"Keir Starmer couldn't run a bath". What next for Labour?

Summary

The Story — “Can Labour (and Starmer) turn things around?”

Podcast by The Times | Hosts: Manveen Rana & Luke Jones | Date: May 11, 2026

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Overview

This episode examines the devastating local and devolved election results for the Labour Party, including their historic collapse in Wales and continued struggles across the United Kingdom. Manveen Rana and guest Aubrey Allegretti, chief political correspondent for The Times, discuss Keir Starmer’s embattled leadership, internal party unrest, the rise of other political factions, and what these shifts herald for Labour and British politics at large.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Labour’s Devastating Election Results

• Wales: Labour loses control of the Senedd for the first time in a century, coming third overall.
• Scotland: Labour’s efforts to replicate its recent UK-level success fail; Anas Sarwar loses his bid to become Scottish First Minister.
• England: Reform Party emerges as the biggest winner, gaining 1,400 councillors, primarily at Labour’s expense. The Greens and Liberal Democrats also make significant gains.
• Constitutional Implications: Separatist parties now poised to govern Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland – “a major challenge to the makeup of the United Kingdom.” (Aubrey Allegretti, 06:58)
• Notable Losses: Labour loses key councils and council leaders in places like Hartlepool, Redditch, and Tamworth.

2. Party Mood & Internal Recriminations

• Wave of anger and frustration at every level—members, MPs, ministers.
• Growing calls from Labour MPs for Starmer to set a timetable for departure.
• Quote:

  “Kier is dead and he’s completely powerless. We’re stuck in inertia.”
  —Aubrey Allegretti quoting a Labour minister (04:30)

3. Breakdown of Britain’s Party System

• Traditional two-party dominance fragmented; Reform and Greens outperform both Labour and Conservatives.
• Memorable Statistic:

  “Labour and Conservatives were basically left on 17% each, a joint tally making up just 34%, which is a record low for both main parties.”
  —Aubrey Allegretti (09:55-10:09)

• Growing sense of anti-establishment sentiment, with voters seeking alternatives across the spectrum.

4. Collapse of Old Tribal Loyalties

• Labour heartlands in Scotland and Wales break ranks.
• Loss of grassroots infrastructure poses long-term threats:

  “Today’s councillors are tomorrow’s activists...”
  —Aubrey Allegretti (11:18)

5. Keir Starmer’s Response and Survival Prospects

• Starmer admits the results are “really tough” (12:09), but refuses to resign.
• Attempts to rally Labour with cabinet appointments and interviews widely seen as out of touch; “completely tin-eared,” says Allegretti (13:32).
• MPs publicly urge change, but Starmer clings on, citing the need for stability.

Notable Quotes:

• Angela Rayner (private meeting, recalled by Allegretti):

  “Keir Starmer couldn’t run a bath.”
  (18:43)

• Aubrey Allegretti:

  “All the briefing...was that [Monday’s speech] would be focused on closer ties with the EU, but it would be largely devoid of new policy.”
  (18:01)

6. Leadership Challenge: Mechanics and Plausible Candidates

• 40+ Labour MPs publicly want Starmer out.
• Catherine West (MP for Hornsey): Emerges as a “stalking horse” candidate threatening a formal challenge if Starmer does not step aside (15:53).
• Potential Successors:
  • Wes Streeting: Leading “moderate” candidate (26:20).
  • Angela Rayner, Andy Burnham: Contenders from the “soft left.” Burnham is particularly notable for polling well with both Green and Reform voters but faces resistance from party loyalists (28:42).
  • Ed Miliband: Former Labour leader, potentially making a comeback.
  • 2024 intake MPs (e.g., Al Khan): Represent new blood in the party (27:30).
• Starmer could theoretically stand in a contest himself (28:20).

7. Underlying Problems for Labour and Next Steps

• Internal Divisions: MPs across all Labour factions now openly critical—no single group can be blamed for destabilizing Starmer.
• Policy & Communications:
  • Labour criticized as too slow, too “status quo,” and unclear in vision.
  • “Change” slogan from 2024 now seen as vague and ineffective in inspiring or uniting voters (32:00).
• Public Perception:
  • Starmer’s lack of charisma recurrently noted:

    “Like the DLR...a computerized train that doesn’t require a driver.”
    —Patrick Maguire via Aubrey Allegretti (22:20)

8. If Starmer Goes—What’s Next?

• Difficult prospects for reuniting Labour’s fractured voter base.
• Polling Insights: Andy Burnham’s popularity among Green and even some Reform voters makes him uniquely positioned, but institutional barriers may yet block his return.
• The party must rebuild grassroots connections to regain trust and energy in coming years.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments (with Timestamps)

• 04:09 | Aubrey Allegretti:

  “It’s a bit of a bin fire, really, to put it mildly.”

• 04:25 | Labour Minister via Allegretti:

  “Kier is dead and he's completely powerless. We’re stuck in inertia.”

• 09:21 | Manveen Rana:

  “The Green Party leader, Zack Polanski, has said that two party politics is dead in Britain. It does look like that, doesn’t it?”

• 11:18 | Allegretti (on grassroots erosion):

  “Today’s councillors are tomorrow’s activists, effectively meaning that losing them now means that they’re less likely to come out and support you...at the next general election.”

• 12:04 | Starmer:

  “These are really tough results. I’m not going to sugarcoat it...But I’m not going to walk away and plunge the country into chaos.”

• 18:43 | Angela Rayner (via Allegretti):

  “Keir Starmer couldn’t run a bath.”

• 28:42 | Allegretti (on Andy Burnham):

  “He polls clearly better than the Prime Minister. He’s seen as having truck and big influence and appeal to both reform voters on the one hand and Green voters, making him pretty uniquely placed among Labour politicians.”

• 32:00 | Allegretti (on Labour’s “change” slogan):

  “It was encapsulated in this single word of change, which simultaneously meant everything and nothing.”

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Key Timestamps for Major Segments

• 01:03 — Episode begins: summary of Labour’s disastrous weekend.
• 04:09 — Aubrey Allegretti joins; mood within Labour described as “bin fire.”
• 05:22–07:35 — Breakdown of election results: Wales, Scotland, England.
• 08:07 — National issues dominate local elections; outsider parties surge.
• 09:21 — Collapse of two-party politics and tribalism.
• 12:04–13:51 — Starmer’s defensive response and new appointments.
• 14:11–16:27 — The backbench revolt grows; possibility of leadership challenge.
• 17:54 — Monday’s critical speech previewed; leadership future discussed.
• 21:44 — Dissection of Starmer’s failures, party’s appetite for rebellion.
• 26:09–30:37 — Potential leadership contenders and strategies to rebuild.
• 31:56–33:09 — Can Labour recover? Urgency for clear vision and bold leadership.

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Summary: Outlook for Labour

The podcast paints a bleak but dynamic portrait of UK Labour. The party faces its worst results in living memory, a rapid fraying of core allegiances, and rising threats from both left (Greens) and right (Reform). Keir Starmer’s future looks grim as pressure for his resignation mounts—including formal talk of contests from both familiar and unexpected corners.

The episode closes with a consensus: Labour urgently needs a convincing vision, energized leadership, and a way to reconnect with disillusioned voters, or else risk further disintegration in the run-up to the next general election.

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This summary covers the most substantive sections of the episode, omitting ads and non-content, and retains the tone and detail of the discussion for listeners who want a thorough understanding of Labour’s crisis as presented by The Story.

Transcript

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[Manveen Rana]

From the Times and the Sunday Times, this is the story. I'm Manveen Rana. It's been a bruising weekend for Labour. As the results of Thursday's election have continued to trickle in, it's clear that the party has suffered a historic collapse. In its support, Welsh Labour has today suffered a catastrophic result. It ends a century of Labour winning in Wales and the party will need to take a really hard look at itself and understand the depth of the challenge that we face. In Wales, where Labour have dominated the electoral map for decades, the party came a crushing third, losing control of the Senate for the first time ever. And yet with the party in disarray, its leader, Sakir Starmer, has so far remained defiant.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

It's very important that we do reflect on what was a tough set of results, but I'm not going to walk away and plunge the country into chaos. I think the right thing to do is to rebuild and show the path forward.

[Manveen Rana]

And yet many of his own MPs are not convinced that a path forward can be found with Keir Starmer at the helm. A number of them are now calling for him to go peer as soon

[Aubrey Allegretti]

as possible and Monday would be fine. Should publicly accept that he's led Labour into his last election and he should set out a timetable to go probably by the end of the year.

[Manveen Rana]

The voters sent us a very strong message that we are not good enough. If you were a school fail an inspection report, you would take the head out, wouldn't you?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

My view is that if we simply carry on with Keir Starmer as leader and he leads us into the next election, it will be a disaster. Then at the general election as it has been in the local elections.

[Manveen Rana]

So with a stalking horse candidate already throwing her hat in the ring, can Keir Starmer survive? And what do the election results tell us about the country's political future? The story today can labor and Starmer recovery?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

It's a bit of a bin fire, really, to put it mildly.

[Manveen Rana]

Aubrey Allegretti, chief political correspondent at the Times, has been flooded with messages from Labour MPs in the wake of the catastrophic local election results.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

There is anger at every sort of possible level of the Labour Party, from members up to MPs and ministers who are all sort of very frustrated and directing their anger in different ways. But I think the most damning indictment I had from one minister was, Kier is dead and he's completely powerless. We're stuck in inertia. And I think that probably goes to typify the frustration between the two warring factions of MPs that want him gone and those that don't. They feel like they're going to be stuck in this doom loop for seemingly the indefinite future.

[Manveen Rana]

It does feel like the party is in a sort of a zombie state at the moment. We put out an emergency episode of our sister podcast, the State of It on Friday as the local election results were coming in. We know now know so much more because the Welsh and the Scottish elections have also come in. Aubrey, just give us an update on where things stand.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

Of course. Well, we knew this would be a truly sort of seismic set of elections, but now the dust has settled, we can say that it has been. I think it's probably worth actually starting in Wales, where Labour was consigned to third place for first minister, losing her job and Labour losing its grip after more than a century of being the most dominant political force there. And obviously Labour was also looking to replicate a lot of Keir Starmer's success at the 2024 election in Scotland, where it took lots more MPs in July nearly two years ago. But it seems that the popularity since then has completely petered out and Keir Starmer's own personal ratings have tanked massively. So Anas Sawa failed in his bid to become Labour's new Scottish first Minister, and his attempts to distance himself from the UK or the sort of Westminster branch of the Labour Party fell on deaf ears. And more broadly, across England, reform has been by far and away the biggest beneficiary. They have now won over 1400 councillors, largely at the expense of Labour, who've lost a thousand as well as control of dozens of Councils. There have been some really embarrassing and high profile losses ranging from places like Hartlepool, Redditch and Tamworth. And multiple council leaders lost their seats to the Greens. It should be pointed out that the Tories have struggled too. They have lost hundreds of councillors and the Greens have obviously made significant inroads. They've gained their first directly elected mayors in Hackney and Lewisham. The Lib Dems have also made some progress too. They won 155 councillors and took control of councils like West Surrey. They're feeling relatively pleased about it, although given that they used to be the sort of beneficiaries of the A and other votes. I know there are some LIBD mmps who'd like them to be making more progress at this point in the electoral cycle. And then there's the sort of big constitutional picture we have victory for the SNP and seemingly plied in Wales, presenting a major challenge to the makeup of the United Kingdom. As for the first time ever, each devolved government is likely to be led by a separatist party in Scotland, Wales and of course already as is the case in Northern Ireland. So all in all a huge amount to digest.

[Manveen Rana]

So we could be looking at more independence referendums. And Aubrey, local elections often end up being a referendum on, on the party in power, on what's happening at Westminster rather than at local council level. As you said though, even, even the elections in Scotland and Wales, which are for devolved parliaments, seem run on Westminster lines. People were voting against Starmer. Why do you think this has become the local election which is so governed by what's happening in Westminster?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

I mean, it was obviously really interesting to see reforms tagline for the local elections campaign be get Starmer out. And of course the Greens made the UK government's response to the war in Gaza and Israel's action a really prominent feature of the campaign. I mean, under the Conservatives, when these elections were last being held, the Tories used to say it's bins, not Boris on the ballot paper. And they were basically saying that because they wanted to remind voters that this was in many cases about sort of local regional services and not about national issues. But it's certainly true that unpopular leaders can be a real drag anchor and they can be very easily distracted from actually the issues that a lot of these politicians are going to be in control of, whether that's libraries or schools or bins. But and not to sort of outsource too much of our politics to the us. I remember government insiders describing the sort of elections we were facing in the run up to the ones that have just taken place as the Prime Minister's midterms, I. E. They were basically saying they are a way to give the government of the day a kicking and allow voters, if you like, a free hit or a free pass to tell the Government in Westminster what it thinks of it.

[Manveen Rana]

You know, given the state of the final scoreboard, the Green Party leader, Zach Polanski has said that two party politics is dead in Britain. It does look like that, doesn't it? It does look like we're into a whole new political system.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

Yeah. It seems as though two party politics is really bursting at the seams and we're now in a place where the left and the right are both divided, which just can't function really under a first past the post system when it comes to the next election. I mean, there are some really sort of interesting records being broken. I think this is the second year in a row where the two parties, Labour and Conservatives, did not finish in first or second place overall in terms of the overall share of the votes. The Reform came out top with 26% and the Greens narrowly took second place with 18%. That's according to the BBC's projected national share of the votes. The Conservatives and Labour were basically left on 17% each, a joint tally making up just 34%, which is a record low for both main parties. And even once you factor the Liberal Democrats into the equation, they were not far behind on 16%. It shows a massive appetite for other political parties, independents and movements.

[Manveen Rana]

And you know, as we've said in both Wales and Scotland, it's often like the heartlands for Labour, which are now switching, you know, what does that mean, I suppose, in terms of just the tribalism that we've always known in British politics? Is that all gone?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

I mean, it's certainly true to say that there were some new thresholds reached. So Labour's performance was worse than any government which was then re elected and worse than the tory locals in 2024, I. E. Just before Rishi Sunak's sort of historic loss. Obviously, the Tories have also done pretty poorly. They were on their lowest total number of councillors since 1997. And I think what that signals is that tribalism in many areas has basically disappeared. Voters are kind of angry with the status quo. And you hear critics in Labour saying that the party has been seen as too much of a defender of it and not keen enough to move fast and break things. And it's also true that where Labour has really suffered in its heartlands, as you were saying there, the ripple effect of that will be felt for years. There was one MP I spoke to recently who said today's councillors are tomorrow's activists, effectively meaning that losing them now means that they're less likely to come out and support you do all that door knocking and volunteering at the next general election. So there is a lot of pain to be felt across Labour's heartlands.

[Manveen Rana]

And Aubrey, given the battering that Labour has experienced in these elections, how is Keir Starmer responding to it?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

In a word, predictably, because it echoes a lot of the sentiment that we've heard from him before when there have been these big crunch moments and cris of confidence. On Friday, Keir Starmer came out nice and early acknowledging that the results were tough, very tough. Let me be clear, these are really tough results. I'm not going to sugarcoat it. And we have lost brilliant Labour representatives, people who put so much into their communities. But he was going to refuse to walk away, I think probably trying to win some plaudits for being somebody who saw that there was a fight still to be had and that he didn't want to sort of leave the country in turmoil. And by coming out quite early on Friday, before a lot of the results had been declared, he was able to do that interview before the sort of full extent of the picture was known. Then on Saturday, we saw the Prime Minister appointing Gordon Brown as special envoy on global finance and Harriet Harman, Labour grandee, if you like, a former Cabinet minister and interim leader, as an advisor on women and girls. So a real blast from the past and sort of sucker for anyone who thinks that this is effectively a sort of new Labour Tribute act and that it is sort of devoid of ideas of its own. The Prime Minister then went further and gave an interview to the Observer. That interview seems to have only really added fuel to the fire because within it, the Prime Minister was asked whether he would fulfil his promise to lead a decade of national renewal, that is go into the next election, fight it and serve for a full five years, meaning he'd have spent 10 years in Downing street in total, which only angered Labour MPs and thought it was a completely teen eared response to his election defeat.

[Manveen Rana]

There are lots of Labour MPs who now seem to be getting quite anxious about having Keir Starmer still at the top. We're hearing more and more people coming out in a way that doesn't often happen, but coming out and calling for him to go or to at least express a timeline for when he'll go. Talk us through the responses we've heard this weekend and how serious that threat is at the moment.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

I will actually start with Louise Haig, an MP in Sheffield on Friday afternoon after her local council leader has just lost his seat. And it was her that effectively fired the starting gun on this.

[Manveen Rana]

She said, well, he is doing an

[Aubrey Allegretti]

incredible job at the moment on the

[Manveen Rana]

international stage in the middle of global

[Aubrey Allegretti]

instability and a war, and it is imperative that he is successful in that

[Manveen Rana]

role because our constituents livelihoods are dependent upon it. But I think what is abundantly clear is that unless the government delivers significant

[Aubrey Allegretti]

and urgent change, then the Prime Minister cannot lead us into another election. So interesting to note in that that she is effectively putting an asterisk after saying that the Prime Minister should quit. She is saying unless there's urgent change and she's also saying that the timeline for this should be within the next 12 months, that is before another election. And then throughout the day, it caused a bit of a cascade again, starting with figures who are very much seen as being aligned on the soft left with people like Andy Burnham and Angela Rayner. You had a backbencher called Anneliese Midgley, another one called Sarah Owen and others who are really closely associated with the Tribune group of left wing Labour MPs. They are by no means the sort of usual suspects. And what I mean by that is the socialist campaign group, which is the sort of hardcore cadre of around 12 to 15 benches who are, to be brutally honest, kind of malcontents when it comes to this Labour government and would frankly have called for Keir Starmer to go at almost the drop of a hat at any opportunity during the course of that Friday. It seemed to escalate quite significantly. And what started as a trickle became a flood. I think we had over 20 by the end of Friday and over the course of the weekend we've now reached 40. So it's more than doubled and new names are being added even as we talk now on Sunday afternoon. Another thing we've seen recently is Catherine west, the MP for Hornsey in North London and a former Foreign Office minister, saying that she will come out and trigger a leadership contest if Keir Starmer doesn't step down voluntarily and allow an orderly process for his successor to be found.

[Manveen Rana]

And Aubrey, just talk us through that. You know, most people won't even have heard of Catherine west until. Until she threw her hat in the ring. What happens now? And is there a scenario in which the Stalking horse candidate effectively could actually end up running the party.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

It's very interesting. I mean, Catherine west is a pretty unknown figure, certainly outside Westminster and inside Parliament. Friends of hers I spoke to have been saying, you know, she doesn't sort of spent her evenings in the bars and restaurants of Parliament, cavorting with colleagues and trying to sort of bend their ear. This is not a sort of major mover, shaker and influencer. Although, having said that, she has actually already ended the career of one Prime Minister because she asked the question at PMQs of Boris Johnson during the Partygate scandal that was later used in the evidence to effectively find him guilty of having misled Parliament by the Privileges Committee.

[Manveen Rana]

Will the Prime Minister tell the House whether there was a party in Downing street on the 13th of November?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

So she's already ended the career of one Prime Minister, now she's looking to do the same for a second.

[Manveen Rana]

Definitely. More than a footnote in the political history of this country, what do we know about Keir Starmer's approach to. To try and get through all of this? We know that he's got a big speech coming up. Is there a strategy, is there something he can do to reset his relationship with the party and with the country?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

I think there's a lot of pressure on number 10 to get this moment right, because some MPs who are still agitating against the Prime Minister don't want to look too spurious by sort of pledging to go over the top without giving him his final chance on Monday. But I think secretly they don't believe that there is any realistic way for him to convince them and to turn things around. All of the briefing that we've heard about this speech before, the scale of the losses became known was that it would be focused on closer ties with the eu, but it would be largely devoid of new policy. And I think a lot of MPs will just be asking not whether Keir Starmer has the hunger to change things, but whether he has the ability to. I keep going back to a quote from Angela Rayner in a private meeting many months ago now, where she said that Keir Starmer couldn't run a bath. And what she meant by that was not that he was inept, but that he was often kept out of decision making. He was seemingly not in control of his own destiny. And that, I think, is the greatest fear amongst MPs who believe that even if Keir Starmel really, really, really wanted to improve things and significantly change things, he just doesn't have the sort of ability to grip the government, move fast and break things and and bend the government in to his will in the way that they want to see.

[Manveen Rana]

Coming up, what happens if Keir Starmer goes. That's in just a moment.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

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[Manveen Rana]

Aubrey the Sunday Times yesterday included a piece from Jason Cowley, one of our colleagues, who wrote that Starmer has been Prime Minister for less than two years and is pleasing none of the people all of the time. In trying to understand how we got to this point with the local election results, just talk us through where things really went wrong for him.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

So I'm actually going to go with quite a curveball start to this very complex answer, and begin with the issue of assisted dying. And for many Labour MPs, it was their first real taste of organizing, of rebellions, of plotting, and they kind of developed an appetite for running their own whipping operations that they had never encountered before. And it certainly wasn't the sort of complete spark that fueled the remainder of the sort of 18 months of chaos that have largely followed. But it was certainly a catalyst. And I think since then we have seen Labour MPs growing increasingly in confidence and feeling emboldened to rebel against the government. You'll remember that crunch vote over welfare reforms where number 10 of the treasury were forced to back down in the face of a rebellion by over 100 Labour MPs. There was also obviously lots of anger over the winter fuel allowance cuts. There have obviously been lots of U turns and things like digital id, which before it was announced by this government, was a relatively sort of popular policy in principle. But as soon as it came into political contact with ministers became increasingly unpopular. There were obviously complaints about Keir Starmer's own perceived lack of charisma and his lack of drive. My colleague Patrick McGuire wrote very memorably about Keir Starmer being like the DLR, the Docklands Light Railway for those London Dwellers listeners, which is effectively a sort of unmanned computerized train that doesn't require a driver, it doesn't need to think for itself. And there have obviously been many more issues besides that. I mean, in the Prime Minister's defence, he obviously experienced the Southport riots very soon after he was elected and there was lots of praise for his handling of those. Since then, of course, the Labour government has done some things that many MPs have been waiting for a long time for. It's cut the 2 child benefit cap, it's invested lots of money in schools and the nhs. And there have been a raft of pieces of legislation to give people rights like renters and workers. But I think it's just ultimately come too slowly for voters who were incredibly impatient and viewed the government as too pessimistic.

[Manveen Rana]

And it does feel like they have a communication problem, even on, even on the policies that they could claim as a victory. How much time does he have, realistically? You know, you've been speaking for lots of people in the party who think there should be a timeline. A year he's been saying he wants 10. How long does he actually have?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

Well, for the Prime Minister, I think the die has been cast in terms of his long term future. It seems that there are very few Labour MPs, even loyalists, who think that he will lead them into the next election, but that he has some control over the manner of his departure and whether it comes in a matter of days or weeks or possibly months instead. And I think the things keeping Keir Starmer safe were effectively that no faction wanted to be seen to move against him and therefore be blamed for bringing him down and their candidate therefore incurring a loss because of it. What's happened instead is that you have the sort of three groups of the Labour Party, not that they can be as crudely defined as such, but let's do it for the sake of argument, the sort of hard lefts, which is the socialist campaign group, the. The soft left and the moderates, all effectively having big name MPs coming out and calling for the Prime Minister to go, meaning that not any one of them can be blamed for necessarily fueling this spiral. Again, we haven't had any ministerial resignations, so that is the thing keeping Keir Starmer the safest. He is still able to form a government that makes him different from someone like Boris Johnson, whom MPs were literally queuing up to tell him to go, or threatening to resign from their posts. There have been some notably sort of lacking in strength supportive messages from Cabinet ministers like Lisa Nanti and Ed Miliband, as well as West Reading. So it will be interesting to see whether those translate into them pulling away support completely in the coming weeks.

[Manveen Rana]

If this does now lead to an accelerated leadership challenge, I mean, who do you think will emerge as candidates?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

The field still seems fairly wide and it depends slightly on exactly when the contest is called, but so far it seems like West Reading remains the candidate of the sort of moderates or centrists. You have Angela Rayner and Andy Burnham both vying for that kind of big soft left position. And then you even have the Cabinet Minister, Ed Miliband, who's obviously the Energy Secretary and a former Labour leader himself. Allies of Edward, telling me a couple of weeks ago, he's like Donald Trump. He knows much better what he'd like to do second time round, effectively comparing him to when Trump ran for the White House again successfully in 2024.

[Manveen Rana]

Although unlike Donald Trump, we should say he's never actually won an election.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

That's true. You also have other sort of maverick contenders. There are lots of outsider names being thrown around, including from the 2024 intake, who, let's not forget, make up effectively half the parliamentary Labour Party. They're a big force to be reckoned with and they have shown that they can successfully vote en bloc to support themselves in the past. They include people like Al Khans, who's a Defence Minister. I remember one of his allies recently saying to me, we're building an army for Al. And, you know, it sort of speaks to, I think, the hunger of some of these new intake MPs who think that their next leader needs to be somebody who didn't necessarily serve in this government or comes from a little bit separated from it. That's why Andy Burnham is seen as having such appeal. I should also say that if there were a Labour leadership contest, there would be entitled to be Standing as a candidate one Sir Keir Starmer himself. And how he might articulate himself in a leadership contest is completely fascinating considering the platform that he obviously ran on in 2020 was so magnificently jettisoned because he effectively ran to try and win over what was then a very left wing membership and shed a lot of those policies in the aftermath in a bid to make Labour more sort of appealing in the mind of the sort of middle ground, Middle England voters, if you like.

[Manveen Rana]

And Aubrey, everybody's talking about Andy Burnham as a plausible candidate, but you know, the last time he tried to stand in a bar election, he, Keir Starmer stopped that from happening. Is there even a route into Parliament for him, let alone one into power?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

Well, anti Burnham's allies are bullish that they will be able to find an MP to stand down so that he can replace them. That would obviously require the consent of Labour's ruling body, which is known as the National Executive Committee. And last time they met in January to consider his bids to stand in Gorton and Denton, they blocked him. It was 8 to 1 in fact. And Shabana Mahmoud, who was chairing the meeting, abstained. But it was still very much a sort of landslide defeat for Andy Burnham, whose only supporter on the committee was Lucy Powell, Labour's deputy leader. I think since then the sands have shifted somewhat. Starmer loyalists still feel very, very strongly that Andy Burnham has been unhelpful, a detractor, a sort of outside critic of the Labour Party. They say that he effectively ran scared and wasn't there during the, the difficult years when Jeremy Corbyn was leader. And so there's a real sort of bitterness and resentment with which he's viewed by Keir Starmer's supporters. Having said all of that, he polls clearly better than the Prime Minister. He's seen as having truck and big influence and appeal to both reform voters on the one hand and Green voters, making him pretty uniquely placed among Labour politicians. And for that reason I think even people who were sort of gently opposed to him returning before are increasingly of the view that he might be the only answer to their prayers.

[Manveen Rana]

Well, Aubrey, tell us a bit more about that because you know, even if Keir Starmer is replaced, there is going to be a battle for the Labour Party to try and reclaim its base from both the working class that is often shifted towards reform and sort of, you know, the progressive, more urban voters who had voted Labour at the last general election but now seem to be shifting towards the Greens. Are there candidates who can try and bring Some of those core voters back to Labour, certainly.

[Aubrey Allegretti]

I mean, I would suggest that the volatility of certainly the last five years, but you could extend it back a bit further than that to maybe 10 or 11, suggests that if Labour can lose voters, it might be able to win them. If not just as quickly, then people are possibly still willing to give them a hearing by the time of the next election if the parties recognized their concerns and chosen a new leader. I think there was some polling from public firsts which found that the majority of Green voters disapproved of Starmer, but most approved of Andy Burnham. And then Amongst Reform voters, 83% disapproved of Starmer and 37% of Burnham. So he's clearly a politician who holds great sway amongst lots of the electorate and he's been making many speeches and interventions, talking about economics, Manchesterism, as he calls it. But whether or not those really sort of survive contact with the bond markets, who have a say over the price of government long term debt, and with government institutions themselves, which will of course put some of those sort of guardrails in place to say what are and aren't possible. That remains to be seen.

[Manveen Rana]

And Aubrey, for Labour, who will be licking their wounds over the next few weeks, what can they do to recover?

[Aubrey Allegretti]

Labour is in a way, I think, a victim of its own success. And what I mean by that is that when you look back to the 2024 election sort of mandate or slogan, it was encapsulated in this single word of change, which simultaneously meant everything and nothing. It sort of encapsulated the vibe, the feeling at the 2016 Brexit referendum, which in many cases was probably about people wanting to leave the eu, but it was also a rejection of the status quo and political elites that were effectively enabling it. I think since July 2024, Labour has struggled to show whose side it's on and it's risked trying to cater to all, all but pleasing none and mps. I speak to say that they want politicians with conviction, they want someone who is willing to have an argument to articulate it and that those sorts of people will much more likely be ultimately rewarded by voters.

[Manveen Rana]

That was Aubrey Allegretti, the Times chief political correspondent. The producers today were Sophie McNulty and Dave Creasy. The executive producer was Tim Walklate. Sound design was by Dave Creasy and theme composition was by Malicetto. We'll continue to cover the fallout of the election as things progress this week. So if you have a question about this or any other big headline do. Drop us a line to the [e-mail] we'll be back tomorrow. Thanks for listening.

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