All pain no gain

The lad's for turning

Boris Johnson was a cakeist - who believed he could do both the popular thing and the right thing, even when the two opposed.

Liz Truss was a fantasist - who believed she was a genius who could outplay the markets and bankers.

Keir Starmer, it seems, is a masochist - who derives joy from absorbing the maximum amount of political pain, for the minimal amount of national gain.

There is no other explanation for his bizarre habit of absorbing heaps of criticism for an unpopular decision, and then subsequently absorbing a second round of pain for U-turning on that position.

Like postponing the local elections. Announcement → months of criticism → u-turn → criticism for u-turn.

Or Digital ID. Announcement → months of criticism → walkback → criticism for u-turning.

In just a few years of governing, Starmer has done a decent job of building a list of flip-flops, swerves and 180s.

I can only assume he has appointed, as his policy advisor, a 2009 TomTom SatNav - that can only seem to say ‘turn around when possible’.

There is a place in politics for changing course when you have made the wrong choice. Sometimes, the ramifications of a policy do not become clear until it faces the ultimate stress test of an announcement. For example, the government was right to walk back plans to raise business rates on pubs at a time when pubs are struggling to stay afloat.

But other times, a policy is the right one even if it is unpopular. Means testing winter fuel allowances was obviously the right decision. Rich pensioners do not need taxpayer cash to heat their mansions. U-turning on this in the wake of a media frenzy was a terrible move.

But it was also just bizarre. Starmer absorbed the enormous political pain of cutting universal winter fuel allowance: he suffered the weeks of harsh headlines, the deluge of mean tweets, the protests, the combative interviews. He took it all and he let his polling numbers take a nosedive.

And then, just as people were beginning to forget and move on - he reversed course.

The thing about u-turning is it does not change the polls. If you announce a new tax, your popularity dives - but at least tax incomes rise. If you reverse that tax, your popularity stays at the deep end but the tax receipts go back to where they started.

U-turning on decent policies is, quite literally, all pain no gain.

The anti-populist

In July 2024, Britain had come off the back of a string of bad PMs. Boris Johnson and Liz Truss did untold damage to the country, and potentially irreversible damage to the Tory party. Rishi Sunak might’ve turned things around, but he did not have the time or political manoeuvrability to make anything happen.

The country needed a political leader who was unafraid to be unpopular. The UK was in dire straits: sluggish economic growth, flatlining productivity, a crisis of illegal immigration and public services that had perhaps never been worse.

Starmer appeared to be that leader.

Here was a politician who would make an honest assessment about the state of the country and make the difficult choices that moved us onto a better path.

Early in his premiership, in fact, he seemed to be too much like that leader: during one dour-faced press conference in the Downing Street garden he promised things were “going to be painful.”

But then came the u-turns. The sheer number of them speak to a leader who cannot hold his nerve: who winces at the newspaper headlines and gets spooked by whispers from his backbenchers.

Starmer holds the largest Parliamentary majority since Blair, yet he is acting like Theresa May.

But here is the great irony: Labour is working.

The machinery of government is actually clunking into gear. The NHS delivered the most treatments and operations in a single year in its history last year. Crime is falling. The economy is growing.

And the unpopular decisions are working, too. Government income is rising and the deficit is falling.

But Starmer is like an upside-down duck: flapping like mad on the surface, even when things are calm under the water.

Even though things are working, he’ll only speak out to apologise, or to remind us how weak he is. He stuck his head above the parapet to apologise for his ‘island of strangers’ remarks that everyone had forgotten, or to brief to the press that his job was in danger from the threat of Wes Streeting, or to repeatedly and emphatically state his regret for appointing pedo-pal Peter Mandelson.

Why is he never so vocal about the things that he is doing well?

Starmer may be the anti-populist the country needs: but he is perhaps trying too hard to be anti-popular. Things are getting better, albeit slowly. He needs a bit more conviction, a bit more strength - but above all he must, must, must stop the u-turns.

The choices that are right and the choices that are popular do not often go hand-in-hand. But it shows a political naivety to spend capital on the right choice, only to end up taking the wrong one. Starmer is covered in bruises and says ‘you should see the other guy.’ Unfortunately, he is also the other guy.