Keir Starmer’s team had a few moments to reminisce about the past three years at their regular morning meeting on Tuesday, with one senior aide recalling when their winning leadership team first walked into the leader of the opposition’s office.
It had only just been vacated by Jeremy Corbyn’s team and in one room, there were assorted revolutionary flags including one from the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. In the next room there was a large bin full to the brim with shredded documents spilling on to the floor. In Corbyn’s office was a sleeping bag. “You could not have pictured a more symbolic scene,” they said. [Members of Corbyn’s team have disputed details in this account, saying the offices were left tidily.]
Now, Starmer’s inner circle believe they are “three-quarters of the way through” his time as leader of the opposition as they prepare for a general election. They strongly believe an election will take place in May 2024 – not later that year – for a number of convincing reasons.
The first reason is that the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, would rather fight a general election at the same time as local elections in May next year than risk another set of damaging results potentially opening up an opportunity for Boris Johnson to mount a last-minute challenge to replace him.
“Some of their voters will treat those local elections as midterms and protest against them, but they would otherwise vote Tory in a general election, because that’s what happens to governments. If you’re a few points behind, why risk things looking worse? We have to be ready for May ‘24,” one strategist said.
There is another key argument: Labour has been losing a lot of its key policy platforms to the Conservatives. Most noticeably childcare, which was set to be the major offer from shadow education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, but also key welfare reforms proposed by the shadow work and pensions secretary, Jon Ashworth, as well as a smattering of smaller policies.
The internal wisdom is that Labour should not spell out its biggest manifesto offers until after the budget next spring, expected to be a “pre-election giveaway”. But a May election would give the Tories an advantage because it would squeeze Labour’s time to make their case.
September’s Labour conference will be structured as the final pre-election rally, setting out a “serious proposition for government”. That will mean walking a tightrope – setting out a vision with concrete proposals for government without giving away everything before the final push.
There are few in Starmer’s shadow cabinet who are enthusiastic about the five missions that he is setting out over the course of the coming months, all of which include a sprinkling of policy – so far on economic targets and policing.
“I don’t think they will register with the public at all,” one shadow minister said. “Their main usefulness is keeping my colleagues on message.”
The other useful tool keeping party discipline in check is the looming threat of a post-May reshuffle, which has led some shadow cabinet ministers to suddenly lurch into hyperactivity.
However, several of Starmer’s closest allies say they expect any reshuffle to be limited, with changes to shadow new government departments, some roles moved out of shadow cabinet and promotions for a very select few, including the shadow policing minister, Sarah Jones, and select committee chair, Darren Jones.
There is widespread acknowledgment that Labour has not yet found its killer slogan or message – instead a dozen or so vapid messages such as “security, prosperity, respect” or “build a better Britain”.
But another shadow cabinet minister said they were less convinced of the need for a perfect motto and it was more about “Keir’s capacity to look like the change candidate”.
Although Sunak’s ratings are still exceeding that of his party, his much-touted recovery has been wobbly in the polls to say the least. What has remained consistent in polls is the public saying they want to see change – two-thirds of adults in the latest Ipsos poll.
“The most effective slogan I can recall from Labour was Harold Wilson’s hammering home the 13 years of Tory misrule, that the past belongs to the Tories, the future belongs to all of us,” the shadow cabinet minister said.
In Starmer’s inner circle, there has been a concerted push to expand horizons beyond the “red wall”.
Part of that push was the latest Labour Together report, which identified “Stevenage Woman” – the socially conservative full-time working woman hit by the cost of living – as a key target.
“The red wall gets you to Ed Miliband territory,” one of those present for the group’s presentation said. “We do not need to just listen to a focus group in Bassetlaw and think: job done.”
Local elections in a month’s time will give the party’s election team its best indicator yet as to how the party is faring in places it needs to increase the vote in order to get a majority.
Shifts in polling can often mask the scale of the challenge. “Our vote distribution in 2020 was very poor,” one senior strategist said. “Last year it was even more important that we are winning in Cumbria, making progress in Kirklees, in Stevenage, winning in the red wall and marginal seats. That’s the kind of progress that we’re looking to do again.”
The party has spent £1.5m this year on its trainee organisers’ programme, with 75 new organisers. It has selected 117 candidates, almost all of whom are pro-Starmer – although amid significant controversy.
The ruthlessness of that approach, including excluding candidates for some very spurious reasons, has made even some of the most hardened political figures in the party flinch.
But those running the strategy inside Labour HQ say it is a very specific part of the marginal seats strategy. They argue candidates will be particularly important at this election where there are very fine margins in many seats, with trust that needs to be built and established locally.
There can be no doubt the machine politics has left many party members – and even perhaps its voters – feeling uneasy. Starmer’s own personal rating is worsening with Labour voters despite the healthy poll lead. Ipsos’s Ben Page said Starmer was on track to become the least popular opposition leader to win a majority in recent history.
“The next stage of the challenge is all up to Keir,” said one MP. “We can see the way the operation has been transformed. We can see how the polls are favourable. Now it’s up to him to make sure that we don’t fall at the final hurdle.”
Another senior Labour figure said the energy and enthusiasm now was incomparable to the bitter divisions of the past – stressing the comparison with when Starmer’s team first walked into that office three years ago.
“Our office in Blackfriars is now full of bright, energetic, hungry people who are here to win. We can have conversations about winning elections without hiding in a cupboard because we’re frightened about what other people in the office might think.
“There might be mistakes that we make along the way, but no one’s pulling in a different direction any more. Everyone’s pulling towards the country.”
• This article was amended on 7 April 2023 to include reference to members of Jeremy Corbyn’s team saying the former leader’s offices were left in a tidy state.
