Vote West, get Wes? Why some Labour MPs are worried about 10 Downing Streeting
Vote West, get Wes? Why some Labour MPs are worried about 10 Downing Streeting
Timing is everything, for example had North Korea invaded South Korea the day after the release of Gangnam Style nobody would have protested and many would have praised them, but now, it would lead to all sorts of denunciations and bad consequences for North Korea.
The timing is everything mantra is focussing the minds of plenty of Labour MPs and Andy Burnham. On the left of the party the thought of replacing Sir Keir Starmer with Wes Streeting is a seen as bit like soiling your trousers and choosing to replace only your hat. Andy Burnham realises an early contest rules him out.
So we're faced with the curious position of the likes of John McDonnell and the titan this is Richard Burgon defending Starmer from being ousted this week, this is 5D levels of chess or just plain ineptitude.
Before the locals it was said Wes Streeting had the numbers to trigger a contest so it is possible they back Catherine West as a means of ensuring their man becomes leader.
I have said I consider Wes Streeting the least transfer friendly candidate under the alternative vote system Labour use to elect their leader. RIght now I consider there to be some value in backing Streeting.
What is clear so far is that the Labour Party once again doesn't possess the ruthlessness of the Tory Party when it comes to ousting leaders.
Timing is everything, for example had North Korea invaded South Korea the day after the release of Gangnam Style nobody would have protested and many would have praised them, but now, it would lead to all sorts of denunciations and bad consequences for North Korea.
The timing is everything mantra is focussing the minds of plenty of Labour MPs and Andy Burnham. On the left of the party the thought of replacing Sir Keir Starmer with Wes Streeting is a seen as bit like soiling your trousers and choosing to replace only your hat. Andy Burnham realises an early contest rules him out.
So we're faced with the curious position of the likes of John McDonnell and the titan this is Richard Burgon defending Starmer from being ousted this week, this is 5D levels of chess or just plain ineptitude.
Before the locals it was said Wes Streeting had the numbers to trigger a contest so it is possible they back Catherine West as a means of ensuring their man becomes leader.
I have said I consider Wes Streeting the least transfer friendly candidate under the alternative vote system Labour use to elect their leader. RIght now I consider there to be some value in backing Streeting.
What is clear so far is that the Labour Party once again doesn't possess the ruthlessness of the Tory Party when it comes to ousting leaders.
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Nigel Farage's loyalty lies either to the guy in Thailand who gave him £5 million, or to his idol Donald Trump. He's clearly happy to distort policy to satisfy both of them. Can we chuck Farage out of the country?
I’m sure he’s learned and grown in the eight years since our paths separated, but it’s still weird to have someone I knew as an actual person, rather than a face on TV, possibly about to run the country.
https://x.com/Peston/status/2053478593146012021
My unscientific weekend poll of Labour MPs and government ministers is that Keir Starmer will be replaced as their leader and the country’s prime minister “by the end of the year”.
They also say that an immediate defenestration and snap leadership election should be avoided if possible, for two reasons.
First, the party needs to have a debate about its future direction and what could be a “big story of hope for Britain” they could coalesce around and sell to voters
Second, the leadership change should be orderly, respectful and likely to yield a stable outcome.
This means, they say, that the process needs to be long enough to allow Andy Burnham the opportunity to resign as mayor of Greater Manchester and contest a by-election.
Which is not to say they all want Burnham as Britain’s next prime minister. Some do. Some don’t.
What it means is they fear he and his supporters would never cease to lobby to be Labour leader, and therefore no new leader would be secure, unless Burnham was given the opportunity to win a leadership contest or crash and burn.
“If Andy feels he is blocked again, any new leader will be toast before the next election,” one senior MP said to me.
And to give Burnham the rope he wants, the leadership contest has to be delayed till the autumn, say his friends and foes.
Later the same day West might lodge a challenge, but probably not. If Starmer's many enemies are not backing her I don't see where she gets enough support. Streeting then needs to decide if he goes over the top giving up the highest spending cabinet position. I think he will duck it.
So Starmer limps on, wounded but alive. Oh, and entirely incidentally, the country continues to go to hell in a hand cart.
Streeting's got such a compelling backstory, working class family, went to Cambridge and look at him now.
*wakes up*
Nah I'm sure ChatGPT will fart something generic out about hope and change and change and hope.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzrFrsiR3Fg
EXCLUSIVE
Wes Streeting has told Sir Keir Starmer that he is preparing his case to be the next Prime Minister, the Telegraph can disclose.
An ally says: “Wes has made it clear to No10 that he won’t challenge Keir, but he is preparing a case if it all falls apart.
“Like most of the party, he thinks Keir is owed the chance to set out how he’s going to turn things around this week. He’s not plotting.”
If Streeting does launch a leadership campaign, I understand he will argue that he is the only candidate who can beat Reform UK, after Labour held on to his local Redbridge council this week.
He will point out that Angela Rayner’s council fell to Reform.
"I'm still not sure it answers the question of why immigrants should be less able to access the opportunities that exist in the UK than people born here."
Because what your questions in your post utterly ignore are that a nation is a home and that people in that home are entitled to decide who joins their family. You talk about dehumanising immigrants but your post dehumanises those already living here by denying them any agency at all in who is allowed to join them - and in what numbers. You assume that if a migrant wants to come here (and your post confuses migrants and asylum seekers) that is the only factor: he or she wants, he or she has some gumption so he or she gets.
But what about people born and living here? Do they not get a say?
I am not a Reform supporter so cannot speak for them.
But people in a country should have agency over who is permitted to join them because the country is their home and homes are not open to anyone, regardless of who they are or what they bring, to anyone who demands entry.
That sense of home, of "this is us, this is who we are", of a social contract, of burden sharing, of mutual obligations, of trust, of control are essential to any well-functioning society, any group - frankly - including a school - which you should understand - and certainly a nation. Mass immigration with little control and with a sense of contempt for those feeling that their home has been changed without their consent and in ways they don't like breaks that down and fractures society. That is I think at the root of why people who feel this turn to Reform in the absence of other more established parties paying any attention to their concerns.
This article by Matthew Syed describes this well - https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/reform-uk-local-election-result-stoke-r23mtlhbp
A Ukrainian man finds a genie in a bottle. The genie offers him three wishes.
The Ukrainian says, “I want the Chinese to invade Ukraine and then go back to China.”
So it happens.
For his next wish, the Ukrainian also asks for the Chinese to invade Ukraine and then go home.
So it happens.
For his third wish, the Ukrainian again asks for the Chinese to invade Ukraine and go home.
“I gave you three wishes,” the genie cries. “Why did you ask for the Chinese to invade Ukraine and then go home three times?”
“Because they had to march across Russia six times.”
He has a paltry 500 vote majority . Elections are nationwide and Redbridge is hostile territory for Reform.
I like Streeting and he’s a good communicator but there’s also the elephant in the room that he’s gay and how well will that go down in less socially liberal parts of the country?
I couldn’t care less about his sexuality but others might .
1. Streeting is the most likely contender to take on both Farage and Polanski, and defeat them, and:
2. Streeting is the least likely contender to be elected by the Labour Party to be its leader.
And that's why there's such interest in Burnham, for whom 2. may not apply if he were an MP.
- Glenn Gibbins (Sunderland): suspended by Reform following allegations of racism;
- Jay Cooper (Sefton): declared “not welcome” by Farage following reports of him calling the Holocaust a hoax;
- Daniel Devaney (Bradford) said he was pulling out before polling day but got elected anyway... it's not yet clear if he is resigning as a councillor....
https://x.com/JohnRentoul/status/2053410295159074957
Fascinating admission of failure by @RishiSunak
And compared to Truss, he was the sane one.
Starmer just does not understand that being PM means taking decisons, standing by them, and just doing it
It may well be unkind, but he looks like a middle manager on a tourist visa as he goes to meeting after meeting, usually abroad, with these meetings announcing more meetings and everyone looking self satisfied as they smile for the camera and nothing is done
This comes back to the Ming vase and totally unprepared for government
Labour need to rip off the plaster now, as a 6 month leadership debacle will only make things worse and paralyse government
I think he is also right in saying that the problems governments have is the interventionist role played by our courts but he completely fails to recognise that it is politicians who have given the courts both the power and duty to do that.
The answer to me is much more fundamental. It is withdrawal from the Convention on Refugees and passing legislation that those who come here by boat without our permission will simply be ejected because they have no rights whatsoever. But our political class are simply not up for that kind of law. Its much easier to blame the courts for enforcing the laws they passed.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/may/10/starmer-faces-perilous-24-hours-streeting-readying-leadership-bid?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
It appears to be happening. Wes ready to move and perhaps Angela as well
I agree that home, culture and the social contract is important. As I hope I made clear, I have huge sympathy for those who are bearing the brunt of economic migration (a previous girlfriend's grandparents lived on a street in Peterborough that experienced enormous culture change in a short space of time that massively disrupted their sense of place and of home, about which they were powerless. Watching it happen was quite a formative experience for me).
I am reluctantly supportive of the main thrust of my original post - that, despite being one of the wealthiest countries on earth, we seem not to be able to afford to provide adequately for our own citizens, nor for migrants. I lament this but I don't deny it. I do not assume that if a migrant wants to come here they should be allowed to. I can entirely understand why in practice we need to restrict inward migration. I agree the scale of migration in the last few years was a mistake, especially after a decade or more of austerity.
I am interested in the justification for refusing entry to a migrant, or an asylum seeker, though. (I realise even now I may be being very unclear, apologies).
As an aside I don't believe the nation or country has the role you are claiming for it. Communities and smaller groups do. We drape ourselves in flags to try to pretend the country (or at least the state) is home, but for most people home is the community around them. I think Reform are selling a nonsense to communities in Peterborough and elsewhere that by making the nation or the state 'home', their lives will improve. There remains huge inequality within our country and I do not believe Reform will address this, in fact I think the opposite will happen.
But the central thrust of my disagreement with you is that someone who happens to have been born in UK or has citizenship somehow 'deserves' to have the power to create the sort of home you write of, whereas someone born in a poorer part of the world does not. I am not arguing that the former doesn't deserve this power. I think they do. I just think migrants of whatever form also do.
I think he is also right in saying that the problems governments have is the interventionist role played by our courts but he completely fails to recognise that it is politicians who have given the courts both the power and duty to do that.
The answer to me is much more fundamental. It is withdrawal from the Convention on Refugees and passing legislation that those who come here by boat without our permission will simply be ejected because they have no rights whatsoever. But our political class are simply not up for that kind of law. Its much easier to blame the courts for enforcing the laws they passed.
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Blockquote failure - above is DavidL, below is me
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They suffer from a lack of imagination. Some of the refugee treaties are now out of date. The only options that ever even get discussed are staying in (and moaning about them) or leaving them. Two better options are creating a new one and inviting others to join, or setting out the reforms we want (most European countries want similar if not quite the same) and indicating we need it changed within 2 or 3 years max or we will then leave.
Ministers don't even have the power to enforce manifesto commitments these days, so how exactly did 'Conservatives' have the power to micro-manage the system to slow down, even if they'd wanted to?
The papers are just making stuff up at the moment.
Sir Keir’s former deputy has told the Prime Minister it is time to “bring our best players into Parliament”, in a move that could pave the way for the Greater Manchester Mayor to challenge Sir Keir for the Labour leadership.
Sir Keir is facing a make-or-break 24 hours, with a leadership challenge already expected on Monday from Catherine West, a backbencher, over Labour’s local election drubbing.
However, while Ms Rayner criticised the “toxic” culture in No 10 and said it might be Labour’s “last chance” to reverse its fortunes, she stopped short of joining the more than 40 MPs who have called for Sir Keir to go.
She said: “This is bigger than personalities, but it is time to acknowledge that blocking Andy Burnham was a mistake. We must show we understand the scale of change the moment calls for.
“That means bringing our best players into Parliament – and embracing the type of agenda that has been successful at a local level, rather than reaching back to an agenda and politics that has failed people.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/05/10/keir-starmer-local-elections-latest-labour-leadership/
The rest are all jockeying for position whilst playing 12D chess.
Ruthless barstewards.
I don't have high hopes that this lot will be any better, although I might be wrong.
People are complicated. They can have different identities and connections to different parts of the world. Those connections can be through birth, through heritage, through choice or through accident. That’s not a bad thing. It’s not a problem that needs fixing.
@Sandpit has a Ukrainian wife and lives in the UAE. Must we be scared in case his loyalties are split? @rcs1000 mostly lives in the US. Where do his loyalties lie? No, the question is only phrased about brown people, with a racist assumption that every Muslim must be suspected of supporting a global caliphate.
@Luckyguy1983 rhetorically asked what happens if there’s a war. Well, we’ve fought numerous wars with or in Muslim countries over many decades, and the country didn’t fall over because all the Muslims refused to join up. There’s no scary fifth column. Let’s treat people as people.
Oh wait...
Anyone who gets ILR is told lots of things, including this crucial paragraph:
"ILR is not the same as citizenship. While ILR grants permanent residence rights, it can be lost through extended absences from the UK (over 2 years) or serious criminal convictions. Only British citizenship provides truly permanent status that cannot be revoked under normal circumstances."
So they are made aware that it is contingent. That it CAN be revoked. There. Now that's settled, we can all calm down
He argues for a return to the pre-1998 situation before judicial activism where a decision is only overturned if it was so unreasonable that no reasonable person could have foreseen it.
All housed in four star hotels.
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That's factually true.
He argues for a return to the pre-1998 situation before judicial activism where a decision is only overturned if it was so unreasonable that no reasonable person could have foreseen it.
I think he misses one important point: politicians liked handing things off to judges, because it enabled them to escape responsibility for unpopular decisions.
She cannot be the next PM. But her analysis seems very astute to me.
Instead of treating 2 billion diverse people as a suspicious bloc, we should look at individuals as individuals. Is this individual (let’s call them Nigel), who hid a £5 million overseas donation while leading a political party, a potential danger? Yes. Is that person (let’s call them Sadiq), whose parents came from Pakistan and who celebrates Eid, a potential danger? No.
True, but the pendulum haa swung because of vaguely defined duties which has now made it inconvenient for politicians too, when they want to actually do stuff.
In any case I don't reject it as an organising principle per se. If I was 20 years younger and we went to war with Russia I'd like to hope I'd sign up to do my duty to defend the UK.
I do (largely) reject it as 'home' which was Anthony's premise.
I think he is also right in saying that the problems governments have is the interventionist role played by our courts but he completely fails to recognise that it is politicians who have given the courts both the power and duty to do that.
The answer to me is much more fundamental. It is withdrawal from the Convention on Refugees and passing legislation that those who come here by boat without our permission will simply be ejected because they have no rights whatsoever. But our political class are simply not up for that kind of law. Its much easier to blame the courts for enforcing the laws they passed.
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Having now been to Rwanda - last week - I can say with some authority that: it would likely have worked, if enacted properly
Rwanda is actually a perfect choice for such a scheme, in the absence of a handy but bleak nearby island, as the Australians had
It is a long long long way away. It is locked up in central Africa. It is poor and in some places grim, you really don't want to live there. But it it also stable and safe, so you can humanely send people there, if all these people care about is being safe (and that is supposedly the situation with asylum seekers, unless of course they are fake and just looking for better benefits and economic opportunity)
I reckon HMG would have solved the boats overnight if they'd managed to get a few hundred people there, but done it intensely - ie shipping 90% of arrivals in one month. That would have terrified the boat people and the boats would have stopped
What I have said is quite simple - that if people are beholden to an overriding loyalty that conflicts with loyalty to the host nation state, it is foolish to admit them.
Your riposte to that, that lots of Muslims are and have been loyal, isn’t a counter-argument. It addresses a point I haven't made.
All leaders have to make unpopular decisions sometimes, they cannot be eternally fortunate that only popular choices are open to them because not everything is in their control.
More to the point, the policy on ILR won't make a huge difference anyway, it's actually Labour's proposal to extend ILR to 10 years that is necessary and raising the bar for visa renewal to £60k or higher on all visa types. That will naturally mean very few visas are eligible for renewal and people will return home.
I also think we should adopt the US policy of making people apply for their visa extension outside of the country so if they are rejected they have no recourse to re-enter or fight the decision in court.
Finally I think Labour should propose a maximum visa length of 3 years rather than 5, requiring a minimum of 4 renewals before ILR is achieved.
Controversially I also think citizenship should have a 5 year "approval" period of some kind whereby it can be revoked if proof of fraud, criminal activity of support of terrorism is discovered.
We've been far, far too lax in handing out the golden ticket of citizenship over the past 50 years and the concept of how difficult it should be needs a big reassessment. British citizenship for foreign nationals should be seen as a huge privilege and the bar to obtain it should be set extremely high, I'd have it so that even "trivial" crime such as fare evasion would bar someone from eligibility for life and result in visa revocation and return flight. Immigration should be additive to society and importing any person who undermines a high trust society doesn't belong here