“In the first two years or so of government, we were right to level with the public about the challenges that we faced as a country, the legacy we inherited, the international situation, but what we didn’t do was convince them about the future and how things can be better.
“We need to do that, and to be really clear… about not going back to the status quo.”
Keir Starmer speaking to The Observer at the weekend.
The predictions proved correct. The local and devolved elections were as painful for Labour as the response was inevitable.
Ministers speak on the media rounds of the need to reflect and listen to voters. Some MPs, alarmed by the scale of the defeat, call for Keir Starmer to go. The PM himself says he’s not going anywhere.
And strikingly, he spoke on Friday of his determination to break with the status quo ‘once and for all’. Action is needed and act he did. By bringing Gordon Brown and Harriet Harman back into government the next day.
I have huge admiration for Brown and Harman. But their return masterfully sums up how the public sees the PM, pledging to break with the past one day and inviting a former PM back into the fold the next.
The media lapped it up, providing relief in a relentless news cycle. But talking about the election results as a big moment – or a ‘seismic earthquake’ as Reform weirdly did – misses the bigger truth which has screamed back at us for years.
The more things change…
I’m optimistic about the country and don’t buy the broken Britain narrative. I don’t think Keir Starmer should resign and badly want him to do well.
But I’m fed up with the idea that a statement or big moment will change things for the better without a vision and lots of hard work to move towards it.
This ‘moment’ hasn’t crept up on us. Nearly 10 years after the Brexit vote, discontent was brewing for decades before last week. There will be fallout, but the election results in themselves change nothing in communities and in households across the country.
People are still pissed off and deeply mistrustful of politics. They hear promises of ‘change’ and odd slogans like ‘deliver, deliver, deliver’ while struggling with the impact of nearly 20 years of stagnation on their incomes, high streets, public services and opportunities for their kids.
Action and promises
So, what about those promises?
The MAGA-style ‘build, baby, build’ pledge to get 1.5m homes built by 2029 is falling flat, with housebuilding levels pottering at less than half of the number needed to hit that target. In London, the number of starts reportedly fell by more than 80% to around 5,500 last year. Labour’s two-year target for London is 176,000 new homes.
The much-heralded ‘devolution revolution’, which aims to power growth outside London, would still leave the UK as the world’s most centralised modern economy, according to Andy Haldane of the British Chambers of Commerce. Change can happen in cities and towns quickly. Local leaders need the powers to get on with it.
After seeing energy costs rocket since 2022, promises to knock a tenner a month of household bills barely touch the sides. People find it difficult to take messages about £130 off household bills making a difference seriously when their monthly payments tell a different story. Meanwhile, the Fingleton Report finds that UK is the most expensive country in the world to build nuclear plants.
We are not investing enough in skills, while spending billions on welfare, with around 1m young working-age people not in training, education or work.
This is the backdrop that allows populism to do well in places that feel left behind. Gradually, and then suddenly, the discontent overwhelmed Labour in Wales, where Plaid Cymru and Reform were the main beneficiaries.
Eluned Morgan’s concession speech as First Minister was heartfelt, speaking of the wind of change that Labour had failed to notice until it blew the party aside.
My dad, who lives in Pembrokeshire and watched the results come in on Friday, summed it up well when saying that two party politics is still alive an well in Wales. It’s just that the two main parties have changed, as the BBC image below shows. It’s astonishing, but unsuprising for anyone who knows Wales.
Too late for change?
Nearly two years after Labour’s huge election win, we need to know from Sir Keir what breaking from the status quo looks like. By definition, it means making big decisions that some people will not like.
We can expect to see an attempt at a reset today (Monday, 11 May). Media reports say stronger links with the EU will feature. We can also expect to hear about the values that Keir Starmer holds dear.
I’ll listen with interest, looking for a stronger sense of the direction he wants to take the country. I hope it’s not another list of priorities, or things the government is doing or – worse – ‘looking at’. We’ve already had too many of these, and they’re not landing.
Beyond the feverish headlines, there’s still time for Labour for to make a difference. It has a big majority and leads more councils than other parties.
Talking of Reform as incapable of winning a general election is complacent, whatever the party’s failings. Unless Labour starts addressing the issues that led people to desert them in their droves last week, calls to ‘get Starmer out’ will only intensify.