Labour MPs these days are experiencing whiplash. When in opposition, the party attacked the Tories’ proposed benefits cuts for ‘effectively turning on the poorest in our society’. Now, Keir Starmer plans to drive through £6 billion in welfare cuts of his own. Labour ministers previously spent much of their time scolding the government for showing insufficient respect towards civil servants. Now, Pat McFadden, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, has launched a crackdown on poor performers. Since the start of Starmer’s premiership, ministers have announced 27 new quangos – yet this week the Prime Minister scrapped one in a signal of intent, telling his cabinet they cannot do what the Tories did and hide behind regulators to avoid hard decisions. As one downbeat Tory peer puts it: ‘They’re doing all the things we should have done.’
Yet Downing Street aides insist that their cuts are not a Tory tribute act. They argue that in an uncertain world where security demands are changing and Europe is having to spend more on defence, tough choices are needed. Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump aside, the truth is that with negligible economic growth and no public appetite for more tax rises, cuts are the only option Starmer and his Chancellor have left.
How will an army of Starmtroopers elected on a promise to boost public services take to the new orders? On Monday, Starmer appeared at a meeting of the parliamentary Labour party to make his case. The initial signs were encouraging. MPs cheered when he spoke of Ukraine. ‘My Tory constituents have said they’ll even vote for us next time if he stops the war,’ says one newbie. The Prime Minister then moved on to the tricky choices ahead. On welfare, he said Britain was in a ‘worst of all worlds situation’ as the wrong incentives discourage ‘people from working’. Without a change of course, he said, taxpayers will be funding £70 billion a year in incapacity benefits by 2030.
The meeting was largely positive, but there were a few difficult questions on welfare. Aides are gearing up for a fight with MPs over a proposed £5 billion cut to the personal independence payment. Worse could come in the autumn. Starmer has told colleagues he is not for turning.
With every week that passes, a new Labour caucus or WhatsApp group forms. These range from Blue Labour and the pro-growth group to ‘Mainstream MPs’ and ‘Make Work Pay’. Some of them are more helpful to the government than others. ‘Very few of us are out to get Keir,’ insists one MP. ‘But a lot of us are out to keep our seats.’
When Labour’s 2024 intake were selected as candidates for the Commons, they were sent on training courses to learn how to be good parliamentarians. But a few months into this parliament, these newbie MPs are starting to think for themselves. The signs were first seen over the assisted dying bill. Since it was a free vote – in the form of a private member’s bill – new MPs had to consider their position. Starmer’s support for the bill was well known, and there has been growing criticism inside his party that last-minute changes have been rushed through with little scrutiny. ‘I think they expected more MPs to go along with it,’ says one newcomer.
For now, Starmer is only facing one openly hostile gang in the parliamentary party: the Socialist Campaign Group. It has a total of 24 MPs and is largely composed of old Corbyn loyalists. That group won’t lose Starmer much sleep: ‘It’s actually a badge of pride to have them oppose us,’ says a government aide. The group’s members complain that Starmer’s all-powerful chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, is more interested in crushing the left than the right.
Some of the groups are hostile to specific measures: the Labour rural growth group has around 40 MPs and is seen as a ‘union within Labour for rural MPs’. Several of its members have accused the Chancellor of being dismissive of their calls to abandon the family farm tax.
‘I can’t wait for [Richard Hermer] to be fired,’ says one MP. ‘Ideally six weeks before the local elections’
Other groups argue for a general change in direction – such as the Blue Labour group – led by former Corbyn ally (and Socialist Campaign Group member) Dan Carden, the MP for Liverpool Walton. This group has some crossover with the ‘Red Wall caucus’ – led by Jo White, MP for Bassetlaw – which comprises 40 or so MPs who won their seats back from the Tories last year.
The latter group is seen as more friendly towards Downing Street and therefore more controllable, given its links to Labour Together, the No. 10 thinktank of choice. Both groups, however, see Reform as a threat and share a desire for Labour to seem less like a party of the metropolitan elite. The attorney-general Richard Hermer has become their bogeyman. ‘I can’t wait for him to be fired,’ says one MP. ‘Ideally six weeks before the local elections – then I can have a celebratory event with my voters.’
Rachael Maskell, the left-wing MP for York Central, has emerged as one of the backbenchers who is most critical about the plans for welfare. She was one of the first to slam Starmer for cutting the winter fuel allowance, and has been quick to publicly voice alarm over the upcoming cuts. In response, the ‘Make Work Pay’ group has been formed to offer a counter view, and it has the support of Maskell’s neighbouring MP Luke Charters. This group is meant to represent MPs who see getting people back to work as a moral duty – though some insiders think it was set up to help the Treasury.
The view in No. 10 is that the government can survive a few left-wing tears. Anneliese Dodds’s resignation as international development secretary over the decision to slash aid was considered helpful by some in government, since it hinted at Starmer’s ruthlessness. Others fear the PM’s allies appear a little too gleeful about the party adopting positions far from its founding principles.
All eyes are on Ed Miliband. Some MPs are asking whether he could become a figurehead for the soft left. For now, the government’s focus is on welfare, the civil service and the NHS, but few think the Energy Secretary’s clean-power mission will survive unscathed. ‘With everything there is a tipping point,’ warns a more left-wing member. ‘There will be a rebellion at some point.’
Still, Starmer and McSweeney believe that if there is such a rebellion in the future, they will be able to face it down and come out stronger. They can’t afford not to.
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