Move over Ed Miliband. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)
There are some leaders of the opposition who you knew, in your heart of hearts, would never be Prime Minister. Michael Foot, William Hague, Iain Duncan Smith and Ed Miliband all come to mind. So too does Keir Starmer.
Starmer, in his defence, inherited a sinking ship from Jeremy Corbyn. He was handed the lowest number of seats since 1935, a bitterly divided party and a Labour brand that even today remains thoroughly discredited among a large swathe of the country. Corbyn did not cause all of these problems but he certainly entrenched them.
Labour’s fracture with the working class, its loss of credibility on crunch issues such as the economy and immigration and its growing dependency on social liberals who congregate in areas where the party no longer needs votes were all decades in the making. This is why any recovery — if such a recovery is even possible — will be generational rather than cyclical.
Starmer made a good start, or at least appeared to. Over the past year, Labour picked off low-hanging fruit, winning back voters who were repelled by Corbyn. In the polls, Labour’s average support jumped from below 29% to 35%. At the last election, Labour trailed the Conservatives by 12 points; today, they trail by 8.
How much of this improvement is due to Starmer remains unclear. While his supporters point to his strong leadership ratings relative to Corbyn, the fact remains that even today Starmer’s “net satisfaction” score still lags behind Boris Johnson — while 33% of voters are satisfied with him, 42% are not. Leaders only ever have a short period to make an impression. It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Starmer, a year after becoming leader, has now blown his.
Ask someone on the street to describe Starmer and they’ll probably say he opposed Brexit, is a lawyer, took the knee for Black Lives Matter and is better than Jeremy Corbyn but still doesn’t represent “people like them”. This might explain why, when the country is asked who would make “best Prime Minister”, Johnson still leads on 37% while his nearest rival is not the leader of the opposition but ‘Not Sure’. Starmer trails in third, ten points adrift from the man who has been in power for a year and is criticised on a daily basis.
There are, of course, many who argue that Covid-19 dealt Starmer an unlucky hand. But it is during moments of crisis, when the glare of public attention is strongest, that leaders are made. Indeed, it won’t be lost on Starmer’s team that it is precisely at the same time as the entire country has been sat at home, watching the news and paying attention to politics, that Starmer’s ratings have fallen not risen. To put it simply, the more people have seen, the less impressed they have been.
Starmerites might respond that his ratings are better than Mr Corbyn’s. But that is like saying Michael Howard’s ratings were better than Iain Duncan Smith’s. In the end, neither saw power. And it appears that the British people can sense that, too. More than half of them told YouGov last week that they simply do not see Keir Starmer as a prime minister in waiting.
Even if you put the question of leadership aside, there remains little evidence that Labour is dealing with the deep-rooted structural problems that arguably make it impossible for the party to win the next election. To do so would require a swing close to what Tony Blair and New Labour achieved in 1997 – with a leader who is nowhere near as popular as Blair was and a party that is nowhere near as popular as it needs to be outside of London and the university towns.
As the 2019 election and today’s polls underline, amid the “realignment” of British politics Labour is stacking votes where it does not need them while failing to win votes where it desperately needs them. Labour will probably cheer Sadiq Khan’s easy victory in London next month, while struggling to hold its historic blue-collar fiefdom of Hartlepool. It is cruising in its stronghold of London with a 20-point lead, but across the rest of the south it is 25 points behind. No party can win power with these numbers.
This reflects how Britain’s new political geography, the first-past-the-post system and earlier Labour leaders have made life harder than it ought to be for Starmer. Over the past two decades, the Left essentially walked into the casino of British politics and put all of its chips behind social liberals whose support is concentrated in liberal enclaves rather than spread across the country. Much of that was entrenched during Corbyn’s tenure and by the dismal reaction to Brexit, and now Starmer is paying the price. Ask the working class today who should lead Britain and Boris Johnson holds a 19-point lead. Starmer might win a few more seats around London, but he should remember that there are still many more Red Wall seats that could fall. The assault on the Red Wall might just be starting.
There is a broader point to be had, too. At the heart of recent political commentary has rested a fundamentally flawed assumption: that once Brexit was over and done with life would return to the traditional “Left versus Right” fault line that governed politics during the twentieth century. We would get back to debating the economic issues that play to Labour’s strengths and that would clear the path for the party to repair its relationship with workers and return to power.
But I was never convinced. For a start, this narrative completely ignores the extent to which the Conservatives have also leaned towards the Left, variously promising to “level-up” the most regionally imbalanced nation in the industrialised world while moving institutions, civil servants and banks north.
It also underplays the extent to which culture, rather than economics, has come to dominate national life — as reflected in our intensifying debates over cancel culture, freedom of speech, the Royal Family and racism in British society. Only last week, voters looked on as Keir Starmer and a number of his MPs rejected a nuanced report on racial and ethnic disparities and instead implied that Britain, and by extension the British people, are inherently racist. Every day that radical left Labour MPs Clive Lewis and activists like professor Priyamvada Gopal are in the news, screaming about racist Britain, is a good day for Boris Johnson.
But as Ronald Reagan reminded Jimmy Carter, nobody wants to be told over and over again what is wrong with their country and its people, especially when much of it is not true. Nobody wants to hear about the malaise. They want to be inspired and led to the sunlit uplands. They want their leaders to believe in the country as much as they do. Yet as much research over the past year has shown, it is precisely on these questions about culture, identity, race and history where Labour MPs and activists are completely detached from the rest of Britain.
Put all of this together and it becomes extremely difficult, if not impossible, to see how Starmer charts a path to No 10. While he might have steadied the ship, too many gaping holes remain. Labour’s broken bond with the working class, its perceived lack of economic competency, the cultural isolation of its MPs from the average voter and an increasingly radical “woke” Left that is cheered on in seats that the party already holds, but loathed in those that Labour actually needs to win — these are all major obstacles that Starmer has yet to tackle.
And unless he does, then he might find himself going down in the history books as the Labour Party’s Michael Howard — the man who brought “stability” but ultimately failed to win power.
Matthew Goodwin is Professor of Politics at the University of Kent. His new book, Values, Voice and Virtue: The New British Politics, is out on March 30.
GoodwinMJ 
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SubscribeSalmond was a Celtic nationalist! His party certainly had dubious origins on the neo-Fascist right but by the time they reached power Ms Sturgeon had embraced Maoist politics and so practiced the sort of left-wing separatism one sees in Catalonia – the precise opposite to today’s populist movements.
Let us not forget that independence movements are those where individuals try to make themselves more important than they really are. They use emotion – mainly directed at young people – to lever themselves to the top of the tree. They are unscrupulous and will do anything for ‘the movement’. He will be bracketed together with the other two recent failures.
A remarkable lack of self awareness by the author. Doesn’t he realise that it was the hollowing out of politics by New Labour and the proliferation of managerial, career politicians and political strategists like himself that made Salmond’s approach feel like a breath of fresh air. Labour didn’t create the platform for Salmond – they just left a great big vacuum for him to flow into
“Charisma is important in leadership, but it should never go unquestioned.”
Are we to be so put upon?
Is the author here still trying to traffic in the fiction that Alex Salmond was a sexual predator who never faced justice? This was foolish while the man was alive to defend himself, at his own, near ruinous, expense. Now that he is dead and gone it seems cynical and disasteful in the extreme.
For the author to suggest that Mr Salmond’s “party, and the broader political class.. let [his] behaviours go unchallenged” is an extraordinary stonewalling of the truth as anyone who has taken more than a cursory interest in his ordeals of the last few years can attest.
Unchallenged? Mr Salmond’s entire life and work was subject to the most extraordinary, forensic and exhaustive interrogation, using the entire pooled resources of the Scottish Goverment and Crown Office – not falling far short of collusion and corruption.
The man had to defend himself, alone and almost friendless, against unknown and anonymous accusers, aided and abetted (not to say suborned) by dishonest actors within the Scottish Civil Service and political class.
And yet still this man Salmond, who we are archly informed typifies everything objectionable about the ‘masculine profession’ and ‘boys will be boys’ culture of Scottish Politics, was completely exonerated, on all counts, by a majority female Jury under instructions from a female Judge in the Highest Court of the most Unionist city of the Northern Kingdom.
So, what higher tribunal, then, does the author have in mind when he calls, with sham piety, for “clear-eyed scrutiny” of Salmond’s actions?. A scrutiny sharper and clearer than that brought to bear by the Lord Advocate and the Procurator Fiscal before a High Court Jury? Well, no. He answers the question for us when he speaks admiringly of the “prompt dismissal” which attends upon accusations of impropriety in “public services and private companies”. His higher tribunal is the drumhead court of the HR department.
While I disagreed irreconcilably with Mr Salmond’s view of the Union and his campaigns for secession, to see his performance before the Holyrood Inquiry was like seeing a bear at the stake, baited and not down (ardens sed virens to use a phrase familiar to True Scots) and made me, not for the first time, lament the comparison with the leaders of British Unionism.
A well-considered and erudite riposte to the kind of lazy journalism that has helped to drag us as a society into the mud of woke kangaroo courts.
I think other commenters want to believe that the man was the mission. No, it was the people of Scotland, fed up with a remote oligarchy (much like the English felt about the EU) – who elevated the SNP.
Mr Salmond simply rode the crest of the wave. May he rest in peace.
I doubt that his accusers feel that way. Whilst he was acquitted, the Scottish courts did uphold 5 complaints against him and what was clear from his prosecution was a pattern of very questionable behaviour.
As I understand it, it was the Scottish Government itself, led by Leslie Evans, the Scottish government’s permanent secretary which initially carried out the enquiry which upheld the 5 complaints – not the Scottish courts.
When that process did eventually come before the Scottish courts, the highest court in the land indeed, and at Mr Salmond’s own insistence and expense – that same enquiry was found, by Judicial Review, to be unlawful and “tainted with apparent bias”.
Salmond was then exonerated in open court of 12 of the charges against him. One was not found not proven.
To suggest oherwise is innacurate and frankly unfair. It is trafficking in innuendo and insinuation.
All this talk of ‘questionable behaviour’ implies that these claims were not examined. They were and in the most excruciating detail. At the end of the process Salmond walked away with his costs reimbursed and was on the way to receiving a hefty sum in compensation when he died.
I don’t see what more any man could do to clear his name in a free society.
And it is worrying, to me, that is seems not to have proven enough for many.
Indeed he was acquitted and innocent of the allegations, yet it is that detail that led his dubious character to be revealed publicly and send his reputation into the gutter. And that’s the reason why he never recovered from the complaints.
You may be right about his reputation having suffered anecdotally, I could not speak for Scottish Public Opinion.
My point is rather that it cannot be honestly asserted, as it is by the writer of this article, that Salmond’s behaviour was not challenged. It was brought to trial and he was exonerated.
That has to count for something, in a free society.
Thank you for a most considerate and empathetic response
Please read the posting that I am about to post
And hopefully it shall shine a light upon the actual man he truly was
Interesting piece by McTernan, and an excellent starter for ten. Should we compare Salmond to the EU-sceptic populists? Or should we see him as the last of the anti-British nationalists?
He bears comparison to de Valera, with the obvious difference that Salmond eschewed violence. What about Lee Kuan Yew? Or Nkrumah, or Makarios, or Kenyatta?
This is a great opportunity to examine independence movements critically.
More like Parnell.
Very much so, in more ways than one.
Salmond had a shrewd political eye. He was a gradualist who assumed independence would be a long haul, yet when Cameron gave him the opportunity he seized the moment when high oil prices made the economic argument for independence for a moment plausible. ( He was an economist who had specialised in the oil sector). The 45% poll was an addition of near 12 % on pre referendum polling.
He changed the political climate in Scotland that the SNP have now lost for a generation. So failure is not a fair judgement on his career.
He built that additional support on propagating hatred of the English.
Complete , Total and Utter
Coital Bovine Scatology
Here’s a real measure of the Man that
Alex truly was . Just keep reading till
The End and you will find out
I am one year younger than Alex and was reared for the first 5 yrs of my life in Linlithgow in the same Council housing scheme known as Preston Road and my parents knew
Alex’s parents well giving Alex and myself often played together in the same Play Park and joined The SNP Linlithgow branch on the same evening
It is with not only with a sad heavy heart
But with great reluctance I say what follows as I feel not only do I
Owe it to Alex but also my deceased Parents
My Father ( Paddy ) was a face worker in Kinneil Colliery Bo’ness
Which was closed after the Miners strike
My Father being a face worker and due to continual use of Pneumatic
Hammers and drills invariably became profoundly deaf and contracted severe ‘ White Finger ‘
Consequently when the Miners compensation scheme was set up
My Father duly applied
But unfortunately The NCB somehow managed to lose all their
Employees records of Kinneil Colliery
This was never admitted by the NCB however the NUM conveyer for Kinneil knew and told all ex Kinneil workers this and warned them that such would lead to considerable delays in any compensation being determined and attendance to many tribunal
Hearings
Well then My Father was given notice of his 5th tribunal hearing just a few weeks prior my Mother’s
Death who had been discharged from Hospital to Home and basically to die
I always remember my very sick Mum saying to myself and Dad that when I said I would accompany Dad by Train to the Tribunal hearing in Edinburgh
My Father said Oh Margaret how can I go and leave you I have to be with you and take care of you
My Mum’s reply being the supreme Matriarch she truly was And given her condition Raised her Voice firmly and simply saying
‘ Oh Yes you are going ,Never Never let the Bastards beat you ‘
So my Dad and I attended the Tribunal my mother having died in the house the Sunday late afternoon one day before the Tribunal
During the Tribunal my Dad broke down not only due to his wife’s death but also due to the type of Questioning he was subjected to especially
In conjunction with the tone used
Upon his breakdown one of the 3 tribunal adjudicators in a most firm tone ( I not able to recall the exact words ) basically said abruptly in a firm offensive tone ‘ Good God Man grow up ‘
At that juncture I leapt to my feet and was abruptly told to sit down
I refused and told them in no uncertain terms
I am his father and my Mum and his wife died less than 20 hrs ago
And given the manner you have spoken to my Dad and that’s the 5th time he has been called to this tribunal I no longer and speaking for my Father but also Both of us I wish not to be in the same room as you Therefore goodbye
So when by Train we arrived back in Linlithgow.My Dad just as Alex was also was Horse Daft and as we passed ‘ The Bookies Shop ‘ my
Dad said I want to put a bet on ( as he did every single day )
When we entered Alex was also in the Bookies
And as usual and always Alex came upto my Father and said Well
Paddy what do you fancy today
My Dad’s brother used to be a professional Jockey and a personal Horse Trainer assistant at
Horse racing stables and as such my Dad always gave not always winners but a few good few horse winning tips but also good advice as why not to bet upon certain horses to Alex hence that’s why Alex always made contact with Dad everytime they met not only in the Bookies but also upon the Streets of Linlithgow
Well Alex within a few minutes realised my Dad was not his usual
Cheery self
Alex put his hand upon Dad’s shoulder asking what’s wrong Paddy
My Dad said Margaret died yesterday at which my Dad broke down completely .Alex immediately held my Dad tight consoling him as he did myself
Upon which I interjected saying to Alex that it’s not only my Mum Alex
We just back from A miners compensation tribunal and I gave Alex a Brief description of that morning then explaining that despite four previous tribunal hearings and my Dad not wanting to attend that Margaret insisted My Dad attends
I showed briefly Alex the two inch thick file my Dad took to the Hearing
At this point Alex called over the Bookies Managerses Lady over
Asking if he could borrow her office for half a hour
Of course she said and cleared the table and brought in Tea ,Coffee and biscuits for us saying take as long as you need
Once all was explained to Alex and he briefly looked through the Tribunals files He asked me can I keep these files I said off course but why
Alex replied Paddy you within one month shall have a large compensation cheque and a monthly lifetime compensation pension
I said and How is that going to Happen
Alex replied you know I no longer a MP but a MSP and leader of the Party , I shall have one of our MP,S
( I still to decide which one but almost certain who) to table a Parliamentary Question and it will be worded most cleverly that the Government will in no uncertain terms that should Paddies case not be resolved ASAP then this whole matter shall be made public
And Paddy that’s the last thing they want here.One Week later my Dad received a official letter saying his claim was successful for both deafness and White Finger and that within 14 days he would be notified of the Monthly pension payments and a Cheque as a lump-sum
That’s the Measure of the Real Alex Salmond
A man of Dignity , Honour , Trust ,
Empathy , Humility and Respect
Now you know why telling all this is
With great reluctance but more importantly
The most sadden of heart and tears streaming down my face
The World has truly lost One of the Truly Few Good Men
Thank you for sharing this story. It has the ring of truth to it.
It also puts into context the comment by the author of this piece that Salmond could “never be mistaken for a nice man”. It is rarely the business of a tribune, nor does it constitute any part of his public office, to be ‘nice’. Not when he is speaking for the voiceless and advancing a cause put in his trust by his electors.
‘Nice’ certainly doesn’t not get the results that you describe above.