The government’s disastrous coronavirus strategy has cost 40,000 lives. Keir Starmer, it’s time to stop playing Captain Sensible

Last week Keir Starmer said he was putting the prime minister “on notice” and told him to “get a grip”. Well, good.

If the Labour leader’s patience with Boris Johnson has worn thin, who could blame him? As the UK’s coronavirus death rate horrifyingly tips over 40,0000 – among the worst in the world – so too does the scale of government mismanagement. And as other European nations slowly ease out of lockdown, we are trapped by a botched test and trace strategy, leaving us unprepared to squash any virus outbreaks that may follow a further loosening of restrictions.

One figure this week put the problem in perspective: in one day the UK recorded more Covid-19 deaths than the whole of the European Union put together.

The Labour leader has pledged to work with government to tackle the pandemic. Starmer’s all-round reasonableness on this matter has been so resounding that he is mildly ribbed as Captain Sensible. In an interview with the Yorkshire Post newspaper yesterday, the opposition leader shook off such comments. Responding to a jibe from the PM about his “brilliant forensic mind”, Starmer said if that’s the worst he gets, he can live with it.

If this were simply a matter of presentational style, we could put it down to personal preference. But the trouble is that, as a strategy, constructively nudging the government to get a grip is not going to cut it in a crisis of this magnitude.

For one thing, it relies on the assumption of a premiership competent enough to respond coherently – and, as even the former Tory MP-turned columnist Matthew Parris has noted, this is not the case. Johnson is no more likely to transform into a capable leader than Starmer is likely to find himself stuck on a zip wire waving a union flag in each hand in a botched publicity stunt. This virus will be with us for a while – and so will this government. Yes, Starmer’s questioning exposes the PM’s shortcomings. But to get the country to a better place in tackling the pandemic, this flailing government will need to be dragged into it.

From the outside, it looks as though Labour, trying to course-correct after a terrible electoral defeat under Jeremy Corbyn, is now over-steering. Perhaps the reasoning is that, if a major turn-off for voters was Corbyn lacking electable respectability, the current leader must epitomise this quality. But Corbyn, his actual flaws notwithstanding, was pilloried in part because he stepped outside narrowly-defined parameters of political acceptability on both domestic and international policy, for which he was slammed by the press and deemed traitorous and unpatriotic in aggressive social media campaigns.

This vicious, populist-right framing will keep biting Labour, whomever is its leader, unless it is confronted and defanged. As Starmer hinted, “forensic” is not the worst it will get. Not even for him.

Trying to tiptoe around this fate by focusing on appearing constructive brings an additional peril: it binds Labour into parameters dictated by the government, leaving little room for manoeuvre.

This is exactly how the party already boxed itself in over the prime minister’s lockdown exit strategy. Labour set conditions to unlocking, which were not met by the government, but did not then follow through and urge a pause on exit measures. With public opinion, teachers, the British Medical Association, the science community and some of the government’s own science advisors on the side of holding back, there was momentum to try and force a shift in government policy.

Similarly, the shambles of Britain’s test and trace system cannot be rectified with minor tweaks. Contact tracers recruited to systems awarded to private contractors Serco and Sitel described the situation as “shambolic” and unfit for purpose. As we learned that test and trace will not be fully operational before September, a leaked letter from Serco’s chief executive revealed the organisation’s intention to “cement the position of the private sector” in the NHS supply chain through the process.

Anthony Costello, professor of global health and sustainable development at University College London, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme last week: “It doesn’t make sense to me that we’re bypassing what is a world-beating system, actually, our primary care system in the UK.” Putting test and trace within local authorities and health care, he added, would be more cost-effective and trusted, since we know and use these services.

Labour is asking for transparency on the government’s outsourcing process. Fair enough, but hardly far enough when outsourcing should be scrapped entirely.

In a spirit of national unity during a crisis, the opposition initially said it would not push alternatives to the government’s coronavirus plans. But now we know more; that these plans are failing, and public health is at stake.

Nobody can say that Labour has not been patient in its attempts to work with government over coronavirus. The most constructive thing to do now is build momentum for a different approach.