Britain cannot afford another year of Starmer

The Labour Party must take control of this floundering Prime Minister.

Keir Starmer’s instincts are essentially authoritarian. Under his watch, the government has cracked down on free speech, assaulted the principle of due process, attempted to surrender the Chagos Islands to Mauritius against the wishes of the majority of its people, ordered the deletion of the UK’s largest independent court-reporting archive, laid the groundwork for future Islamic blasphemy laws, put citizens at risk by housing illegal unvetted migrants, and postponed elections when it knew it would lose.

Yet Starmer has a weakness. Specifically, he will u-turn when the pressure is sufficiently fierce. He brings to mind the precedent of King John, who was forced by the barons to sign the Magna Carta which ratified the principle that not even the king is above the law. Like that bullish monarch, Starmer needs to be reminded that the principle of liberty still matters. And surely it’s time for the barons in his own party to turn on their leader.

The mistakes have been numberless, and corrections have often been forced. Most notably, Starmer eventually conceded that a national inquiry into the grooming gangs scandal was needed, but only after sustained political pressure and mounting public outrage. Or perhaps he simply realised that preventing those in power from being held accountable for their complicity in the widespread sexual assault of children wasn’t exactly a vote winner.

Another welcome u-turn occurred this week, when the government announced that it will no longer be postponing local elections until 2027. Starmer had claimed that it simply wasn’t affordable to proceed with the elections given the imminent reorganisation of local authorities. Nobody believed this, of course, given that all reputable opinion polls have shown that Labour would be trounced by Reform UK. It is hardly a great stretch of the imagination to grasp the real reason for the postponements.

Again, like King John, Starmer’s hand has been forced. It turns out that delaying these local elections was illegal, a stumbling block that might have been avoided had Starmer consulted the lawyers in advance. We saw the same pattern with the Chagos Islands; only after the deal was struck did the government learn that, under the terms of a 1966 agreement, it needed the approval of the US to implement its plans. Whether Donald Trump will acquiesce is up for debate, and there will certainly be other legal challenges. For a technocrat and former barrister, Starmer is shockingly inept when it comes to checking the details in advance of his decisions.

One can only hope that his other authoritarian policies will likewise be curbed by outside pressure. Most worrying of all is Labour’s plans to scrap juries in certain trials, a means of clearing the backlog that would disproportionately impact those accused of spurious speech crimes. One need only consider the example of the former Royal Marine Jamie Michael, who was arrested after posting a video in which he urged people to protest peacefully against illegal immigration. The jury realised that it was a politically-motivated prosecution and acquitted him after only seventeen minutes. Without a jury, he may well have found himself behind bars.

There have been governments on both sides of the political aisle that have perceived the principle of liberty to be a hindrance to their plans. Starmer is not unique in his authoritarian mindset; he is simply the most egregious manifestation of it. Few were surprised when he claimed that a ban on X was being considered. Ostensibly, this was about the protection of children and sexualised deepfakes. But the online platform where child exploitation is most rife is Snapchat, and Starmer has not once suggested closing it down. A cynic might point out that the government’s most vociferous critics operate on X, and this that – rather than a noble concern for the young – might be the true motivating factor. (The cynic would almost certainly be correct.)

Like every authoritarian, Starmer will not relinquish power easily. Even now, with polls showing that he is one of the least popular Prime Ministers in history, and with party insiders saying that his time is up, he is seemingly oblivious to his vulnerability. ‘Every fight I have ever been in, I’ve won’, he said last week. He might see this as statesmanlike defiance, but really it shows that he prioritises his own interests over the good of the country.

Even after the media scrutiny in the wake of the Epstein Files, and Starmer’s admission that he appointed Peter Mandelson knowing that he had maintained a relationship with the convicted sex offender, he continues to bulldoze on. While the economy is collapsing around him, and other cabinet ministers are whetting their daggers in the shadows, Starmer simply has no intention of stepping down. The arrogance is astonishing.

So maybe we need another King John moment. Perhaps it will be the barons in his own party that will force the change. Even so, this won’t resolve the authoritarian rot at the heart of this government. The political class needs to relearn its function. While the worst see themselves as our masters, the best understand that they are our servants. It will take a major cultural shift in Westminster to see the primacy of democracy restored.

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