Keir Starmer has no ideas, no conviction, no fight. He’s a cypher, a void, a political black hole. Starmer became Labour leader by being a blank canvas – the man Labour members could project their hopes onto. He pulled the same trick last year with voters, winning the election simply by not being a Tory.
Now he’s in Downing Street, this stuffed shirt is horribly exposed. Starmer has left a gaping hole where leadership should be, and nature abhors a vacuum. Mayor of Manchester Andy Burnham tried to plug it, but why replace one political void with another? Now it’s Wes Streeting’s turn to challenge the PM, with Angela Rayner circling too.
Starmer is still nominally in charge, but real power has shifted elsewhere and it’s a disaster for Britain.
Because in the absence of real leadership, the very last people we’d want running the country are now in charge.
They’re flexing their muscles over the next Budget. Chancellor Rachel Reeves is supposed to be in charge of that, but she lost control ages ago.
Her attempts to trim a mere £5billion off the nation’s ballooning sickness benefits bill last year collapsed as a backbench rebellion forced Starmer into a humiliating U-turn.
That’s when we first saw where the true power in Starmer’s Labour lies. And it’s terrifying.
Labour’s bored backbenchers, radical activists and resurgent unions now run the show, and Starmer is too weak to stop them.
The same cabal is dictating this year’s Budget too. They don’t want to make hard choices. They just want to hammer taxpayers and spend the proceeds, on repeat.
Reeves has now been forced to scrap the two-child benefit cap, at a cost of £3.5billion. That’s despite Starmer pledging to keep it just 15 months ago.
While working families agonise over whether they can afford another child, families on benefits can have as many as they like, funded by the taxpayer.
The Treasury has even dropped plans to taper benefits so claimants get less the more children they have. The Labour left wouldn’t allow it.
It’s the same story with sickness benefits. Under Labour, a staggering 1.3million have been signed off sick or long-term unemployed, taking the total to four million. It’s a national emergency but Starmer won’t challenge it. Why? His own MPs won’t let him.
Angela Rayner’s disastrous Employment Rights Bill will cost businesses up to £5billion and destroy even more jobs than the last Budget but again, it has to go through. Union bosses demand it.
Starmer couldn’t sack energy secretary Ed Miliband, even as his reckless net-zero crusade drives up energy costs and batters industry. Activists adore him, so he stays.
The PM’s huge majority has become his curse. With hundreds of Labour MPs pushing their pet causes, he’s paralysed.
We are now under mob rule. A shambolic coalition of union barons, embittered Corbynites, climate crusaders and welfare campaigners are running the government.
PM Keir Starmer is in office but Labour’s hard-left are now in power. And getting stronger by the day.
