Diminished Keir Starmer at the limit of his powers

Good morning. Unsurprisingly, Andy Burnham sought the nomination for the looming Gorton and Denton by-election. Equally unsurprisingly, Labour’s ruling National Executive Committee has blocked him from doing so. Some thoughts on where it leaves both Burnham and Keir Starmer in today’s note.

I will write about the government’s new and wide-ranging plans for police reform in a future newsletter, when I have finished reading the white paper.

No Andies Club

Andy Burnham’s biggest barrier to the Labour leadership is that in order to be a candidate for that office, you have to be an MP, and his path to becoming one runs through an NEC where he has few genuine allies.

Keir Starmer was able to block him from standing yesterday not because the 10-strong NEC Officers’ group is a hotbed of pro-Starmer sentiment — that would be enough for a narrow majority — but because if you are a supporter of one of the other potential replacements, it is also in your interest to keep Burnham off. Their vote was eight to one against, and Starmer was one of those to vote no, according to an NEC member.

When Labour last year introduced the requirement for metro mayors to seek NEC permission to stand in by-elections — in effect a “no Andy Burnhams” rule — no one batted an eyelid. That is partly because it is not just in Starmer’s interest to keep a strong rival out of the next Labour leadership contest. It is also in the interests of all the other politicians jockeying to replace Starmer. Wes Streeting and Angela Rayner were among the politicians saying the NEC should let Burnham pass through to the membership round, but no one who supports either Streeting or Rayner will be saddened to see a potential opponent sidelined.

Because Starmer’s approval ratings and morale among Labour MPs are so low, very little that the prime minister does is “risk free”. But the upsides of “the only candidate who polls better than you is ineligible to stand” outweigh the downsides. Even if the party loses the Gorton by-election, it is small beer, frankly, compared with the scale of Labour’s looming defeat in Wales.

In many ways it leaves the government exactly where it was: the prime minister’s standing is diminished, which means it is hard for him to get anything controversial through parliament (and some ministers complain that there is a noticeable scepticism in parts of Whitehall about the worth of doing anything difficult given the prime minister’s standing too). Labour MPs want a change at some point but are divided on the question of who, when and how. And the only candidate who, per the polls at least, is a marked upgrade on the prime minister is unavailable and looks likely to remain so.

Now try this

I saw No Other Choice. It looked beautiful but it simply went on far too long, and I felt as a result the satire became pretty blunted by the end. Danny Leigh, who enjoyed it rather more than I did, has reviewed it here.

Top stories today

• Starmer in Beijing | In the first visit to China by a UK prime minister since Theresa May in 2018, Keir Starmer will aim to repair strained relations with Beijing. China will want a successful Starmer trip to lay the groundwork for the expected visit of German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in February, which it hopes will help improve ties with the EU and enable it to further exploit growing divisions between the US and its western allies.

• Number go up | Business secretary Peter Kyle has called for MPs’ pay to be directly linked to GDP to incentivise Westminster into prioritising economic growth.

• ‘Britain’s FBI’ | Home secretary Shabana Mahmood will unveil reforms to policing this afternoon. Some responsibilities including combating organised crime will no longer be handled at a local level, and instead be handed to a new national police force for England and Wales that will merge with the existing National Crime Agency and the College of Policing.

• Tricky subject of obesity | Almost a quarter of GPs are seeing children aged four or under who are obese, according to a survey of UK family doctors, the Guardian reports. The survey asked 540 family doctors about their experience of managing obesity and found four out of five of them found it difficult to talk to children or their parents about the condition, in case such conversations made them feel upset, angry or ashamed.

• ICYMI | The FT’s podcast Political Fix digs into Donald Trump’s outbursts last week and Keir Starmer’s approach to the US, with a returning Lucy Fisher and special guest Alec Russell.