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Cabinet ministers were urged to form a “praetorian guard” around Keir Starmer at a highly charged meeting with the Prime Minister in Downing Street this week.
Heidi Alexander, the transport secretary, called out recent leadership chatter, urging her colleagues to protect the Prime Minister from rebellious Labour MPs who continue to agitate against his leadership. Starmer delivered closing remarks which even his critics around the table described as unexpectedly emotional.
The comments came at a political cabinet meeting, which civil servants do not attend. Labour’s top team held a frank and prolonged discussion about their strategy and the current political situation. Several figures blamed Labour MPs for causing recent difficulties. Alexander called on the cabinet to unite, in what many will see as a pointed message for Wes Streeting, who was also in attendance.
After the discussion, Starmer delivered closing remarks, which some less typically supportive colleagues said they found “uplifting” and “inspiring”, to their admitted surprise.
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“Keir summed up, reminding everyone why we’re in politics, why we’re Labour,” one loyalist in attendance said. “It was very emotional, and forthright. Everyone was slightly taken aback to be honest by the passion and fluency of his remarks and what this is all about and why we’re doing it.”
Starmer told colleagues that he was proud to lead the most working-class cabinet in history, and that “we should never forget that most people do not go on the same journey – their voices that should be heard around this cabinet table”.
The Prime Minister also referenced his brother and his sister and said that the government should be fighting every day for the people who have suffered under years of low growth through a lack of opportunities. “It was quite a moment, of the whole team coming together,” one attendee said.
Not everyone was convinced. “I’m afraid there is a ‘steady as she goes’ tendency in parts of the cabinet that are saying ‘keep going’ as the iceberg approaches and are blaming Labour MPs for our problems,” a senior Labour source said. “That the cabinet feels a bit more upbeat is sort of neither here nor there when we are still headed for crashing defeat,” said another.
Starmer and his allies, however, will hope this moment of impressing his often sceptical colleagues is a sign he is turning a corner, as he fights to improve his standing, both in the country and in the eyes of his own party.
[Further reading: To survive Trump, Starmer must think the unthinkable]
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