How Starmer went from seismic Labour landslide to pariah in 23 months ...Middle East

In the immediate aftermath of Andy Burnham’s decisive win over Reform in the Makerfield by-election, Sir Keir Starmer insisted he was not going to “walk away” from the job.

He has repeated this mantra ever since Labour’s disastrous performance in the local and devolved administration elections last month, claiming he would fight any leadership challenge.

The Prime Minister had embarked on a fightback, announcing a new legislative agenda in the King’s Speech, setting out a social media ban for under-16s and putting a renewed focus on security.

But it was not enough to convince scores of Labour MPs that he had what it takes to carry the party to the next election in just three years’ time.

Starmer’s premiership was already on thin ice after defence secretary John Healey resigned following a months-long battle over defence funding, with armed forces secretary Al Carns quitting just hours later.

But it was Burnham’s comfortable by-election win over Reform UK’s candidate, Robert Kenyon, by more than 9,000 votes, that was the final catalyst for his resignation.

Despite insisting on Friday that he would fight on, it was reported over the weekend that Starmer had decided his position was untenable following growing pressure from within his own party.

On Sunday, Cabinet minister Peter Kyle said the PM was spending time with his wife at their Chequers country home to reflect on the “political realities” and focus on what would be in the “best interests” of the country.

With Burnham’s return to Westminster widely seen as the start of a leadership challenge, Starmer found himself facing a contender who is said to have the backing of more than 200 Labour MPs – far more than the 81 needed to launch a contest.

Starmer’s Labour leadership rivals were already circling, having spent the last few weeks building up their power bases in Westminster.

It was not just Labour’s disastrous performance in the polls that contributed to Starmer’s resignation, of course.

The PM had faced intense criticism over his handling of the Peter Mandelson scandal and Labour’s failure to respond to the rise in the polls of Nigel Farage’s Reform and the Greens under Zack Polanski.

For months, Starmer had protected himself from the fallout over his botched appointment of Mandelson by sacrificing some of the most senior people in his government.

But this personally imposed firewall could only hold for so long.

In the end, with his Cabinet ministers turning against him and judgement over his handling of the affair repeatedly called into question, it was a position Starmer could no longer sustain.

When Prime Ministers are forced to resign, sometimes it is an incidental factor at the end of an unhappy period in office that finally tips them over the edge.

Many in Westminster had expected Boris Johnson to quit over Partygate – a scandal that, like the Mandelson saga, festered among rank and file MPs for months.

But Johnson’s final straw, in July 2022, was his failure to be fully open about what he knew of sexual harassment allegations against his deputy chief whip, Chris Pincher.

When that was revealed, it took only a matter of hours for Johnson to resign. By then, Conservative MPs and ministers were already deeply unhappy about their leader’s conduct, judgement and integrity.

As Johnson said on the steps of Downing Street to announce his resignation, “when the herd moves, it moves”.

For Starmer, the Labour herd has been shifting uneasily for weeks – each revelation over what he knew about Mandelson’s appointment, and the pressure from his No 10 to force it through, causing ever-greater dismay among many Labour MPs, particularly the more idealistically disposed members elected in 2024.

And in a similar way to Johnson, it was Starmer’s apparent lack of openness – although he has always denied misleading Parliament – over Mandelson that fuelled concerns among his ministers and MPs.

There were other factors at play too. Labour’s local, Scottish and Welsh elections performance, with the loss of nearly 1,500 council seats, would destabilise any sitting prime minister, but a bad night in May is survivable when the inhabitant of No 10 is in a stronger position and in command of his or her party.

But many Labour MPs were reluctant to demand Starmer’s resignation during the Mandelson scandal and in the aftermath of the local elections without a credible successor waiting in the wings.

Last month, more than 100 had signed a statement saying this was “no time for a leadership contest”, with several using the revolving door of Conservative leaders under the last government as a warning against plunging the country into instability and uncertainty.

But with many Labour MPs seeing Burnham as the party’s last chance to beat Reform, his return to Parliament as Makerfield’s new MP has revived long-standing concerns over Starmer’s leadership.

Lack of grip on No 10 operation

Starmer’s inability to get a grip on his Downing Street operation, starting with his forcing out of Sue Gray as chief of staff just three months into office in October 2024, was frequently cited by MPs as one reason for disillusionment.

In his 23 months in office, there were four directors of communications – fuelling the sense that the newly elected government’s message was struggling to get through to voters.

Last September Starmer attempted to “reset” his government with the first major reshuffle of his Cabinet and Downing Street team.

It was just six days after that reshuffle that Mandelson was fired as ambassador to Washington over revelations in the Epstein files that the Labour grandee had been closer to the convicted paedophile than was originally thought.

Labour lost between Reform and the Greens

Starmer’s “reset” failed to change the political weather. Labour had already begun to lose ground in the polls to Reform in February 2025, when Nigel Farage’s party overtook Starmer’s.

This slippage in support caused alarm among ministers and Labour MPs that they could lose dozens of seats at the next general election.

As Starmer tried to fend off a challenge from Reform on its right – with policies and announcements on immigration designed to keep voters on Labour’s side – there was more recently a surge for the Greens from the party’s left, under new leader Zack Polanski.

Starmer had also angered several key senior Labour figures on the party’s soft left, including Lucy Powell, whom he sacked from the Cabinet last September but who went on to win the deputy leadership election, and Burnham, who was blocked from standing in the Gorton and Denton by-election, which Labour went on to lose to the Greens.

Embarrassing policy U-turns

On the policy front, Labour have performed at least 15 U-turns since winning a landslide victory in July 2024, which has only weakened Starmer’s position.

There was a reversal on the winter fuel allowance, which Rachel Reeves had cut for 10m pensioners in July 2024 – before reinstating it a year later.

Labour MPs complained that the cut was losing the party support on the doorstep, and showed that the government was not concerned about the cost of living for some of the more vulnerable people in society.

This was compounded by disarray over cuts to the benefits bill, which the Chancellor and Prime Minister were forced to water down after a rebellion by 120 MPs.

World stage no longer Starmer’s safe space

Until the outbreak of the Iran war, Starmer could, at least, count on the world stage to be his political safe space when he was under fire at home.

But Donald Trump’s repeated criticisms of the Prime Minister’s refusal to send RAF planes into battle alongside US and Israel against Iran at the end of February have led to the worst UK-US relations in decades.

These broadsides include the US president describing Starmer as “not Churchill” and suggesting the UK was no longer the “Rolls Royce of allies”.

In fact, even before the Iran conflict, Trump had started to criticise the PM over the Chagos Islands deal – calling it in January this year an “act of great stupidity”.

His reputation was further damaged by the successive resignations of Healey and Carns, who quit after accusing the PM of failing to provide enough funds to protect the country in the long-awaited Defence Investment Plan (DIP).

The Treasury is said to have offered £13.5bn of the £18bn needed to make Britain war-ready, which amounts to £10bn in cash terms – or just a 0.08 per cent increase in GDP.

Mandelson crisis never went away

In February, Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar called on him to step down, saying that Starmer was “failing” in office, that his performance was “not good enough” and “drowning out” the positive messages of what the party could be doing in government.

At the time, it was the most serious challenge to Starmer’s leadership, and triggered speculation in Westminster that Starmer could be on the way out.

Sarwar had spoken out in the wake of the resignation of Starmer’s chief of staff and right hand man Morgan McSweeney and his communications director Tim Allan.

It was only when several senior cabinet ministers, including Chancellor Rachel Reeves and Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy, rallied to the Prime Minister’s side that quelled the crisis.

But this was only a temporary reprieve. By that time, Starmer’s cards had already been dealt.

A fresh release of Epstein files in late January went further in revealing the close nature of Mandelson’s relationship with Epstein – which involved him allegedly taking money from the late financier and appearing to pass on market sensitive information while he was in Gordon Brown’s cabinet.

The revelations fuelled questions over why Starmer – and on the advice of McSweeney – appointed Mandelson UK ambassador to Washington in December 2024.

The row intensified when the PM fired the Foreign Office permanent secretary Sir Olly Robbins over what he said was an “error of judgement” in failing to pass on the fact that Mandelson had not passed vetting checks.

Robbins claimed there had been “constant pressure” from No 10 to get Mandelson in post.

The ex-mandarin also revealed that Downing Street had attempted to seek an ambassador role for Matthew Doyle when he was leaving his post as No 10 director of communications.

Labour MPs were aghast that their leader – who had pitched himself as the antidote to Boris Johnson – was now himself mired in cronyism and shady politics.

It was only a matter of time before they lost faith completely. The herd has moved.

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