Labour backlash over PM’s election catastrophe grows : Live updates

Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP, the Labour MP for Clapham and Brixton, has said ‘change cannot come soon enough’ after her party received a thrashing in the most recent local elections.

While congratulating all the Lambeth Labour candidates who were elected, she described the recent set of results as a ‘disaster for our party on both a local and national level’.

The government’s current strategy is holding the door open for a Reform government and electoral oblivion in Labour heartlands up and down the country.

Change cannot come soon enough”

Her recent statement came just minutes after fellow Labour MP, Catherine West called on cabinet members to challenge Sir Keir’s leadership.

Catherine West, the Labour MP for Hornsey and Friern Barnet, said if cabinet ministers do not challenge Sir Keir as party leader by Monday, she will throw down the gauntlet for the party’s top role.

She told BBC Radio 4 that while she would prefer for cabinet to ‘reorganise themselves’ and replace the Prime Minister with their ‘best communicator’.

However, West has put cabinet ministers ‘on notice’, saying she would ask for her peers’ support to trigger a leadership contest if it is not done by Monday.

For a leadership contest to be triggered, 20 per cent of the party’s MPs, would have to back a single contender.

West has insisted she has ten colleagues ready to support her bid for leadership.

She said:

My preferred option is for the cabinet to do a reshuffle within itself, where there’s plenty of talent, and for Keir to be given a different role, which he might enjoy, perhaps an international role.

Then for others to come to the fore who can communicate the message, who are very able, so we can have minimum fuss.”

Sir Keir Starmer has put measures to tackle the cost of living and forge closer ties with the European Union at the heart of his plan to revive Labour’s fortunes after a disastrous set of elections.

The Prime Minister is battling to save his job, with a Labour MP plotting to launch a leadership challenge on Monday in the hope of spurring his Cabinet to move to oust him.

But despite mounting pressure to quit, Sir Keir insisted he would lead Labour into the next general election to continue with his 10-year project of “national renewal”.

The Prime Minister will use an address on Monday and the King’s Speech on Wednesday to mount a fightback after growing numbers of Labour MPs demanded a change at the top of the party.

In a Mirror interview, Sir Keir promised to be ‘full-throated’ about the need for closer ties with Brussels as he sought to win back his wavering MPs and address the drift of voters from Labour to the Greens in many former strongholds in London and cities across England.

In an apparent attempt to address the concerns of voters who felt left behind, Sir Keir promised ‘an economy that really works for everyone, wherever they live’.

The Mirror reported that No 10 and the Treasury are drawing up support for families, targeting fuel costs and household bills which have soared since the Iran war pushed up global oil and gas prices.

Scrapping September’s planned increase in fuel duty is understood to be an option on the table, the newspaper reported.

Sir Keir promised action to address the economic impact of the war, saying: ‘I know this causes anxiety for families, and I won’t stand by.’

He said that he would be responding with a plan ‘about the hope and opportunity of a better future, part of which is a stronger economy and an economy that really works for everyone, wherever they live, whatever they do’.

‘There are a number of strands to that, but one is, we have to be closer to Europe, and I just want to be full-throated about this.’

A youth experience scheme, allowing young EU and British citizens to work and study in each others’ countries, is expected to be agreed this summer and implemented by 2027.

Sir Keir said:

I feel that Brexit has held back our young people. They should be free to work, study, travel in European countries, just as I was able to when I was growing up.

That has been smashed away from young people because of Brexit. I’m not going to let Brexit stand in the way of their opportunities, and therefore we’ll push forward on that.”

Labour MP Catherine West declined to answer outright who she believed should be the next Labour leader.

She said:

That is a question for the Cabinet to begin with, to see whether they can put someone forward, who they can all get behind, then we wouldn’t need a leadership election.

And then the next step is people will put themselves forward and I know that if I get the names requisite to stand myself, that will spark other leadership contenders and then we will end up with somebody emerging.

There are some excellent people, but they do need to have the courage to stand up and say why they should be the next leader to take us forward into the most, I think, the most decisive general election that we’ve known.”

By Caroline Peacock

Former Gogglebox star Josh Tapper has been elected as a Labour Councillor.

Josh first appeared on the Channel 4 show in 2013 at just 15 years old, alongside his parents and sister Amy during the programme’s debut series.

He left Gogglebox in 2017 after securing a Civil Service apprenticeship, later moving into politics.

On Friday, he successfully won a seat in local government after being elected as a Labour councillor for the Underhill ward in the London Borough of Barnet.

Josh received 1,128 votes, winning the seat alongside fellow Labour candidate Zahra Beg in the 2026 local elections.

His sister Amy took to her Instagram Stories to congratulate her brother, sharing a beaming snap of him, writing: ‘My brother is officially a Councillor! So so proud.’

READ MORE BELOW:

Labour Party chiefs have warned Catherine West against her challenge to Sir Keir Starmer.

She said:

The Party leadership has asked me, obviously, not to do this and (said) everything is in hand.

But I’m not convinced. I think we need to have a strong statement from the Prime Minister, either that he feels he’s not the person to take us forward, or he is, and he’s fighting for us.

That is what we need to know. And I think that’s what they just want to hear. After their verdict, which they gave us, as Labour representatives on Thursday, we need a much stronger response from the Government.”

Labour has successfully defended a higher percentage of its seats in the capital than it did in the rest of England.

Meanwhile, Reform UK won a lower proportion of seats it contested than elsewhere, according to Press Association analysis.

Labour won just 67 per cent of the council seats in London, it held just before the elections took place.

This compares with a win rate of 30% for seats the party was defending outside London.

Reform won just 5 per cent of the seats in London in which it fielded candidates, compared with 43 per cent of the seats it contested elsewhere in England.

The Greens won 19 per cent of seats in London, where it stood candidates, higher than the 10 per cent it managed outside the capital.

The Conservatives won 46 per cent of seats they were defending outside London, while, by contrast, the party has seen a net increase of 6 per cent in its number of councillors in the capital.

Sir Keir has vowed to lead Labour to the next general election amid the possibility of a leadership challenge after his party was thrashed in the recent local elections.

When asked by The Sunday Mirror if he would lead Labour to the next election, he said:

Yes I will, and I’ve always said it’s a decade of national renewal, where the legacy we inherited was an appalling legacy on all fronts, not just the economy, which was broken.”

He said his plan and hope for a better future would be ‘really clear’.

‘…part of which is a stronger economy and an economy that really works for everyone, wherever they live, whatever they do.

There are a number of strands to that, but one is, we have to be closer to Europe, and I just want to be full throated about this.

I feel that Brexit has held back our young people. They should be free to work, study, travel in European countries, just as I was able to when I was growing up.

That has been smashed away from young people because of Brexit. I’m not going to let Brexit stand in the way of their opportunities, and therefore we’ll push forward on that.”

More councils in London have been left in no overall control than at any point since the current system of local government in the capital was established in 1964.

There are nine London councils where no party won enough seats to form a majority.

Eight of them were previously controlled by Labour – Barnet, Brent, Enfield, Haringey, Lambeth, Newham, Southwark, Wandsworth – while one, Croydon, remains in no overall control.

The previous record for the most number of London councils left in no overall control after local elections was eight, set in 2006.

Some of Keir Starmer’s most senior Cabinet Ministers have been called out for failing to back him, as Labour MPs plot the Prime Minister’s downfall.

Last night Downing Street forced most of the Cabinet to post supportive messages backing Sir Keir on social media, but three prominent figures appeared unwilling to do so.

Ed Miliband, who reportedly told the Prime Minister to set out a timetable for his departure recently, failed to back Sir Keir continuing in the role.

The Energy Secretary branded the apocalyptic Labour councillor losses as ‘devastating’, pointing out: ‘Voters are making clear their anger at a broken economic and political status quo.’

Mr Miliband cited Starmer’s words that the government ‘must go further in delivering the mandate for change that Labour won in 2024 – and show how we will answer the call for change in our country’.

The post was branded a ‘non-endorsement’ by commentators.

Next up the Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, appeared to scold the Prime Minister as she demanded: ‘Do better’.

Ms Mahmood, who is among those considering a leadership bid, also described the results in her native Birmingham as ‘devastating’.

Tracy Brabin, the Mayor of West Yorkshire, has warned Labour is ‘facing oblivion’ after branding her party’s recent local election thrashing as a ‘catastrophic set of results’.

In a statement, she said: ‘We cannot waste the opportunity of Labour being in government’, before later adding that people are ‘impatient for change’.

Labour suffered huge losses across West Yorkshire, losing Leeds and Kirklees as well as Wakefield and Calderdale to Reform.

The Bradford Council leader declined to address the question of Labour’s leadership in her message.

She said there is ‘still time left… to deliver a brighter future of for the people of this country’, before warning it needs to happen ‘quickly and decisively with a renewed boldness’.

Labour MP Catherine West’s push for a leadership contest had been met with hope, anger and bafflement, top aides and MPs have said.

“Self-identifying as a stalking horse isn’t a thing,” one Labour official told POLITICO.

Meanwhile, another minister said West is “unlikely” to get 80 names backing her, while another branded her challenge ‘mad’.

However, others have recognised that if West does get 80 names supporting her, it would formally spark a contest regardless.

One of Rayner’s allies told the publication: ‘Finally someone has the guts to stand up and tell the truth!’

Another described it as ‘uncharted territory.’ Another said: ‘[I] just don’t know where it leads.’

Andy Burnham’s allies are said to be furious as they have been urging Sir Keir to map out his departure this year, so the Greater Manchester mayor would have time to return to Westminster and throw his own gauntlet for the leadership position.

The announcement has infuriated allies of Andy Burnham, who have been urging the PM to set out a timetable for his departure this year, giving the Greater Manchester mayor time to return to parliament and run for leader.

Some are said to be trying to persuade West to withdraw her ultimatum, with one saying:

We cannot have 80 clinically insane colleagues. Please, God.”