Keir Starmer finally looks like he’s ready to take the fight to the Greens. The Prime Minister claimed yesterday that the rival Left-wing party’s stance on Nato and defense would leave Britain “weak and exposed”, indicating a growing ideological rift. Labour is pushing back against the Greens’ breakthrough and wants to keep its position as the dominant anti-Right party. In doing so, Starmer has essentially poured water on the idea of a future electoral pact.

So far, the Greens have been the main beneficiaries of Labour’s declining popularity among Left-leaning voters. They have risen to the mid-teens in the polls, and the result in Gorton and Denton last month has shown their ability to convert this into electoral gains. In the looming local elections, data suggests the party is likely to strike a key blow against Starmer’s Labour.

This is because a large portion of May’s elections will be fought in inner-city areas. Poorer, urban voters are deserting Starmer. This is partly driven by economics, but also cultural issues such as those surrounding the war in Gaza.

In policy areas where Labour was once strong, the Greens are outmaneuvering Starmer. While diplomatic realities constrain the Prime Minister’s position on Donald Trump and Iran, the Greens are hostile to the US President. On the economy, they reach for measures such as wealth taxes, making Starmer and Rachel Reeves look weak to Left-wing voters. The Greens have also distinguished themselves through an openly pro-migration platform. Party leader Zack Polanski now hopes to channel this into a generational shift in electoral politics, targeting London and other urban centers.

This has prompted a tough response from Starmer. He and his team look happy to punch Left, criticizing the Greens as naive and chaotic. First in Gorton and Denton, and now in the locals, senior figures in Labour have attacked Polanski and co. over radical policies such as the legalization of drugs.

Going into the next general election, this hostility between the two parties could backfire. The Left could face a strategic dilemma, as happened on the Right in 2024. Reform is consolidating its position and is likely to do well in the locals in May. If the trend continues, Nigel Farage’s party will be the dominant Right-wing force by the next election. A divided Left-wing vote between Labour and the Greens would only benefit him.

A pact between Starmer and Polanski would let the best-placed Left-wing candidate have a free run at Reform, maximizing their vote, but it looks unlikely. It would mean abandoning many sitting MPs and Labour voluntarily giving up its position as the default party of the Left.

Such things don’t stay in the hands of politicians forever. The local elections will show us whether voters have shifted away from Labour, and whether the Greens are benefiting. If they are, the electoral calculus will change. The Left of British politics will face a split it has never seen before. The Labour instinct will be to fight the insurgent; but if this effort fails, a deal may eventually become the only option. Britain’s political landscape is fragmenting, and those at the top are struggling to adjust. If the position remains the same, Labour and the Greens will have to accommodate each other one way or another.

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John Oxley is a corporate strategist and political commentator. His Substack is Joxley Writes.

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