Backbenchers told: ‘Cut Starmer some slack’
Labour leader promises to ‘carry the can’ for any election losses but hints that he is unlikely to resign
SIR KEIR STARMER’S top team last night urged Labour MPS to “cut him some slack” over today’s expected election defeats, as he said he would “carry the can” for any losses but needs more time as Opposition leader to turn the party around.
Shadow ministers rallied around their man after backbenchers called for a shake-up of the Labour front bench and asked Sir Keir to consider standing down if the party receives a drubbing at the ballot box today.
In a mass democratic exercise dubbed “Super Thursday”, the country will vote for local councillors, metropolitan mayors, Scottish MSPS and Welsh Senedd members, police and crime commissioners and a new MP in Hartlepool.
One poll, released on Tuesday morning, placed the Tories 17 points ahead of Labour in the Hartlepool by-election and in the mayoral race in the West Midlands.
Sir Keir said it was important that “the leader carries the can and takes responsibility” for any losses, but that “winning the next election” was his main focus – suggesting he is unlikely to consider resigning.
“I take full responsibility for everything the Labour Party does,” he said, but he insisted that he had “further work to do, whatever the results”.
“This is a changed Labour Party. Under new leadership, we are putting working people and their communities first,” he said.
Sir Keir’s critics say he has failed to reform Labour in the year he has been in charge, and they point to the party’s dire poll numbers as evidence that he cannot win back voters who were loyal to the party in the pre-corbyn era.
Internal party polling, seen by The Guardian, suggested 40 per cent of former Labour voters in Hartlepool will not vote for the party’s candidate in the town’s by-election.
An MP allied with Jeremy Corbyn told The Daily Telegraph there was “not simply a gap but a yawning chasm” between the two parties.
“If the results are as bad as people say they will be, clearly we need to change direction. Right now we’re heading in a reverse direction,” the MP said.
Another disgruntled backbencher said Sir Keir should remain in office until a year before the next general election in 2024, before deciding whether he should stand aside.
Labour’s leadership team closed ranks against the criticism of Sir Keir yesterday, insisting that he was the right man to lead their party to recovery after its massive defeat in the 2019 general election.
Jonathan Reynolds, the shadow work and pensions secretary, said Sir Keir
‘If the results are as bad as people say they will be, clearly we need to change direction’
was “a leader who people recognise has the integrity and calibre to be the prime minister”.
Another shadow minister told The Telegraph that the parliamentary party should “cut him some slack” and give him more time to turn Labour’s fortunes around.
“I think we should be under no illusion that it wouldn’t simply be: change the leader, Brexit’s done and back to the glory days for Labour,” the MP said.
“That would have been a massive misunderstanding.
“At these elections, there is a bit of a backdrop of expectation that now that Jeremy is no longer leader, it should be easy for Labour. That is a foolish conclusion.”
Other Labour grandees rowed in behind the current front bench, with Harriet Harman declaring Sir Keir had her “full support”.
“He’s been trying to get the party sorted out and back on track so that we can win the confidence of British people,” she said.
Lord Mandelson, who was the MP for Hartlepool for 12 years, said he was backing the party’s “smashing candidate” Paul Williams but that he would have a “meltdown” if the seat turned blue for the first time ever.
Labour MPS have already begun talking about a potential reshuffle after the election results and some have discussed deposing Sir Keir as leader, although most believe he should be given another chance.
A source told this newspaper that those unhappy with his leadership “haven’t been able to get in the tea room and curry favour due to Covid”.
“They know they don’t have the numbers as it stands,” the source said.
Playing down the idea of a shake-up, a senior Labour MP responded: “There is always reshuffle chat to some degree.”