GOVERNMENTS are never officially “relaunched” because the term is a tacit admission that something has misfired or gone badly wrong.
Nevertheless, relaunches do happen. The last one in British politics was Rishi Sunak’s bizarre and fruitless attempt to present himself as a change agent, challenging the “30-year consensus” at the Tory Party conference in 2023.
But seldom, if ever, has a government had to relaunch itself just five months after its election. The speech by Keir Starmer in a tent in Buckinghamshire is, therefore, a measure of how far his administration has fallen and how fast.
Yet a host of evidence points to Labour’s failure. Starting from an anaemic election result of less than 34 per cent, it is now polling in the mid-twenties.
And the Prime Minister’s personal figures have slumped from a plus 20 positive rating to minus 30 or thereabouts.
It is a political fiasco for the ages and one that only the Tories and Reform UK, both under hard-right leadership, look set to benefit from.
Starmer’s response is encapsulated in the six milestones unveiled today.
These six milestones follow the five missions and the six commitments launched before the general election, which, of course, succeeded the 10 pledges in Starmer’s number-salad of forgettable, or reneged on, policy promises.
This is leadership in the style of a corporate management seminar as if announcing a plan were equivalent to achieving anything. And the increasing velocity with which each initiative follows its unfulfilled predecessor indicates that we are now at the point at which football fans would strike up the familiar chant of “you don’t know what you’re doing.”
As ever, what is revealing about the latest listing of priorities is as much what is missing as what Starmer included. It would seem that green energy targets are being watered down, the latest in a long line of salami-slicing of Labour’s commitments on climate change.
Starmer’s pledges on growth — the mainspring of his economic strategy — are also moving towards the back-burner since it is clear that his plan to make Britain the fastest-growing economy among the G7 big capitalist powers looks unattainable.
That is hardly surprising since the government has relied almost solely on planning reform to stimulate growth, an entirely inadequate remedy.
Instead, the focus is now on improving living standards, which were broadly stagnant throughout the period of the last Tory government. But as to how that worthy aspiration is to be attained, we are none the wiser.
Some of the remaining milestones are hardly new — housing and NHS waiting list targets which have been previously announced. What is missing is any sense as to how these are to be met, given Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s tight grip on the purse strings and refusal to countenance further tax increases.
It is, therefore, impossible to see this new set of policy priorities as likely to turn around the government’s fortunes. Not only does the old saw that you get just one chance to make a first impression hold good — or bad, in Starmer’s case — he also remains incapable of grasping the scale of the change that is required to grapple with Britain’s problems.
Given that his entire leadership of Labour has been about ditching any trace of radicalism or anything that might upset the powerful, we cannot be surprised. The change Labour needs starts at the very top, and that is something MPs and unions alike should be turning their minds to.
Of course, it would be abnormal to ditch a leader just a few months after the general election victory, but, as the relaunch shows, these are not normal times.
