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UKUnloved Starmer quits as UK PM after just two years
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By Elizabeth Piper June 22, 20264:50 AM EDTUpdated 36 mins ago
Summary
Labour falls out of love with Starmer's pragmatism
Starmer faltered on policy, lacked a big idea
Increasingly turned to his wife for advice
Burnham seen as a 'Reform slayer'
LONDON, June 22 (Reuters) - Keir Starmer was once hailed as the leader who would bring pragmatism and stability to Britain after years of political chaos. When he quit as prime minister on Monday, the very lack of ideology that propelled him to power drove his downfall.
After guiding the Labour Party into power in 2024 with the biggest parliamentary majority in Britain's modern history, Starmer focused on what he believed was possible to achieve, rather than setting out a clear vision of a future Britain.
He soon came to be seen by many voters and members of his party as lacking conviction and a clear direction, more than 20 party insiders said. He had no big idea.
Without what one senior Labour lawmaker called "a guiding light", the former lawyer was buffeted by competing Labour factions, lobbied by vested interests and misunderstood by wary voters, many of whom came to hate what they saw as his indecision and his robotic performances.
TURNED TO HIS WIFE FOR COUNSEL
His policies often unravelled, resignations and sackings from his team followed, and the remaining trusted aides around him struggled to help him offer the country a clear narrative of what his government wanted to do to "change Britain".
Starmer, 63, increasingly turned to his wife Victoria for reliable advice. On May 12, five days after disastrous local election results for Labour prompted calls for him to quit, he had a long lunch with her and emerged determined to fight on.
But it was a weekend away at the prime minister's country residence in Chequers with his wife that appeared to have persuaded him to change course, bend to the inevitable and resign.
On the doorstep of his Downing Street office and residence, he said he would do everything to allow an orderly transfer of power to the next Labour leader, expected to be his rival Andy Burnham, the former Greater Manchester mayor.
"The question my party is asking now is whether I am best placed to lead us into the next general election," he said in an emotional speech when his voice broke when he thanked his family foir their support.
"I have heard the answer from my parliamentary party to that question and I accept that answer with good grace."
By the end, deeply unpopular among voters for broken promises and policy U-turns, Starmer saw support drain away from him. Even some of his most loyal allies in his top cabinet team of ministers privately urged him to allow an orderly transition of power rather than a damaging leadership contest.
His pledges to fight to save his premiership quickly evaporated after most in the party decided they could not enter a national election due in 2029 with him at the helm.
After decisively winning an election for a parliamentary seat in northwestern England, Burnham was now seen as the "Reform slayer", the politician who had a chance of keeping the populist party of veteran Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage at bay.
FEAR OF FARAGE DROVE CAMPAIGN TO OUST STARMER
"I would do anything to stop Farage," said lawmaker Catherine West, who broke cover over the May 9-10 weekend to try to force others to mount a challenge against the prime minister.
It was never meant to be this way.
After becoming a Labour lawmaker in 2015 at the age of 52, Starmer was elected leader just five years later inheriting the party after its worst election showing since 1935 under his predecessor, veteran left-winger Jeremy Corbyn, beset by accusations of antisemitism and a fudged Brexit policy.
He used his experience of running the Crown Prosecution Service, an independent body which advises police and prosecutes criminal cases in court, to try to modernise the Labour Party, and ultimately make it more electable.
As when he was Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) - essentially Britain's top prosecutor, he attacked the problem strategically - first getting rid of alleged antisemitism and tackling factionalism; putting the organisation back on its feet financially; bringing the best Labour lawmakers into his top team; and finally adopting policies to address Britain's needs.
"Everything we offer will be built on a bedrock of economic stability and a plan for growth," his spokesperson said at the time.
Initially it worked. His newly re-fashioned Labour won a large majority in Britain's 650-seat parliament, but analysts were quick to point out that the party's victory was fragile - Labour actually secured one of its lowest vote shares ever and the win was highly dependent on tactical voting.
After 14 years of infighting, Brexit battles and five prime ministers in eight years, the Conservatives had all but blown themselves up as a party.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaks as he announces the timeline for his resignation, outside 10 Downing Street, in London, Britain, June 22, 2026. REUTERS/Jaimi Joy
John Curtice, Britain's best known pollster, said: "All in all this looks more like an election the Conservatives lost than one Labour won."
FRUSTRATION SET IN OVER ACHIEVEMENTS
Starting from a fragile base was not helped by the Starmer government's cautious approach to policy during campaigning and an already growing narrative that all of Britain's many problems from housing to anaemic economic growth would take time to fix.
Once in power, Starmer's government struggled first to define its policy agenda and then to implement it - focusing on growth that never really came, on reducing illegal migrant arrivals that kept on coming and on fixing a health system that kept on throwing up more challenges.
One person in his top team in opposition said Labour was just not prepared for government, describing a time when they had tried to formulate policy but were told to "stop" so as not to "frighten people in advance of the general election".
"We don't have a plan for what we're going to do when we get in, if we do get in, because it might jinx it," the person remembered.
As the months went by, Starmer tried to talk up his government's achievements - improving working conditions, reducing health service waiting lists and overseeing an economic environment in which interest rates could be cut.
But despite several resets to his approach, the British leader failed to engage a wary public, with a former aide saying Starmer failed to offer "a destination" from which voters could understand or make sense of his decisions.
Instead voters could not see beyond gaffes over donations, policy U-turns and the appointment of Labour veteran Peter Mandelson despite his known connections to the late convicted U.S. sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Starmer's defence that he was not told about the extent of Mandelson's ties to Epstein made many feel he was out of touch at best, and, at worst, not in control of his administration.
"It was a bad appointment," said one former aide, suggesting it had been driven through by only two other former advisers.
BLAME GAME TAINTED THE END OF STARMER ADMINISTRATION
The frustration inside his Downing Street office became more palpable.
Some aides blamed what they called a hostile right-wing media, but after one reset followed another, Starmer ultimately failed to display, as described by one adviser, "his passion for these domestic causes".
He lost some of his closest advisers, including his former chief of staff Morgan McSweeney, over the Mandelson scandal, and after sacking the top official at the foreign office, his relationship with Britain's civil service soured.
Starmer did better on the international front.
On Russia's war against Ukraine, he was praised by some other European leaders for helping to spearhead the 'coalition of the willing' of nations willing to help in the event of a peace deal, and alongside French President Emmanuel Macron, spearheaded talks on reopening the Strait of Hormuz.
The British leader also had some success in winning round U.S. President Donald Trump, often by massaging his ego - offering him a second state visit to Britain and praising his efforts to bring peace in Ukraine and an end to other conflicts.
That soon was replaced by a torrent of jibes against him from the U.S. leader, who said he was no Winston Churchill after Starmer refused to draw Britain into the war on Iran. On Sunday, Trump posted on Truth Social: "Keir Starmer will resign as Prime Minister of The United Kingdom. "He failed badly on two very important subjects- IMMIGRATION AND ENERGY (OPEN NORTH SEA OIL!). I wish him well!"
Perhaps his lasting legacy will be the fracturing of Britain's traditional two-party system.
The local elections in England, and parliamentary ones in Scotland and Wales showed Britain's traditional two-party system had been blown apart with Reform gaining a strong foothold across the nation.
While Labour membership numbers fell, Reform's rose, with more than 270,000 people signed up. It was that threat, Starmer had hoped would seal support for him, telling his Labour Party in February the battle with Reform was the "fight of our lives".
He'll get a £500k per year gig at an anti-racist government think tank. 5 star dinners, reimbursed travel, free holidays in Israel and only 4 hours of work per year. It's not bad work if can find it.
Amazing how this article still manages to fellate a man whose personal convictions were utter poison to the electorate.
When you punish people angry at migrants raping and murdering children more harshly than the rapists and murderers, you’re not going to win people over.
When you’re hand-picked by the Fabian Society (the secret hand of socialism in the UK) and you need to fix the economy, you’re bound to fail.
When all signs point to the people wanting punishment and expulsion of foreign criminals resident in your nation, but your political dogma says ‘diversity is our strength’, you need to choose between jumping and being pushed.
Good riddance to this piece of trash. He can go back to saving child murderers from the noose in the Caribbean.
Andy Burnham’s record on LGBTQ+ issues as he’s expected to go for Labour leadership
Andy Burnham is expected to run for the Labour party leadership after his return to Westminster and his victory in the Makerfield by-election, and Keir Starmer’s resignation.
On 22 June, Starmer announced he would be resigning as leader of the Labour party but would remain as prime minister until a replacement is found this summer. Nominations for his replacement will open in the coming weeks.
Among the names expected to go for the job – and tipped to get the role – is Andy Burnham, who was the Mayor of Greater Manchester from 2017 until earlier this month. He has previously held a number of other positions, including as Secretary of State for Health under Gordon Brown, between 2009 and 2010.
Despite being Catholic, Burnham has a strong history of being a vocal ally to the LGBTQ+ community – something he previously told PinkNews damaged relationships with members of his own family.
In fact, during the 2015 leadership contest, Burnham urged Pope Francis to support same-sex marriage and bring the Catholic Church “into the 21st century.
But before then, before he even entered politics, he joined a march against Section 28 in 1988, when he was a student.
Later, from 2003, he voted almost completely in favour of a number LGBTQ+ policies, including to repeal Section 28, the Civil Partnership Act in 2004, outlawing discrimination based on sexual orientation when providing goods or services in 2007, giving IVF rights to lesbian couples in 2008, and for same-sex marriage in 2013.
He also supported a review into rules regarding blood donation from gay men in 2015, saying “sexuality really shouldn’t be the issue”. Instead, he said the issue should be anyone “living a lifestyle that is risky”, regardless of someone’s sexuality.
During his time as the Mayor of Greater Manchester, in 2018 he appointed Carl Austin-Behan, who had been let go from the RAF for being gay, as the city’s LGBTQ+ adviser. The same year he launched the LGBTQ+ Equality Panel for Greater Manchester, to help issues faced by the city’s queer residents.
In 2019 he supported the reform of the Gender Recognition Act, as well as the simplifying of the process trans people went through for legal recognition.
Burnham has been a vocal ally of trans people too, defending the rights of trans women to use women’s toilets in 2022 despite backlash from gender-critical campaigners.
However, he has also drawn some criticism. In 2020, he met with the LGB Alliance to discuss reforms to the Gender Recognition Act. The group is regularly criticised by other members of the LGBTQ+ community for their views on trans rights. But a statement released said Burnham had “made his support for the trans community very clear over the years”.
This year, after the 2025 Supreme Court ruling which defined sex as “biological sex” only, Burnham said the EHRC guidance should be introduced “in the fairest and most compassionate way possible”.
He went on to say that single-sex spaces should be protected, but without “marginalising already marginalised communities”.
When you punish people angry at migrants raping and murdering children more harshly than the rapists and murderers, you’re not going to win people over.
Great, maybe the UK get can get a hideous British Hitler and at least save their society, if not their economy. Hopefully Restore Britain gets more seats.
The whole point of restore britain is to so divide the anti-labour vote as to keep the labour party in power forever. Rather than fix anything in Britain or do anything,, most of britain wants to do (as always) nothing whatsoever. The country isn't interested in fixing anything. Its only interested in complaining and launching the next purity spiral leading nowhere.
The votes are all there to accomplish change in the country just as they were at the last general election. But there is no leadership to be found anywhere in the country including ironically the labour party. The country needs someone who actually lead rather than complain. Yet there is not a single leader to be found anywhere.
Probably. Now Keir's out, Andy's going to immediately be facing accusations of acting without a mandate.
He's going to run into the same issue Starmer did, which is that he doesn't have a strong enough relationship with the Labour backbenchers. He cannot meaningfully increase taxes due to the "red lines" in the manifesto, and the bond markets are opposed to additional borrowing. He's also got a very poor track record in relation to the grooming gangs scandal - you can get a sample of some of the lines that'll be getting used from Reform's website.
He's basically Keir Starmer 2.0 and once the shine wears off he'll probably be in a weaker position. Which means a lot of flailing.
