Chaos may well be preferable to Keir Starmer’s unyielding blankness
Keir Starmer’s promise for change is as convincing as a bad boyfriend’s. MPs and voters may well decide they prefer chaos to this neverending blandness, writes Theresa Bischof
There it was. The PM’s final reset speech. Perhaps final, because he has set a successful course, or final, because MPs have finally decided the jig is up. This speech was – to invoke Trump – one for the haters and losers. Or – in Starmer’s characteristically measured language, but unusually dramatic tone – the “doubters”.
He appeared much like a boyfriend who repeatedly promises you he will change – just about convincing enough to stop you from pulling the plug, never enough to fully convince you that this is going to end well. Yesterday’s speech promised action on Europe and British steel. For some MPs, that wasn’t change enough. In his first speech as Prime Minister, back in the honeymoon phase, Starmer promised that he would “tread more lightly” on our lives.
Starmer has disappointed from the get-go
Instead, one by one, the government alienated various parts of their voter base. Let’s start with winter fuel payments – a policy the government now noisily regrets. What it really meant was months of anxiety for many voters who by now will have deserted Labour.
In the City, business enthusiasm built through months of wooing business over salmon and orange juice evaporated in a matter of minutes, at the government’s first Budget. The contested rise in National Insurance Contributions meant it would cost businesses more to hire, leaving some bosses scratching their heads as they tried to square the move with the government’s growth ambitions.
In the months that followed, the UK’s youth unemployment crisis would rage on, with AI actively taking jobs from young people. There were some bright spots too of course – the minimum wage rise, the Employment Rights Bill – all popular, but drowned out as the puzzle pieces simply didn’t quite fit together.
No more resets – voters want change
And again, yesterday, we didn’t get a comprehensive answer to voters’ big questions. We got some good bits – like on Europe. Europe is part of the answer. But not the flagship item that will change voters’ minds, many of whom, naturally, are more worried about getting by. The government – led by Starmer or one of the various eerily quiet leadership contenders – has to convince voters they can fix the economy. No more resets, no more polished words. Simply an answer for voters who are in disbelief whenever they reach the supermarket till.
Some quarters of the Labour party have been putting serious thought to what this change of direction needs to look like, in specific policy terms. The Labour Growth Group – headed up by Chris Curtis, who came out of the barracks yesterday calling on the PM to stand down – will this week present its proposed path to growth. What remains to be seen is whether decision makers are willing – as they repeatedly claim – to go further, faster.
In the end, the PM did tread lightly – but at a moment that required a visible footprint. It required a statement of intent about how the government would win hemorrhaging voters back. In the end, MPs may well choose chaos over a blank canvas.
Theresa Bischof is an independent writer and political commentator writer and political commentator