Starmer’s 10-year plan needs a reset

Most voters thought that Keir Starmer was only being realistic when he said that the “work of national renewal” would take more than one parliament. Rather than the hubris of Boris Johnson, who speculated about being prime minister for 10 years, this seemed to be merely acknowledging the scale of the damage to the public finances, public services and the government’s integrity.

But Starmer’s ambition is in danger of going the same way as Johnson’s.

The opinion polls confirm that the voters think the government has got off to a bad start. One in seven “regrets” voting Labour, and three in five expect Labour to lose the next election.

Of course, it is absurd to be making predictions about politics in four or five years’ time, but these findings are a clue to the anger among people who voted Labour in the hope that they would be different.

Privately, all the Labour people I have spoken to at the annual conference in Liverpool recognise that free tickets, clothes and holidays are a problem, but they tend to argue that they are not the most important thing, and that what will matter at the next election is the cost of living and the state of public services.

I don’t think they realise quite how damaging the stories are. Certainly, the lines taken by cabinet ministers on the media, from Starmer down, succeed only in making matters worse. Angela Rayner, the deputy prime minister, just about managed to get to the right starting point in her Sunday interview with Laura Kuenssberg of the BBC, saying: “I get that people are angry and I get that people are upset.” But that was after starting her defence with, “all MPs do it”, and it was followed by more acres of self-justification.

At no point has any minister apologised or admitted that they had made an error of judgement. The closest we have come to that is Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, in interviews before her big speech on Monday, saying that she won’t be accepting donations of clothes any more.

This self-denying ordinance, originally briefed by an anonymous “government source” over the weekend, is an implicit admission that it was wrong to have accepted the donations in the first place. Although in her interviews Reeves tried to avoid even this implication, drawing a distinction between the requirements of campaigning in opposition and the responsibilities of government. Do opposition politicians need to dress more smartly than government ministers? Or is it simply that ministers are paid more and can afford to dress themselves?

The only defence that comes close to working is that of security. It makes sense that Starmer shouldn’t watch football from the stands. No wonder he devoted the entirety of a TV clip in defence of freebies to the argument that he was saving the taxpayer money on police protection by going in the directors’ box.

But he didn’t try to defend Waheed Alli paying for his suits and glasses, or for the Taylor Swift tickets. When Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, was asked about her Taylor Swift tickets, donated by the Football Association, we could see why Starmer stayed off the subject. Phillipson said: “It was a hard one to turn down... one of my children was keen to go.”

These are not the right lines to take. The damage that has been done is deep and irreversible. People voted Labour because Starmer assured us that they were different. Yet for every new revelation of Labour politicians on the take, there is a tweet from the same Labour politician only a few months ago attacking the Tories for exactly the same thing.

The latest example is Rayner’s photographer in her department of housing, communities and local government. Personally, I am almost persuaded by the argument that a photographer is no different from either a press officer or an archivist, both of whom are employed on the public purse. But that is not what Labour said in opposition. And it is not what Rayner herself said on Twitter, when she attacked Boris Johnson for employing a “vanity” photographer.

The damage is done. It could have been mitigated somewhat if Starmer, Reeves, Rayner and Phillipson had said: “Sorry, we made a mistake and we will pay it back.” Instead, they have compounded their error by saying “we followed the rules”, we have been “overly transparent” and “all MPs do it”.

Of course, it is too early to be thinking about the next election, but if Starmer in his big speech tries to suggest that he needs to be in power for two parliaments to fix everything that is wrong with the country, the average viewer watching at home is likely to be offended. Especially if they are a pensioner with just enough savings in the bank to ensure that their winter fuel payment is taken away.