london —
Keir Starmer has posed a challenge to potential rivals, ignoring calls to step down as UK prime minister and instead challenging his candidacy to mount a formal challenge to his Labor leadership.
A fifth of Labor’s MPs, or 81 MPs, would need to unite around a single candidate to trigger a leadership challenge. If one or more candidates gathers that level of support, they can put their name on the ballot paper to face Mr Starmer in a race where Labor members vote.
Despite nearly 100 MPs publicly urging Starmer, 63, to resign, no candidate has yet formally launched a leadership challenge against him. It is believed that only a handful of names can gather the required 81 signatures.
Let’s see who they are here.
There are currently two camps in the Labor Party. Those who say they want a “quick” change of leadership mean they support Health Secretary Wes Streeting. Those who say they want an “orderly” transition of power mean they support Andy Burnham, the current mayor of Greater Manchester, but more on him later.
Street is a minister tasked with fixing Britain’s battered National Health Service (NHS) and is from the right wing of the Labor Party. Most of his life has been spent in and around politics. First as president of the National Union of Students, then as a local councilor, then as a councilor for an east London borough near the council estate where he grew up.
Mr Street has often expressed his admiration for Tony Blair’s government, which he served as prime minister when he was a student at Cambridge University. Mr Street briefly left the Labor Party because of his support for Prime Minister Tony Blair’s war in Iraq, but is said to have embraced ‘Blairism’ in his mission to overhaul the NHS through support for public-private partnerships and technology reform. Mr Street has previously warned that the NHS needs to “modernise or disappear”.
Mr Street, just 43 years old, has long been seen as the future of Labour’s moderate wing and has been praised as one of the government’s most effective communicators. But his friendship with veteran Labor politician Peter Mandelson, who was sacked as British ambassador to Washington over his relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, has been tarnished. Given that scandal has dogged Starmer, Street may also be tainted by it.
andy burnham
Mr Burnham’s supporters hope things will move slowly because, as Mayor of Manchester, Mr Burnham is not yet an MP and therefore cannot yet become Labor’s next leader.
That hurdle may be insurmountable. Mr Burnham, 56, had hoped to stand as an MP in the Greater Manchester constituency earlier this year but was blocked by Labour’s national executive committee, a decision seen by many as an attempt to prevent Mr Starmer’s toughest rival from challenging him as leader.
Most polls show that Mr Burnham is Britain’s most popular politician. Starmer is often accused of lacking political vision, but Burnham defends “Manchesterism”. This is a business-friendly brand of “ambitious socialism” that seeks to bring essential services back into public control and make life “viable” for ordinary Britons.
Mr Burnham, also educated at Cambridge, pointed to the success of his policies in Manchester, Britain’s fastest growing urban economy and where he has been elected mayor for three consecutive terms, and asked why he could not take his bold vision to other parts of the country.
However, at Westminster Burnham did not have much success. He has been an MP for more than 15 years, but his previous two attempts to become leader of the Labor Party have been disappointing. Mr Burnham was also hurt when he told the New Statesman last year that the UK “must break free of its current dependence on the bond market” and suggested the government should pursue more radical economic policies. The mayor’s mere statement sent British bond yields soaring.
Starmer is often criticized for being a straight-laced lawyer. The same cannot be said of former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Reiner. His earthy, outgoing demeanor appeals to many young Labor voters and old-school socialists.
Rayner, 46, grew up poor in the suburbs of Manchester and became a mother at 16. She said there were no books in her childhood home because her mother, who suffered from bipolar disorder, was illiterate. Rayner, who had trained as an elderly carer and worked as a trade union representative, said she was persuaded to become a politician.
As Starmer’s deputy and housing secretary, Rayner was responsible for many of the Labor government’s proudest policies. She enacted housing reform, raised the minimum wage, introduced reforms to support renters and passed legislation to crack down on “exploitative” zero-hour employment contracts, set to go into effect next year.
Rayner resigned as an MP last year following a scandal in which he underpaid property tax on a holiday home on England’s south coast. Ms Rayner claimed her mistake was unintentional and based on bad legal advice, but her unresolved tax issues could undermine attempts to oust Mr Starmer as party leader.
In a letter to Starmer on Sunday, Rayner stopped short of calling for his resignation, but warned: “What we are doing is not working and needs to change. This may be our last chance.”
Interior Minister Shabana Mahmood, 45, is seen as a rising star within the party. Some hope that her task of cracking down on illegal immigration will help her appeal to voters on the party’s right.
Ed Miliband, the energy secretary and former Labor leader, is also seen as a potential candidate. A poll of Labor members – mainly climate-sensitive teachers, public sector workers and trade unionists – said Mr Miliband was the most popular candidate to replace Mr Starmer.
