indeed only effective – with a stonking majority. ‘Fixing Britain’ requires annoying people. Planning frustrates local MPs; public sector reform angers the unions. The logic ran that a strong majority gives him the mandate to do just that.
In parliamentary terms, that is his. His party is the House of Commons.
In the nation, the picture is more complicated. The lack of a genuine popular mandate will embolden critics; MPs will be more nervous than they might otherwise have been, looking at majorities that will feel distinctly insecure. The next election starts today, and MPs will already be assessing how they hold on next time, particularly in seats that are neither tribally nor historically Labour. The spectre of Reform will spook those in more anti-immigration areas and it is impossible to believe
David Cameron was once asked why he wanted to become Prime Minister. His answer – “I thought I’d be rather good at it” – became a byword for Etonian arrogance.
Listening to Keir Starmer, one suspects that for very different reasons he thinks the same of himself.
In recent years if you asked him why he wanted the job at No10, he talked of his past: what he sees as a successful legal and public sector career, a record as he sees it of consistent performance.
Now, though, the job is as much about herding a large, diverse, and nervous party as it is organisational change and delivery.
To deliver the change Britain needs – on housing, infrastructure, on a step change in productivity – he will need to prove his political talents once again.