Keir Starmer: Why is he gambling with his political career?

It looked like a bold move, a big gamble.

But what other option did the Labour leader have?

"What is left of Keir if he doesn't have honesty and integrity?" - so said a shadow cabinet minister to me about their boss.

They weren't seeking to undermine him, but to emphasise what his supporters see as the essence of him personally and professionally.

Yes, Sir Keir has publicly said his political future is now out of his control - and in that of Durham Constabulary.

But he and his team felt the alternative was worse. Why?

Because if he'd said nothing he would have been politically crippled for up to two months, while the police decided what to do.

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A former director of public prosecutions, steeped in the law, left dodging questions every day, for weeks, about whether he'd do the very thing he'd called on the prime minister and the chancellor to do.

And not just him - every single Labour MP, from the shadow cabinet down, would have been asked just the same thing as well.

Over and over and over again.

I'm told that as soon as the police said they would be re-investigating what happened just over a year ago, Sir Keir's instinct was that he would have to say publicly he would go if he was fined.

But he didn't want it to overshadow the party's gains in the local elections, and he wanted to seek the advice of senior colleagues.

Not all thought the course of action he has chosen was wise.

Some, over the weekend, were boiling with rage that given the scale of rule-breaking in the heart of government, it would be unimaginably cruel, as they see it, if it's the leader of the opposition who loses his job over Covid rule-breaking.

Others fret that whatever Labour's lawyers might be saying to reassure them that a fine is unlikely, the police could do it nonetheless.

But in the end Team Starmer felt they had little option but to attempt to make a virtue out an almightily sticky situation.

"Gutsy and principled" as another shadow cabinet minister described it.

His supporters see a best case scenario, from their perspective, playing out like this: the police do their thing, they don't fine him, and people notice that he was willing to stake his career on a principle of behaving properly or face the consequences.

Who on earth could they be seeking to draw a distinction with?

Conservatives are being very careful to avoid saying Sir Keir should resign - given their boss has been fined and hasn't gone.

But privately Tories are cock-a-hoop: saying the Labour leader's hypocrisy, talking for months about Covid rule-breaking when he might have done it himself, means he may get what he deserves.

'Roll of the dice'

"Decency and fairness is what being British is all about," another senior Labour figure told me.

"If Keir can come to personify the very things the British people like, that could be huge for him."

But, they added, "it's a major roll of the dice."

And clearly it is, because in a matter of weeks the man who dreams of being the next prime minister could be toast.

Finished. Out. Political career over.

And a Labour leadership race would beckon.