Borrowed Time

Ben Wildsmith

With regards to the spiralling awfulness of Labour, it is difficult to identify a single trait that defines the party’s performance in 2025.

For me, the most surprising element has been the Westminster government’s incompetence. Prior to the election, I expected a Starmer administration to be dull but efficient in the middle-managerial manner that characterises Labour MPs nowadays.

Ambition will be slight, I thought, but delivery and presentation would likely be on point enough to shame the memory of shambolic Tory regimes.

In reality, the government’s lack of an overarching vision has been obscured, somewhat, by its week-to-week inability to make policies stick.

Some greatest hits in this regard include cuts to the winter fuel payment and PIP benefits, the decision not to hold a national grooming gang enquiry and even backing for swift bricks in new-build houses.

Despite enjoying an unassailable parliamentary majority, Labour has governed as if its survival were threatened from Day One.

The reason for that has become clear over the last couple of weeks. Whilst the parliamentary arithmetic looks rosy, scant few of the MPs on Labour’s benches are enthusiastic about the Prime Minister or his team.

With the Conservatives in abeyance, and Reform’s support not reflected in parliamentary seats, the de facto opposition is within Labour itself.

Yoked to an incoherent programme, with public support in freefall, and an unpopular leader, backbenchers who barely tolerated Keir Starmer and the Iago-esque Morgan McSweeney are now in open revolt.

Weakness

The government’s weakness has been most obviously betrayed by the Chancellor’s desperado performance over the last few weeks. Knowing that she lacked backbench support to raise income tax, she took the unprecedented step of nodding and winking towards the idea in a speech weeks ahead of her suspiciously late budget.

There is a reason that budgetary decisions are kept under wraps until their official announcement: leaking them in advance allows people to take market positions that evade the intended consequences of changes being made.

Reeves allowed it to be known that income tax rises were on the way, thus drawing the ire of backbenchers who fondly imagined that a wealth tax might be the Labour way of raising revenue.

What transpired then was quite extraordinary. A series of briefings suggested that ‘the markets’ would react badly if either Reeves or Starmer were replaced. Put simply, the UK public was threatened with poverty unless internal dissent in the Labour Party was quelled.

I doubt the average Labour candidate expected Starmer’s ‘changed’ Labour party to be operating an overt protection racket on behalf of international finance, but here we are.

Nothing motivates MPs, however, like the prospect of having to get a real job. So, with Labour continuing to plummet in the polls, yet another U-turn was extracted from Reeves and potential replacements for Keir Starmer began visible manoeuvres.

Bacon

Wes Streeting’s attempts to conceal ambition resembled a well-trained Staffordshire Bull Terrier drooling whilst waiting for a slice of bacon. You had the impression he could snap at any moment.

Andy Burnham, meanwhile, continues to flash tantalising glimpses of socialist leg from the Manchester stage. He’s ‘absolutely committed’ to his current role, you understand, but not above a redistributive shimmy when the cameras point his way.

Angela Rayner, fuming on her seafront balcony, can still rely on journalists to print something if she calls them up. Just you wait…

Now that Reform UK has, as Nigel Farage predicted, replaced the Tory party, it remains to be seen if Zack Polanski’s Greens will do a similar number on Labour. Plaid Cymru seem sure to hoover up the non-Reform vote here in Wales.

With potentially 3.5 years until an election, a new leader could, in theory, rescue Labour from the disaster of Starmer’s unmoored leadership.

Public expectations are low, so a competent centre-left offering that didn’t try to dogwhistle its way onto Reform’s lawn might be enough to persuade voters that the party hasn’t lost its soul.

To pull that off, though, the party’s MPs will need to act swiftly and decisively. Next to the Tories’ grave, another is already being prepared.