More than 120 Labour MPs have now indicated their support for a parliamentary amendment that would stop the Government’s flagship welfare reform bill in its tracks. Aimed at getting more unwell people back into work and containing the growing benefits bill, the reforms have divided Labour activists and parliamentarians alike ahead of a vote next week. Rebels claim that the bill is being pushed through without adequate consultation, and have noted that the Government’s own impact assessment estimated the legislation would push an additional 250,000 people into poverty — including 50,000 children.

The MPs have signed a “reasoned amendment”, which — if selected by Commons speaker Lindsay Hoyle and signed off in a parliamentary vote — would prevent Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall’s reforms from passing into law. It’s shaping up to be the biggest domestic crisis to face Keir Starmer since his election victory a year ago, and last week Government whip Vicky Foxcroft resigned over the bill.

So much for the biggest parliamentary majority since 1997: it would take only 83 of the more than 120 amendment signatories switching voting lobby to defeat the Government. The timing couldn’t be much worse either, with much of the Prime Minister’s focus trained on this week’ s Nato summit and the fallout from conflict in the Middle East. Starmer’s prioritisation on boosting military spending will not be lost on Labour MPs, who are temperamentally disinclined to back “warfare over welfare”.

On his way to the Nato summit, Starmer reiterated his support for the welfare reform bill. “There is a clear moral case, which is: the current system doesn’t help those who want to get into work,” he said. “It traps people. I think it’s 1,000 people a day going on to [Personal Independence Payments]. The additions to PIP each year are the equivalent of a city the size of Leicester. That is not a system that can be left unreformed.”

The Government’s thesis would appear to be that the welfare bill can be eased simply by reducing eligibility, using a points-based system to score whether the claimant is able to live independently. For example, are they able to prepare a simple meal for themselves or wash properly? But the more difficult question is: what if growing welfare spending is predicated on an increase in genuine need?

Much is made of the increase in welfare claims made by Britain’s young, often in relation to mental health conditions. How much of the rise is tied to changes in underlying population health, cultural and identity factors, and behavioural shifts is still being worked out; but the associated rise in mortality in working-age claimants is clear evidence that much of the need is being driven by quantifiably worse population health outcomes in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. The Government risks playing welfare whack-a-mole, with service cuts pushing the same genuinely-in-need claimants to surface elsewhere in the system.

Whatever the proximal causes of growing welfare spending, Labour MPs should not be babied. What did they expect to experience in office after telling the country that Liz Truss and the Tories had obliterated Government finances? Starmer has repeatedly lectured the House about the £22 billion black hole left behind by the Conservatives. It is weak to suggest that there is enough money for plentiful spending today because cutting it incurs moral conflict in the present, at the expense of moral conflict in the future when the bill takes effect.

The potential welfare rebellion is symptomatic of a wider syndrome affecting this government: namely, Starmer’s woefully underdeveloped ability to define and sell a narrative. Marching under a banner requires a banner in the first place, a wider motivating idea or philosophy. If Labour MPs are to simply carry on the Conservative record of managed decline, what is the point in them being Labour MPs? Why isn’t Starmer regularly outlining how Britain will achieve the economic growth necessary to dig itself out of the current hole and prevent difficult choices from being presented in the first place?

A plan is there, albeit out of focus: housing and infrastructure planning reform, and changes in upfront capital spending. But as Prime Minister, only Starmer can bring the plan into sharp relief — and inspire hope about ending the fallow decades of decline. MPs want reassurance. There must be an end to this government’s means. After all, what is cruelty without purpose if not torture?

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James Sean Dickson is an analyst and journalist who Substacks at Himbonomics.

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