Sir Keir Starmer will take responsibility for Labour’s heavy election losses in a bid to head off a leadership challenge.
After a bruising night in which his party is expected to lose as many as 1,800 council seats in England as well as ceding control of Wales and failing to retake Scotland, the Prime Minister will face the cameras on Friday morning.
He will ‘take it on the chin’ and insist he has heard the message from the electorate, sources said.
Despite playing a low-key role in Labour’s campaign ahead of polling day because of voters’ animosity, the PM will defend his position in public repeatedly over the coming days rather than retreating to the No 10 bunker.
His move is reminiscent of the ‘masochism strategy’ employed by his predecessor Tony Blair in the run-up to the 2005 general election, when the New Labour premier faced questions from voters angry about the Iraq war.
But as well as taking the blame for Labour haemorrhaging votes to the Greens on the left and Reform on the right, Sir Keir will warn plotters within his party that now is not the time for him to be toppled.
‘The message is that we need to change the country, not the leader,’ a source said.
‘Let’s not repeat the Tory mistakes of the past.’
Sir Keir Starmer and his wife Lady Starmer leaving a polling station in Westminster
The insider added: ‘It is not unusual for a governing party to have a difficult time at midterm elections.
‘He recognises the anger out there – the fact that people are tired of the status quo – and he is going to make tackling that his mission.’
A No 10 source told the Mirror: ‘Asking the PM to reapply for his job at the very moment he is tackling the impacts of the Iran conflict on British families, including the cost of living, would be a serious distraction.’
On Thursday the PM cast his own ballot in Westminster accompanied by his wife Lady Starmer. He posted a video of them walking to the polling station with a message urging voters to ‘choose progress over the politics of anger’.
After acknowledging the scale of the losses in yesterday’s elections to English town halls, the Welsh Senedd and Scottish Parliament, Sir Keir will attempt another reset.
The PM is working on a major speech for the start of the week before his Government’s next plans are unveiled in the King’s Speech on Wednesday.
However it risks being overshadowed by the prospect of growing calls for him to step down.
A handful of Labour MPs and peers have already called for Sir Keir to quit over the Peter Mandelson scandal and some backbenchers are considering writing a letter that would demand he sets out a timetable for his departure.
Reform UK Nigel Farage strikes a more upbeat pose as he votes in Thursday’s local elections
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar urged the PM to quit back in February and Wales’ Baroness Morgan admitted on the eve of polling day that Sir Keir ‘comes up as an issue on the doorstep’, with anger expected to increase when the ballots are counted.
However Sir Keir’s position has been made more secure by the absence of a potential successor with widespread support who is able to challenge him now.
Labour’s former Deputy Leader Angela Rayner is still waiting for the results of an HMRC investigation into her failure to pay the correct stamp duty on her purchase of a seaside home, and was also left embarrassed when the Daily Mail revealed she had staggered into a door at the end of a night in a Parliamentary bar.
Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham is believed to have the most support among soft-left MPs but cannot run for leader unless he returns to Westminster first. North-west MPs are understood to have been asked to step down for him but Sir Keir could block him from standing again and even if selected there is no guarantee he would win a by-election given Labour’s unpopularity.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting is said to have built a ‘shadow team’ and to have the support of the 81 MPs required to trigger a leadership contest. He is thought to be wary of going over the top first, however.
Nigel Farage posted photographs of himself enjoying an ice cream in the sunshine as he looked forward to Reform UK making huge gains from Labour as well as the Tories across councils in England.
Kemi Badenoch voted with her husband Hamish in her Essex constituency – one of the true blue areas now under threat from Reform.
