Don't expect Starmer's Tory attacks to fade away

The 2024 general election concluded just 54 days ago. The next general election is probably more than 1,700 days away. And yet the campaign is already under way.

That’s one lesson to take from the new prime minister’s deliberately gloomy speech in the Downing Street garden this morning.

Ironically enough, given this was a speech in which Sir Keir Starmer decried the past 14 years of Conservative government, his is an approach which consciously apes that of David Cameron after he took office in 2010.

Senior advisers to Sir Keir believe that Mr Cameron secured his Conservative victory at the 2015 election in his first few months as prime minister in 2010, when he and his team relentlessly criticised their inheritance from Labour.

That’s not to say it is merely a strategic tribute act when the prime minister castigates the “black hole” he says he was left by his predecessor.

Speak to Labour officials who have spent the summer at work in Whitehall and they bristle with palpable anger at what they have uncovered.

That’s a view vigorously contested by the Conservatives, who say that Sir Keir is using attacks on them as justification for inevitable tax rises he was not candid about during the election campaign.

That’s an argument that is likely to play out over not just the coming months but the coming years.

Don’t expect Labour’s attacks on the Conservative record to fade away as this government beds in.

The Conservatives were still wielding Labour MP Liam Byrne’s infamous “there is no money” note at this year’s general election, 14 years after he left it on a desk at the Treasury for his successor.

And only last week one of the party’s social media accounts attacked Gordon Brown for the decision to sell the UK’s gold reserves a quarter of a century ago.

Of course it’s one thing for the prime minister to advance arguments about why he is forced to make decisions that are “difficult” (he used that word six times in his speech this morning) and “tough” (three times).

It’s another to persuade people that those decisions are correct and fair once he’s taken them.

Politically, the thorniest segment of Sir Keir’s speech was probably his justification of the decision, announced just before parliament’s summer break, to means-test the winter fuel payment for the first time.

He stressed that he “didn’t want to” do it, but argued that it was “a choice we had to take”, framing it as a trade-off between saving money there or improving the NHS, public transport and other public services.

Whether that argument is enough to withstand the inevitable unease from Sir Keir’s own MPs and ministers as temperatures drop over the winter is another matter.

The Treasury is looking at extending the hardship fund for households struggling with the cost of living, currently due to end at the end of September, in an attempt to ensure that the poorest pensioners are not affected by Sir Keir’s hard-nosed decision-making.

Yet as the prime minister acknowledged today, this is just one of what are likely to be several more painful announcements, with tax rises and spending cuts in Rachel Reeves’ budget on 30 October now seemingly inevitable.

Some of those same “working people” protected by Labour's commitment not to increase the main three taxes - VAT, national insurance and income tax - may well find that taxes are increasing on their property or their pensions.

Each of those measures is also likely to mean disappointed demographic groups, anxious taxpayers, and jittery new MPs’ email inboxes filling up with complaints.

It is also worth remembering that when Sir Keir argues that he has no choice but to take these decisions, that is partly a consequence of other choices he has made - for example not to increase the main rates of income tax, VAT or national insurance; to enforce fiscal rules requiring debt to fall; and to settle pay disputes with public sector workers in the hope doing so will damage the economy less over the medium and long term.

Nor will Sir Keir’s diciest moments politically over the coming months necessarily all be a result of big tax and spend decisions he makes.

The squall over the past week about roles in government for Labour-affiliated figures is given short shrift by the prime minister’s supporters - as it was Sir Keir in the press conference following his speech - but it is a reminder that when you’re in government potentially damaging issues can fly out of the left-field.

For now, the prime minister is able to be not just a player but a commentator, analysing the situation his new government confronts.

But as the political pace picks up again, that role will soon be returned to the commentators who matter most of all - the voters.