When Sir Keir Starmer became Labour leader in April 2020, he inherited a party in ruins. Under Jeremy Corbyn, Labour had suffered electoral catastrophe and public shame. On current polling evidence, Labour is likely to return to government within two years, possibly in a landslide victory. Yet while Sir Keir has dispelled much of the obloquy Labour earned in the Corbyn years, he has given little reason for enthusiasm or even trust in a putative Labour government. He should use the opportunity of a shadow cabinet reshuffle to show voters that his party has abandoned the political fringe and will be attuned to their concerns rather than those of leftwing activists.
The polls have turned to Labour’s advantage for mainly negative reasons. The conduct of Boris Johnson in Downing Street prompted a collapse of confidence among his own ministers. The brief tenure of Liz Truss then suggested to voters that the Conservatives were in thrall to dogmatism, with big costs (in the form of a sharp rise in mortgage interest rates) for many households. Rishi Sunak has managed to narrow the polling deficit but the damage to the Tories’ reputation is severe.
It would be unwise for Labour to hope it will form a government by default. Voters will want a clearer idea of whether they can safely switch from other parties. Sir Keir has gone part of the way to reassure them. He has shown determination in draining the toxin of antisemitism from Labour’s ranks. Sir Ephraim Mirvis, the chief rabbi, encouragingly acknowledged last week the “significant strides” that Sir Keir has taken on the issue. Sir Keir has also ensured Labour is unmistakably committed to the Nato alliance, and has given support for Ukraine’s just war of self-defence.
But there is a void. It is inevitable, since Labour has been out of office for 13 years, that the shadow cabinet has few figures with government experience. But even with this allowance, Labour’s team lacks strength in depth and few shadow ministers have made a decisive impact.
Of these, Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, has made effective interventions concerning the Tories’ recent disastrous adoption of unfunded tax cuts. Yet Labour’s own approach to mitigating the combination of high inflation and stagnant growth is mysterious. It appears to rest heavily on economic nationalism. Doubtless the party does not wish to revive controversy over Brexit, which is an accomplished fact, but openness to trade, foreign investment and overseas labour with requisite skills has lasting economic benefits.
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Nor has Labour sufficiently defined itself as a potential party of government rather than of sectional interests. The public have been inconvenienced, and business revenues damaged, by strikes in transport, the postal service, the health service and other sectors. Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, courted controversy within the party by accusing the British Medical Association of “doing the doctors a disservice” with its obduracy, but he was speaking sense. Sir Keir should give prominence to party figures who are prepared to dispense with ideological shibboleths. His own curious targeting of the charitable status of private schools suggests he may be loath to do this.
On issues of culture, Labour ought in principle to have a message in tune with modern mores, committed to expanding liberty and dismantling disadvantage. Yet with few exceptions its MPs appear incapable of even defining the noun “woman” lest they transgress against the orthodoxy of transgender activists. This is not the language of the British public, which generally favours social tolerance and free choice but will not abandon facts of biology out of convenience.
Labour has benefited from the unforced errors of the government. In the coming year Sir Keir should also demonstrate that there are positive reasons for trusting his party as an alternative.
