Keir Starmer might not have ‘rizz’ – but maybe we should give him a chance

As an experiment, let’s see if we can somehow rustle up a positive appraisal of Labour’s first year in office. What has changed since Keir Starmer first walked into Downing Street?

Well, other than new trade deals, a deft realignment with EU and an absence of the sort of corruption, incompetence, sex scandals and rampant in-fighting we endured under the Tories for the previous 14 years, not much. People on the right don’t like this government. People on the left don’t like this government. Even people in the middle aren’t that keen.

Many people – some of them diehard Labour supporters – are adamant Starmer has already lost the next general election, probably to Nigel Farage. They remind me of the football fans who destroy their season tickets in despair after a defeat on the opening day of the season. They’re like uptight diners in a Pizza Express, angrily asking the waiter where the hell their dinner is, even though they only ordered it five minutes ago. 

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Starmer never promised miracles – that’s the sort of thing Boris Johnson did. But Johnson was also the bloke who conjured the self-defeating Brexit deal, oversaw the spaffing of billions of pounds during Covid, lied to parliament, tried to destroy our democracy through the proroguing of parliament, and whose own ego and libido rendered him a liability and the country a joke. And he wasn’t even the worst Tory PM of the past few years.

It’s essential to look at Starmer in that context. Sure, he lacks rizz, is short on banter and has presided over some pretty disappointing policy decisions since he took office. But he has taken over amid social unrest, a radically shifting geopolitical climate and new threats to the UK’s security. No one said it would be easy, but it seems to me that he at least has a plan.

The country doesn’t have enough money to meet all of its outgoings. The best way to fix this, Starmer and Rachel Reeves reckon, is to grow the economy. They could borrow, but the national debt is already bigger than ever. He could tax the rich harder, but as we learned in the Liz Truss apocalypse, the market gets jumpy about statement moves like that. I’d rather a pragmatic leader with a sensible plan who delivers gradual and consistent progress than a showman seeking short-term plaudits.

Read more:

• Keir Starmer on being as ‘bold as Attlee’ and why there’ll be no return to austerity under his watch
• No, Keir Starmer, immigration isn’t turning Britain into an ‘island of strangers’. Here’s why
• ‘Starmer needs to be more scared of us than Reform’: Zack Polanski on how the Greens can outflank Farage

Margaret Thatcher, incidentally, was even less popular than Starmer after her first year in office. Like him, she had inherited a dire economic situation. Unemployment got worse, there were inner city riots, and she was considered charmless and cruel. But she had a plan to change things, and by her third year, she crept up in the polls as the benefits of her economic policies were felt by a sufficient number of voters. People started getting back to work. Tax yields began to grow. 

I am not here to suggest her policies were good for the country; we know now how much damage she went on to do. My point is that she played a long game. It helped that she had a large enough majority in the Commons to see her through the difficult early years. Starmer has an even bigger one. 

He can afford to do all the brutal and unpopular stuff now. The fiscal rules he and his chancellor stick to so rigidly are annoying and cause genuine harm. But they are banking on them keeping the ship steady until the economy grows and they can release the purse strings.

Will it work? Search me. I don’t know much about economics. But I once wrote a book about elections, how they are won and lost (it’s called Man Men and Bad Men, in case you’re bothered). We are still in the foothills of this government’s adventure. Yes, things seem shit right now. But they are less shit than they were 18 months ago, and I’d bet they will be a lot less shit 18 months from now. So hold your nerve, remain calm and don’t chuck your season ticket away just yet. 

Read more from Sam Delaney on his Substack.

His new book Stop Sh**ting Yourself: 15 Life Lessons That Might Help You Calm the F*ck Down is out now (Little, Brown, £22) and is available from the Big Issue shop on bookshop.org, which helps to support Big Issue and independent bookshops.

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