Sir Keir Starmer insisted on Monday he was “not ready to step down” after surviving the most serious challenge yet to his leadership, even as fresh tensions emerged between the embattled British prime minister and one of his major rivals.
Starmer’s authority was badly damaged after Anas Sarwar, the leader of Labor in Scotland, asked him to resign less than two years after winning power, saying “too many mistakes” had been made.
Aides to the prime minister claimed Sarwar’s move was co-ordinated with Health Secretary Wes Streeting, who is seen as a contender for the Labor leadership if Starmer leaves office.
One MP close to Starmer said, “You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to wonder whether Wes was aware of this and encouraged him to make the move.”
Streeting’s team hit back, criticizing Starmer’s Downing Street operation for trying to implicate the Health Secretary despite voicing some support for the Prime Minister.
A Streeting spokesperson said, “We did not ask Anas to do this, he did not co-ordinate with Anas on this, Anas is the leader of the Scottish Labor Party, he is his own man and Wes has the utmost respect for him.”
On Monday evening, Starmer addressed the weekly meeting of the parliamentary Labor Party, urging more time to bring about “change” in the country.
Saying he had won every battle he faced, Starmer told Labor MPs: “After fighting so hard for the chance to change our country, I am not prepared to step back from my mandate and my responsibility to our country.”
He described the fight with the right-wing populist party Reform UK as “the fight of our lives, the fight of our times”.
One person at the meeting of Labor MPs said that overall there was strong support for Starmer, although some unfavorable questions were raised by a handful of backbenchers.
Another person said: “There won’t be any bids for the leadership anytime soon, this felt like a real wall of support for the Prime Minister.”
The crisis engulfing the prime minister began in late January, when the US released documents showing that Lord Peter Mandelson passed confidential UK government information to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in the wake of the 2007 financial crisis.
The revelations, which also included bank statements showing Epstein sending money to Mandelson several years earlier, intensified questions over Starmer’s appointment of him to the role of UK ambassador to the US.
Starmer’s communications director Tim Allen stepped down on Monday, the latest senior aide to step down. Number 10 chief of staff Morgan McSweeney had resigned a day earlier, saying he had taken full responsibility for advising the prime minister on appointing Mandelson as ambassador to the US.
It emerged on Monday evening that Cabinet Secretary Sir Chris Wormald is in talks to step down from the government after just 14 months in the role, according to officials.
A person familiar with the matter said Wormald’s expected exit, first reported by the Guardian, is part of a broader reset at the top of the Starmer government.
Earlier Sarwar, who fears a major defeat in Scottish Parliament elections in May, said the public was “crying out for a capable government”.
The pound fell against the euro and government borrowing costs rose as traders bet on the increasing likelihood of Starmer leaving office.
But the entire Cabinet later issued a public declaration of loyalty to the Prime Minister, calming financial markets.
Streeting’s announcement of support was the slowest from Cabinet. He told Sky News that Starmer “doesn’t need to resign” but acknowledged the atmosphere in Westminster was “feverous”.
Streeting, once a close aide to Mandelson, tried on Monday to put distance between himself and the former ambassador by releasing dozens of messages exchanged since August 2024.
Streeting said he had “nothing to hide” about his relationship with Mandelson, with one message showing the Health Secretary saying he could be “harassed” at the next general election in his Ilford North constituency after Labor lost a safe council seat in a local election last year.
The messages also suggested that Streeting was pushing Starmer to take a tougher stance on Israel last year, arguing that there were moral and political reasons to take a leadership role in condemning the state’s actions in the Palestinian territories.
An aide to Starmer said there was growing anger among some cabinet ministers over Streeting’s alleged disloyalty.
The briefing war has echoes of the battle that began between Streeter and Number 10 in November, when Starmer’s aides told him the prime minister would fight any challenger to his leadership, and the health secretary was collecting signatures for his bid. Streeting denied the claim and criticized Number 10 officials at the time.
Streeting, who comes from the right wing of the Labor Party, is seen as a key rival to former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, who will rely on the support of the left in the battle to succeed Starmer.
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper confirmed that Starmer is set to attend the Munich security conference later this week.
He is likely to try to build on Cooper’s statement that his leadership is needed “not just domestically but on the global stage.”
But many Labor MPs believe Starmer is now stepping down before his colleagues topple him, either after the impending parliamentary by-elections in Gorton and Denton in Greater Manchester, or after voting in Scotland, Wales and parts of England in May.
