“The distraction has to end and the leadership in Downing Street has to change,” said Anas Sarwar, the leader of Scottish Labour, on February 9th. He is the most senior figure in the party to call for Sir Keir Starmer to resign after a bruising few days during which Morgan McSweeney, the prime minister’s chief of staff, and Tim Allan, his director of communications, both quit.
Rather than follow Mr Sarwar, who faces tough elections in May, cabinet ministers issued statements of support for Sir Keir (with varying degrees of enthusiasm). Angela Rayner, his former deputy and a potential rival, tweeted her “full support”. That evening at a packed meeting of Labour MPs the prime minister defended his record and said he was “not prepared to walk away…or to plunge us into chaos”. “It was all right, really. Strong,” said one northern critic.
For now, none of Sir Keir’s potential successors seems to have a plan to tackle Britain’s underlying problems. The prime minister might remain in post for some time—propped up for long enough to do the bidding of his left-wing MPs—or he might be replaced by a more convincingly leftist leader. Either way, the Labour government will probably be less willing to reckon with reality.
Sir Keir is the most unpopular British prime minister since records began (see chart): the sick man who cannot afford to catch a cold. That is why the scandal around Peter Mandelson’s relationship with the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has been so destabilising. Sir Keir’s decision to appoint Lord Mandelson as Britain’s ambassador to America left him perilously exposed once fresh revelations emerged.
Though the prime minister sacked Lord Mandelson as Britain’s ambassador in September, files released recently have revealed the extent of the former cabinet minister’s friendship with Epstein—including evidence that he appeared to share confidential government information during the global financial crisis. Sir Keir has apologised for believing Lord Mandelson’s “lies”. Mr McSweeney, who had pushed for the former Labour grandee to get the Washington post, resigned on February 8th.
Sir Keir has made little discernible progress on voters’ top priorities, according to our Starmer tracker. But the task of governing was always going to be hard. Britain shares many challenges with other rich democracies, including sluggish economic growth and an increasingly hostile American administration. In addition, Sir Keir inherited creaking public services and looming crises in social care and special-education funding. Given all that, his abysmal poll-ratings—even worse than Liz Truss’s during her 49-day stint in office—might seem unfair.
And yet under Sir Keir’s leadership Labour did little to prepare for these conditions in opposition. The party pledged not to increase taxes on “working people”—a promise it could not afford to keep. Under Labour’s chancellor, Rachel Reeves, taxes are expected to rise to the highest levels since the 1940s. The party claimed it would stop the arrival of migrants crossing the channel in small boats. The numbers are higher than when Sir Keir took office.
A lack of realism in advance means the government has no mandate for difficult choices in office—despite a thumping parliamentary majority. His own MPs have turned into a rebellious bunch. And unpopular policies incur political damage before (too often) being abandoned.
The problem is compounded by a dysfunctional operation in Downing Street. MPs and ministers privately complain that the prime minister’s team is both overbearing and erratic. In 19 months Sir Keir has lost two chiefs of staff, four directors of communications and 11 ministers. With no coherent project or ideology to fall back on, the prime minister has appeared to be paralysed by events, often outsourcing strategy to Mr McSweeney.
Voters are left feeling that nothing has changed. As the cost of living spiralled from 2021 onwards, Britons despaired at a Conservative government which was consumed by scandals and infighting. Sir Keir’s pitch in 2024 was that it was time to end the chaos and “put the country first”. Instead, the disorder has continued. One former Conservative minister in the May and Johnson years wandering by the crowd of journalists in Parliament on Monday said: “I’m getting terrible flashbacks. Awful. Repressed memory syndrome.”
Almost half of Labour’s 2024 voters now say they would vote for another party. Reform UK, the right-wing populist party led by Nigel Farage, has led every opinion poll since May 2025. Labour MPs are scared of losing their jobs. Many of them are openly discussing the end of Sir Keir’s premiership.
In the short term, he might be sustained by the lack of an obvious successor. Prospective challengers need to secure the support of one-fifth of Labour MPs (81 of them) before the election would go to a ballot of the party’s members. Ms Rayner, the punters’ favourite, is under investigation by tax authorities. Wes Streeting, the health secretary and figurehead of the Labour right, is damaged by his own proximity to Lord Mandelson and would struggle to win the support of members. Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester and the grassroots members’ favoured candidate, cannot stand because he is not an MP.
More likely, Sir Keir will struggle on, doubling down on his government’s progressive policies to maintain the support of his MPs. Backbench Labour MPs might reason that they stand to benefit from a weak and malleable prime minister, especially with Mr McSweeney (whose political instincts were at odds with many of theirs) out of the way. There is no guarantee that this will work. Local elections on May 7th could be the next moment for challengers to strike. And more damaging information might emerge from the documents relating to Lord Mandelson’s appointment, which the government has agreed to release.
Few voices in Labour are calling on the party to confront hard problems, such as bringing welfare spending under control. Given the government’s huge majority, a general election is unlikely soon. Instead, yet more Labour drift and drama beckon—to the dismay of voters, who were promised something better.