On Friday Rayner resigned after the prime minister’s ethics adviser found she had breached the ministerial code over her underpayment of stamp duty on her £800,000 seaside flat. Her departure leaves the government without one of its most authentic working-class voices at a time when it is struggling to reconnect with its traditional voter base. In what is likely to prove a bittersweet moment, her workers’ rights bill is due to pass its final stage soon.
Rayner has been an emblem of social mobility. “It’s an absolute tragedy for Labour to lose her,” says Polly Toynbee. “She was representative of something quite different in the cabinet – not just that she’s working class because this is a very working-class cabinet – but the way she came up without a university education, unmarried mother of a disabled child aged 16. Her backstory is so extraordinary. But more than that, she was such a blazingly bright character. You would see her singing and dancing at party conferences. She was fun, she was human, and she was full of indignation about injustices of every kind.”
Rayner was the first to pile the pressure on Conservative party chair Nadhim Zahawi when the issue over his tax affairs was first revealed in 2023. She did the same with Jeremy Hunt in 2018. “The trouble is, that’s what’s done it for her, because there are so many quotes of her being outraged by the rich not paying their taxes, or other people not playing the game fairly. That’s really finished her off. What she’s done herself – whether it was by accident or on purpose, who knows – is a complete calamity,” says Polly.
Starmer has been told by senior Labour figures he must stop making mistakes. The mood within the party is “pretty ferocious” after achieving a stonking great majority with nothing in its way, and then such an appalling first year, says Polly. Rayner’s departure sparked a big cabinet reshuffle, with David Lammy made deputy prime minister and Yvette Cooper made foreign secretary. Only a handful of cabinet ministers stayed in the same job (including Wes Streeting at health and Rachel Reeves as chancellor).
The number of cabinet changes suggests the extent of worry, with a feeling that there needed to be a complete reset within No 10, with Labour continuing to disappoint in the polls as Reform UK’s successes pile up (although a No 1 single may yet elude them).
On a personal level, Starmer was clearly sad to see Rayner go and said in his response to her resignation letter that she had been “a true friend for many years”. He said: “I have nothing but admiration for you and huge respect for your achievements in politics.” The letter was, unusually, written by hand.
Managing the surge from the right
A YouGov poll last month put Labour on just 20% of public approval, eight points behind Reform UK and its lowest level in more than five years. While everyone else was on sunloungers for summer recess, Farage spotted an opportunity to get some attention with a series of press conferences for journalists hungry for news, whipping up anger about the rising number of small boat crossings, and hotels housing asylum seekers.
Polly says the public’s appetite to reduce immigration will never be fully sated. “I think there will always be some people who want more and more foreigners out, and it comes and goes in waves.” But Farage doesn’t have much else to campaign on, said Polly.
And his ideas don’t generally hold under scrutiny. For example, when asked for clarification on his pledge to pay the Taliban for taking shipments of refugees, he changed the subject. And speaking at the Reform UK conference in Birmingham, Farage declared he will run on a pledge to “stop the boats” within two weeks of entering No 10, which he quickly rowed back on.
Much to the discomfort of the left, immigration is now considered one of the most important issues for voters – which is why getting a grip on Britain’s borders, and showing visible progress on this issue, is one of the most pressing things in Starmer’s in-tray. Farage was eager to trumpet a general election in 2027 – although something truly extraordinary would need to happen for that to occur given the size of Labour’s majority.
Following Reform UK’s conference over the weekend, the government made announcements about speeding up the closure of asylum hotels and suspending refugee family reunions. Starmer has been criticised for peddling populist narratives, recently warning that Britain had become an “island of strangers” – though later blaming his Enoch Powell-esque language on his speechwriters.
Polly says Starmer needs to completely change tack and attack Farage’s views, rather than placating him. “In every speech, he has to go for his racism, he has to go for his stirring up race hatred and hatred against foreigners, the terrible incidents of people being attacked, like the deputy leader of the Greens, on the beach at Cromer, with his family of Asian origin having bottles and insults thrown at them.”
Populations are declining across Europe, projections show, creating economic shocks and slower growth, which will be exacerbated without immigration. So Polly says Starmer should make a stronger case for the benefits of immigration.
“We need these people. Look around you and you see how much we need migrants with the skills that we need … you can turn it into a different conversation,” she says.
Can Starmer win economic credibility?
A major political event this autumn is the budget.
It has already been delayed, sparking speculation about the size of the fiscal deficit and how it can be plugged, with Rachel Reeves acknowledging that the UK economy is “not working well enough for working people”. She said: “Bills are high. Getting ahead feels tougher. You put more in, get less out. That has to change.”
Experts suggest the spending gap is likely to reach more than £40bn after sluggish economic growth and higher-than-expected inflation. Reeves has already ruled out putting up income tax, national insurance or VAT, in order to stick with her manifesto pledges. Options include increasing inheritance tax and raising capital gains tax on expensive homes.
Coupled with her struggle to explain tax rises to the public, she also needs to improve public services. She must manage demands for higher pay for public sector staff, deal with the doctors’ strike and oversee the phase-out of NHS England.
One option in her arsenal would be to “remind citizens that their taxes pay for things that we value”, says Polly.
“[They should] say, look, if you want public services that are up to standard, you have to pay for them. There is no free lunch. These are hard times right across Europe. Donald Trump has made them much worse … When it comes to it, I know most of the people in this country would rather have a health service, local council services that work and pay a bit more tax, than to have tax cuts and threadbare services on their knees,” she says.
Of course, the party might be afraid of big business, but as Polly says: “There’s no point in trying to do quite ‘left’ things and sort of whispering about it. Business is never going to like Labour very much, but I think there would be more respect if they spell out what they’re about and why.”
