Keir Starmer The ‘Labourist’ Prime Minister

Starmer’s plan

Starmer comes into office prepared for governing. It was striking just how often during the election campaign the Prime Minister mentioned his previous career leading the Crown Prosecution Service. He did this not only to show he had experience in a ‘tough’ role, and could talk about prosecuting serious criminal cases, but because he is fundamentally interested in running things – in governing well and governing properly. The first part of Starmer’s governing plan is competence. His cabinet is filled with Secretaries of State working to clear early objectives, with many of them experienced in their briefs, if not in government. They are all working to shine an early spotlight on the problems within their portfolios: Rachel Reeves has highlighted the spending challenge, Wes Streeting wanted to publicise the state of the NHS and Shabana Mahmood the crisis in prisons, for example. One lesson of public policy research is that who defines the problem can create the context for the ‘right’ fix.

The direction of travel, though, is relatively clear: the UK has elected a centre-left government committed to centre-left objectives. And its first task is to persuade people that competent government is possible again.

Achieving competent government is no mean feat but it is a prerequisite for everything that follows. The next part of the plan is taking early decisions that can contribute to evidence of change four or five years from now, and to start delivering on what Labour called its ‘first steps’. The Treasury announced quick changes to planning early on, aimed at encouraging stronger, consistent investment and – ultimately – economic growth. Ed Miliband ended the ban on onshore wind. And the new government’s legislative programme, announced in the King’s Speech, brought clearer recognition from the media that Labour means some of what it has said: the government will bring rail services into public ownership as contracts expire or services fail; it will provide investment (and expect private money to follow) to support an industrial strategy, a green transition and regional economic development; and it will overhaul workers’ rights, in consultation with trade unions. Of course, attention will soon switch to delivery, and rightly so. Curiosity at the arrival of a more ‘interventionist’ government will give way to a questioning of the results. Indeed, scepticism of ‘big government’ was apparent as soon as Starmer entered Number 10, despite the evident caution of his political and economic strategy.

Within labourism there are also longstanding traditions of the British Labour Party: the importance of class, the lack of appetite for socialist or social democratic theory, a small ‘c’ conservatism suspicious of the idea that there is a latent radicalism in the UK. Keir Starmer fits into the tradition of labourism very well – which might tell us something about where his government is going.

At the same time there are decisions that will need to be made soon – decisions that will definitively mark the end of a government ‘honeymoon’. This is clearest when it comes to public spending. The state needs more money. How the Labour government makes that happen is one of the biggest questions it faces. Labour has – in opposition and since taking office – placed great emphasis on economic growth as being key to well-funded public services. Yet, while Starmer’s Labour has a parliamentary majority comparable to New Labour’s in 1997, its economic inheritance looks very different.

In the second quarter of 1997, during which Tony Blair’s New Labour was elected, GDP growth was 1.1 per cent. It grew in every quarter until the second quarter of 2008, when the global financial crisis wrought havoc. Starmer’s Labour government inherits an economy that has struggled with consistent growth. The latest statistics show stronger growth than the last couple of years, but it remains a challenging and uncertain economic inheritance. Before the election, the Office for Budget Responsibility forecast an uptick in growth to around 2% per cent in 2026 and then 1.8 per cent and 1.7 per cent in 2027 and 2028, respectively, which would still entail a serious budget crunch for unprotected departments, including local government and justice, two areas which everyone knows are under intense pressure.

In opposition, Labour opted to support the Conservative government’s tax cuts through reducing the rate of national insurance, as Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt sought to create a dividing line with Labour over tax. Labour did eventually draw a line in the election campaign – committing to not increasing headline rates of income tax, national insurance and VAT, but not promising cuts – and the Conservatives failed to derive much electoral benefit from promising further tax cuts. Yet, it’s fair to say Labour has constrained itself in office with its promises – and concessions – in opposition. There are still reforms that can be made to taxation and may well be made by Labour on top of its very specific revenue-raising measures (e.g. ending private school tax breaks), but the state arithmetic remains tricky. Labour’s manifesto does not contain many clues here. It was a ‘wait and see’ document on tax and spend. When the moment of clarity does arrive, we will learn a great deal about how big Labour’s aspirations are for improving public services.

Starmer’s politics

Of course, we are only at the beginning of this Labour government. We do not know what unforeseen challenges may arise over the next four or five years, nor what overall effect different policies being proposed by Labour may have. Starmer’s governing agenda will likely develop over this Parliament, too. So let us turn to Starmer’s political instincts, instructive for the unforeseen. We know a great deal about the Prime Minister’s life before politics, from his own interviews and from Tom Baldwin’s very readable and interesting biography, Keir Starmer. As Starmer has often repeated, his father was a toolmaker, his mother a nurse. A love of football and a diligence in education and at work are also part of the Starmer story. But what of Starmer as a Labour Party figure?

I agree with Jon Cruddas, the former Labour MP and author of A Century of Labour, that Starmer has been difficult to locate within Labour’s politics and traditions. That isn’t to say Starmer comes without any familiar Labour Party accoutrements. He does, and his leadership campaign sought to highlight his engagement and connections with causes of the left. Rather it is that, having come to politics later in life and having had a career some distance from day-to-day, party-political matters, Starmer has been free to shape how he was and is seen.

He supported Andy Burnham for leader as a newly elected MP in 2015 and was broadly associated with the ‘soft-left’ to centre-left Tribune group of MPs. His opting to serve in Jeremy Corbyn’s Shadow Cabinet (after Corbyn saw off the challenge to his leadership from Owen Smith, the then Labour MP for Pontypridd) was very helpful to Starmer personally. As Shadow Brexit Secretary he trod a cautious line towards a pro-Remain stance, but was always careful to appear on the side of those wanting a closer relationship with the European Union than the state of the Brexit negotiations offered.

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As leader of the opposition, Starmer moved from offering continuity with a left economic platform to offering what he thought of as sound management. At times, this strategy looked rather shaky, but Starmer maintained it through successive Conservative Party meltdowns, and it was sufficient to deliver consistent poll leads. During these years, Starmer’s cautious, technocratic instincts found a home within a strand of British Labour history: a form of ‘labourism’. What is labourism? It’s a disputed term within Labour but inspired by Eric Hobsbawm’s political writings (where one can find a thoughtful critique of Labour’s relationship with ‘ideas’), I think of it as a politics that aims for Labour’s traditional goals in ways considered politically safe, and one often more ambiguous in its language than other socialist traditions. ‘Fairness’ replaces ‘equality’ in the labourist lexicon, not because people don’t believe in equality – of course they do – but because they are not certain of the trajectory for getting there.

Within labourism there are also longstanding traditions of the British Labour Party: the importance of class, the lack of appetite for socialist or social democratic theory, a small ‘c’ conservatism suspicious of the idea that there is a latent radicalism in the UK. Keir Starmer fits into the tradition of labourism very well – which might tell us something about where his government is going. Alongside the Chancellor Rachel Reeves and the Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, Starmer is convinced of the importance of good work for living standards and for the kind of economy Labour wants to grow: that commitment is important, because as the Labour government ‘consults’ on its overhaul of workers’ rights, there will be no shortage of people keen to sow doubt. Labour’s plans for a more extensive industrial strategy and its green energy ambitions require a clearer (and bigger) role for the state. In addition to changing the way the UK economy works to make it ‘fairer’, there is a welfare and redistribution aspect that Labour will need to attend to.

The politics of Britain and the European Union are contentious. Here, labourism as a tradition is perhaps less instructive, but it still tells us something. Consistently stronger economic growth, and particularly trade in goods, requires a better trading arrangement with the European Union. Starmer is undoubtedly pro-European, but he is conscious too of the huge damage Brexit politics did to Labour in the 2019 election, and the connection to political trust one can draw between what he has said about Brexit – that the UK has left and won’t be going back – and what a ‘better deal’ actually looks like. There are more avowedly pro-European Labour politicians keen to see Labour be an internationalist party of the social democratic tradition – and that could well mean rejoining one day. Keir Starmer is not in that place. His is a politics of caution, while trying to get better results.

On foreign policy more generally, Starmer will need to find his feet. He looked comfortable at the NATO summit in Washington in July. In opposition, Starmer was far too slow in calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. He has held a consistent position on support for Ukraine and will be helped by the Foreign Office – and the British state more widely – having clear positions and relationships around the world that a Labour government will broadly seek to maintain.

Conclusion

For Labour, the 2024 election marked incredible electoral progress when viewed from the starting point of 2019. Consecutive Conservative Party meltdowns no doubt aided Starmer in his mission to turn things around, but there is no taking away from the Prime Minister his achievement in returning Labour to office, and with a majority few would have thought possible after Boris Johnson’s Brexit election. The short-term dynamics of the Labour government are far clearer than the medium- and longer-term outcomes. Much will depend on the economic situation and whether the UK economy can return to consistent growth. In the meantime, Labour faces a series of crises across public services and an electorate keen to see what ‘change’ will mean, and to know how soon it will arrive.