Keir Starmer promised transformation—and delivered disappointment. I argue that Starmer is not just failing, but failing in a way that makes him worse than his Tory predecessors.
This is the transcript:
I made a comment in a video recently in which I suggested that Keir Starmer is the worst Prime Minister that we've had for a long time, and certainly worse than all the Tory Prime Ministers who had preceded him over the previous fourteen years.
And this created a lot of reaction. People said, "What? He's worse than Boris Johnson? He's worse than Liz Truss? How can you say that?"
And my answer is very simple, and I'm going to stick to my guns on this one.
Keir Starmer came into office saying he was going to deliver good things for the people of this country.
He came in as a Labour prime minister, promising he would improve the lives of the vulnerable, and he hasn't.
Boris Johnson and Liz Truss never promised the earth to anyone. They basically said they were going to make the rich richer, or they were going to deliver Brexit, and they didn't care about the consequences. We knew they were going to be rubbish.
But Kier Starmer said he was going to be great, and he isn't. And that's why I think he's a worse prime minister than those two, and the other Tories as well, because he promised the Earth by saying he would deliver and it's very clear he had no idea how to do so, he had no intention of doing so, and now that he's in office, he's going to do nothing about finding out how to do so.
He really is worse, as a consequence, than even Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, because they knew they were rubbish; we knew they were rubbish, and we weren't surprised that they were rubbish.
But Keir Starmer has let everyone down badly.
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Spot on. No steer is utterly useless.
And as for the rest of this government ,what is correct collective noun for a bunch of useless, self serving tossers?
Ah the Labour Party.
A starmer of disappointments is fine..
Ah ha! A new collective noun – a Starmer of disappointments. How about a Starmer of a betrayal?
🙂
John Fairhall : don’t throw the baby out with the bath water! Not all of the Labour Party are “toddlers” as you describe them. The leadership is a big disappointment if you were optimistic after the election win last July. I wasn’t because ai saw the kind of people Starmer put in his cabinet at Morgan McSweeney’s malign direction: the horrible benefits slasher Liz Kendall at the head, with the belligerent offence secretary John Healey and the nasty enforcer Pat McFadden. But there are plenty of back bench Labour MPs in whom we should have hope, like Richard Burgon
Not toddlers but tossers. An over zealous auto-correct!
I like Richard Burgon, Ive attended meetings where he spoke, I follow him and others in parliament.
But there is literally NO WAY he or any other “left” Labour MP could ever become leader, the way Corbyn did. That door is slammed shut, locked, bolted, welded shut then bricked up and plastered over and painted blue. (See rule changes on leadership nominations, candidates now need 20% of MPs to even start a challenge (that’s 20% of 403, which is 80.6).
They also need that number of MPs for nomination to join the race.
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn03938/
And that’s if they can survive the selection process for their own constituency candidacy at the next GE. (See story of Jamie Driscoll).
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamie_Driscoll
A carefully timed complaint based on an old tweet or a careless handshake witnessed on a protest march and Burgon will be suspended at the time nominations are due from CLPs for the 2024 GE, replaced by a loyalist, then cleared AFTER the election.
(I’ve seen it happen, and been on such an overruled selection committee)..
If you disagree with me please redo the maths and show me their route to replace Starmer. Find those 80 nominations for any left wing or progressive Labour MP. I wish it was possible but it isn’t.
Watch what happens after the next Labour “rebellion” on welfare or war or Israel, more suspensions, or if not, then info stored away for a discipline process just before 2024 GE.
I totally agree with you about Starmer but I would extend that condemnation to much of the HoC at the moment.
The only thing ‘common’ about it is the huge wages it consumes and the rank stupidity on display.
I’m listening to a load of – what? – supposed legislators – blubbing themselves through the Assisted Not Sure What it is About Bill, whilst they should be shedding real tears for the children being starved and shot at with adults in Gaza, Tehran, Yemen and the Sudan.
On top of that, you have MPs who have voted for austerity measures prattling on about pain whilst people here in England cannot find an NHS dentist, resorting to spending savings to get around NHS queues and being let home early without post treatment assessments and suitable pain management.
Here they are debating how to deal with the dying and the lot of them can’t even look after the blessed living, damn them!!!!! Worried? We should all be.
Much to agree with
“I would extend that condemnation to much of the HoC at the moment” &…………….most of the gov & the civil service. All of em – unfit for purpose.
This came to my attention: https://www.wigantoday.net/business/wigan-fibre-glass-factory-to-close-despite-tireless-efforts-to-save-it-5182789
250 jobs lost in Wigan – the factory makes glass fibre for wind turbine blades and struggled with a combo of stupid energy prices (elec) and a Japanese owner that was at the very least two faced in what was promised and what was delivered (which sounds somewhat familiar).
Cue arm waving by the usual suspects. I took a look @ the site (very post industrial) – why doesn’t the industrial estate as a minimum have a load of PV on the roofs FFS (elec @ circa 8pence/kWh). Much of it is old indusrial sites gone greenish (whatever you do don’t look under the green veggie)
It is piss poor and redolent of the usual British incompetance @ the government and civil service level… no idea how to develop practical approaches to real problems.
The opportunity cost of wasting this mandate will be as great as the Obama fumble that has set the stage for the current calamity in the US.
I am sorry but when I read his phiscal rules I expected this disaster in fact by first thought was how soon will the pitch forks be on the streets.
I started to make a quick list of their (his) bad decisions – in no particular order:
Flawed understanding of how the economy works – trying to attract foreign private equity rent seeking ‘investors’ like Blacrock to run the economy
Two child benefit cap retained
Sizewell nuclear £14bn
SMR nuclear Rolls Royce £4bn
12 new AUKUS nuclear submarines £15bn
nuclear warheads breaking non proliferation treaties £15bn
4 new dreadnought submarines £40bn
Ruling out public ownership of water
Ruling out public ownership of energy
New British Energy – only a private equity funding exercise
Not limiting interest payments on BoE money created in pandemic
Green new deal investmetn cut
Continued drip drip NHS privatisation
Handing over public and personal health data to CIA linked Palantir
Supply arms and spy flights to increase starvation and masscres in Gaza
Taxing jobs thru NI rather than the wealthy whose income /wealth has rocketed
Continuing the corrupt HS2 contract at a further cost of £60bn by 2035
Continuing freeports and SEZ’s tax free corrption zones across the country
Not setting up commission to outlaw corrupt money payments to politicall parties and politicians
Pandering to ultra right in Enoch Powell ‘Island of Strangers’ speech
Thanks
I can’t see the Winter Fuel chaos on that list. Ridiculous decision then a U turn that creates more issues
No disagreement on Starmer’s lack of qualities (and I don’t think he actually promised much after his fake continuity Corbyn act).
But many of us saw this coming a mile off and some of us were expelled from Labour in his witch hunt against the left.
The one possible benefit of Starmer and co being so bad is they will implode so badly we could see the Labour right losing a lot of power – the question is will there be a new left party or can Labour be rescued.
I warned it would happen, but never thought it would be as bad as it is.
Only the lanour back benchers can save this absolute mess but will they?
I think he is a great success for Israel and probably the USA. The appointment of a Zionist as head of MI6, development of anti-dissent policy….it’s all one way. The government is rubbish for the ordinary citizen, but that isn’t who they, the Tories and Reform are serving anyway.
The persecution of anyone who speaks out on behalf of Palestine is chilling.
https://novaramedia.com/2025/06/12/palestine-activists-convicted-of-harassment-after-questioning-mp/
Noted
Agreed – but it’s a mystery to me why everyone is so surprised. Any Labour party member even remotely connected with party matters could see this coming from the beginning of Corbyn’s defenestration, no matter which side of that battle they were on. I was a novice member in a fairly quiet CLP (Bristol W nxt door was much nastier -Thangham Debbonair and the enrire CLP takeover from the “centre”, then she lost to Carla Denyer.)
Starmer knows how to please/deceive either a party or public audience, Ive seen him do it.
It was also rather telling that his fans kept reminding us how “forensic” he was, but never could tell us anything about either his politics or his campaign funding.
What I didnt realise, was who Morgan McSweeney was or how awful he was.
Your 1,000th comment.
Thank you.
Am I now an offical “acolyte”?
How many posts before I become a “Murphy Mobster” or a “Funding the Future Freak” or a “TaxResearch Troll” or one of “Richard’s Ruffians”?
KUTGW!
🙂
None of those, I hope
Murphy’s mob ?
No more mindless empty days!
https://aftn.co.uk/murphys-mob-no-more-mindless-empty-days/
🙂
All true, but could this be a step in the right direction, do you think?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cgq7yvy1ke9o
It’s “to be phased in over three years from 2026”, i.e. just in time for the election.
It helps, a little.
But it won’t help those who lose PIP next year to appease Liz Kendall’s maliciousness.
Divide & rule?
Set the rural poor against the urban poor?
This is still playing with a different set of rules for slicing a seriously undersized pie containing all the wrong ingredients, cooked for the wrong time at the wrong temperature in the wrong appliance, allowed to get cold, served on the wrong plates and forgetting that people need cutlery before they can eat it,
I spent my veterinary life seeing rural poverty on large landed estates owned by important Tories. Served 2 rural churces & saw rural poverty (& rural wealth) for another 27 years, and retired here in S. Bristol to see urban poverty (7 years) close up and personal.
The only point I feel qualified to comment on from personal experience (rather than uninformed opinion or ideology), is that rural poverty at an individual level carries additional burdens – isolation, local prejudice, lack of relevant services (eg distance to council office or Job Centre/DWP or bank or foodbank, GP surgery, dentist, hospital) or cheaper shops, even cost of energy – oil or bottled butane, due to no mains gas, and cost of transport. Rural poor do a lot of walking, miles of it, and often not on pavements either, rural roads are terrifying things to walk on, even worse with a toddler in a buggy.
Urban poverty is different, with its own extra challenges, but it is far less isolating, less lonely, and a lot cheaper, mostly.
I used to sometimes take food parcels to clients in tiny social housing estates (maybe 20 or 30 units) at “the rough end” of little villages or hamlets with no other services. Those visits I found very “educational”.
Quite disappointed in this post if I’m honest. Its fine if you think Starmer is a tory in disguise or an austerity freak but he is definitely not worse than Johnson or Truss or a few more I could mention. Just remember the left look for traitors & the right look for converts. Be careful if you think politics will get better if Labour get voted out..
He’s not on the left.
If you think he is, no wonder you don’t understand where I am.
And right now Labour is betraying evryone but the very rich. Why should I want to keep any party in office who does that?
Why do you?
Why do you want, for example, to penalise those with disabilities and not tax the wealthy instead? Please explain instead of writing nonsensical comments the first time you have appeared here.
Honestly its your comments that are nonsensical. This government is (slowly, yes slowly because change takes time) making a lot of positive changes, which as a working class person I’m pleased to see.
People on the hard left constantly harping on with out of proprtion criticism are just going to contribute to Reform’s popularity and the one chance we have of getting the country into a better position will be gone due to lack of patience and idealism.
WFA was and still is a mess
PIP nd otnher benefit changes are a disaster
The NIC change is a disaster
The root causes of problems in the NHS are not being tackled and there is still no plan
The positionn on Gaza is a disgrace
The invitatioin to a fascist is a disgrace
Continuing tax drag is a disgrace
Permitting above infaltion price rises by monopolies was a disgrace
The failure on water is a disgrace
No action on wealth redistribution is a digrace
The failue to support councils is a disgrace
Tell me, what is going well?
Yet again, a criticism that brings an opinion but no facts.
Give us real verifiable sourced examples of how Starmer/Reeves’s Labour have made the world a better place for those on the margins.
Remember that they are on the record as saying they are not the party for those on benefits, and their actions have penalised the poor, the sick and the disabled, already on their knees after 14 yrs of Tory incompetence and corruption.
Facts please.
True, but just think of all the wonderful things he has done for Larry Fink of BlackRock, and Peter Thiel of Palantir, and, of course, the TechBros.
Of course, one could argue, correctly, that, despite being a change of sorts, all of those things are to our general detriment, but then what are modern politics for, if not self-aggrandisement and the enrichment of the superfluously wealthy?
I don’t think my words are ‘nonsensical’ – it just happens to be a point of view which differs from your own.
I actually agree with much of your writing particularly on MMT but I sense you don’t want to enter into a debate – I never said don’t tax the rich for example but you have immediately loaded that on to me & criticised me for having a view about the ‘worst’ prime minister that is different to your own.
Its disappointing for me as a first time poster to be treated like this – do you only want responders that agree with you or who aren’t ‘nonsensical’ by your definition?
I wanted youi ti tell me why I was wrong – and you haven’t
That was all
We are witnessing the complete failure of a highly centralised governance system dating from the 1662 settlement and restoration of the monarchy.
It cannot cope with the complexity of the 21st century.
MPs are whipped to do whatever the executive commands. The executive are overloaded and prone to capture by policy wonks, think tanks, lobbyists, and vested interests generally.
It needs to be completely torn up and replaced by dispersed power. Then good people might come forward to contribute to the development of society.
I’m not convinced that it doesn’t go all the way back to Magna Carta and the formalisation of feudal governance by the aristocracy.
You know what you’ll get with the tory scumbags.
Despite warnings, I don’t think anyone expected him to be such a neoliberal patsy.
Starmer promised the victims of Troubles violence that once in power he would revoke The Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023. An Act which effectively gifts full criminal amnesty to those who committed human rights atrocities during General Kitson’s counterinsurgency conflict (1969-2007). He has broken this promise delivering a few amendments that amount to nothing more than media PR window dressing. This treachery, albeit no surprise to any living here, will not easily be forgotten.
What leadership election or pre-GE promises did Starmer KEEP?
Given Starmer’s pre-election effective volte-face on a number of issues like the environment and climate and his reluctance to make any more binding commitments than electoral blather, together with his cosying up to media and big money in the election run-up, it always seemed rather unlikely that he was actually going to fulfil any of the hopes of the electorate. He was patently incurring a level of political debt that would bind the course that he could follow if elected.
The only solution would have been, and still is, to get private money and media out of politics and that’s never really been a viable proposition in our thousand-year feudal oligarchy.
Agreed