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How Keir Starmer's support evaporated in just 24 months
The silence over the weekend from Prime Minister Keir Starmer's front bench was both deafening and telling.
Barely a single member of Starmer's cabinet emerged to publicly implore the embattled leader to remain at his post — not even two years after he led a historic election win, and with his job on the line and adversaries circling.
By the time Monday morning rolled around, and the familiar wooden podium was moved outside the iconic door of the prime minister's residence at 10 Downing Street, that silence foretold the decision that had essentially been forced on Starmer.
Barely two years after a historic election win, Keir Starmer resigned, with Andy Burnham poised to inherit a deeply polarized country.
"The question my party is asking now is whether I am best placed to lead us into the next general election," he said. "I have heard the answer of my parliamentary party to that question. And I accept that answer with good grace."
Starmer said he will remain as caretaker prime minister throughout the summer, until his party can organize a leadership convention — which is already looking more like a coronation for Andy Burnham, Greater Manchester's long-time mayor who was just re-elected to Parliament on Thursday.
Taking over from the polarizing Jeremy Corbyn, who was on Labour's hard left, Starmer presented Labour as a moderate, centrist party. He promised to bring stability to Britain after the turbulence of Brexit, the COVID-19 pandemic and the implosion of the Conservative Party, which burned through four prime ministers in short succession.
His plans to claw back more than five and half billion pounds from the welfare budget enraged many Labour MPs, triggering a rebellion that ultimately forced him to back down. He also backtracked on a pledge to cut tuition fees and watered down a commitment to move the U.K. away from oil and gas production.
Local elections in May proved to be the decisive blow. Labour suffered massive losses while Reform and the Greens surged.
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