Oh dear. It seems that nothing is going Keir Starmer’s way. Our poor PM is losing Labour MPs at a rate of knots, with nearly 40 now demanding his hand. With Wes Streeting’s allies briefing furiously, it increasingly looks like the Labour leader’s days are numbered. And this evening Angela Rayner has decided to get in on the act, releasing a 1,028-word statement that makes her discontent clear.
The ex deputy-PM declares, sorrowfully, that given how ‘many good Labour colleagues have lost their seats’ it is clear ‘what we are doing isn’t working, and it needs to change.’ Warning, ominously, that ‘this may be our last chance’, Rayner – with all the hand-wringing worthy of a Maria Callas hit – insists ‘we must be the party of working people’. In a post which really could have done with a sub-edit, she gushes that:
Ordinary people are paying the price for decisions they didn’t make. It’s no wonder that across the UK, working people feel the system is rigged against them. Things can be so much better than this. Countries including Spain and Canada have shown that economies can grow and people can thrive when governments stay true to labour and social democratic values and put people first. We need to learn from that…. We are in danger of becoming a party of the well-off, not working people. The Peter Mandelson scandal showed a toxic culture of cronyism. Decisions like cutting winter fuel allowance just weren’t what people expected from a Labour government. For too long, successive governments have allowed wealth and power to concentrate at the top without a plan to ensure the benefits of economic growth are shared fairly.
In other words: a pitch-perfect appeal to the average angry Labour activist. To solve all this, Rayner argues, the choices are obvious: more devolution, a higher minimum wage and boosting community ownership. But she saves the best idea for last, declaring that ‘it is time to acknowledge that blocking Andy Burnham was a mistake.’ There’s a fun one for whoever does the morning media round to face tomorrow! Rayner ends her manifest- sorry, her plea, with the warning that ‘Labour exists to make working people better off. That is not happening fast enough, and it needs to change – now.’
Good luck Keir – you’ll need it.
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