The fact that Keir Starmer has drafted Morgan McSweeney back in to save him has to be funniest part of all of this. Truly committed to never learning a single lesson you have to give it to him

Huh. This does make it much less likely that BBC are going to do another global streaming partner a la Disney. In this case with Bad Wolf seemingly out too, it’s a BBC solo production. www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/d...

Tomorrow evening's piece of post-SP26 analysis will be how each party's vote was spread across the country, and how it changed. This is one of the starkest maps: the complete backfiring of Scottish Labour's much talked about "constituency strategy", as support crashed across the Central Belt.

Plus, a fifth of Reform UK voters have a positive opinion of Andy Burnham (likely more in the NW), which while still a small minority, is the most positive I've ever seen Reform voters about anything to do with Labour.

So what will it be, PM Andy, Chancellor Red Ed, Home Sec Angela?

What a day, Streeting resigns, Rayner cleared of her tax affairs, Burnham gets his seat, I forgot there was an actual Kings Speech yesterday!

right. Well………

Josh Simons? Josh Simons of Labour Together? Josh Simons of 'send all the asylum seekers to a Scottish island'? Josh Simons of paying hacks to stalk and discredit journalists? Josh Simons of nobody owes his seat to the Starmer-McSweeney project more? Well, okay, if you insist...

This feels like when a show has been cancelled early and they’re trying to wrap up every storyline

the toot of triumph

Funny outcomes ranked 3. the NEC blocks Burnham from getting the nomination 2. Burnham gets the nomination but loses the by election 1. Burnham gets the nomination and then wins the by election, and loses the leadership election

Oh that is an interesting seat to pick……

When someone asked to find a seat Andy Burnham wouldn't lose to the Greens in and you turn up this one? In the borough that just did this?!

Interesting threadlet here:

I’m sorry, he’s just saying nothing about his authority being detonated over the course of the last few days? God, Starmer has turned into the two leaders he defined himself so strongly against (Boris and Corbyn).

So Wes doesn’t have the numbers? Lol.

CLAXON!!!

Labour to Reform switching was a bigger phenomenon in Scotland than anywhere else! Which is...erm...not that surprising if you know a bit about Scottish politics, but it's not what most commentary and public perception would assume.

Labour will always have a significant chunk of voters with more immigration skeptic views than this website, but that chunk is not the ones on or sympathetic to those marches or that riot and collapsing anti-immigration sentiment into it has had a catastrophic effect.

Oh what a farce.

I’m so tired of this. Of course you need to pay some level of heed to the people lending you money, but you cannot prioritise their wellbeing over having a functional government. She’s right, if the argument for Starmer to stay is pleasing bond markets then we might as well all not vote!

I'll go nation by nation now. In England, why did people not vote Labour? Interesting split here where non-Labour voters overall cite competence/cost of living/migration BUT Labour 2024 defectors talk about values - Lab as 'Tory lite', uncertainty over what they stand for. (sorry for small graph)

The local elections in one chart. Labour has been squeezed between the Greens in young wards and Reform in older working-class wards www.economist.com/britain/2026...

Rayner reveals she's been cleared by HMRC in Guardian interview. And more or less says she'll run if Streeting triggers a contest. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

It is almost impossible to stress how utterly pathetic it is to say that the prime minister has failed and lost all authority and must be given a few more months because you miscalculated the timing on how you could personally benefit?? Fuck off with this

You can ask survey respondents for their views of Burnham, Rayner and Streeting but the only valid conclusion to draw from the findings is that the average person in the street (and the 50% of people less engaged) do not currently know much about any of them at all.

A move of anything less than, say, 0.1 percentage points -- sorry, Ten Basis Points -- in gilt yields is meaningless noise and does not qualify as news. Please stop breathlessly reporting every 0.02 pp move and connecting it to the Westminster soap opera! This is getting ridiculous.

Labour: everything's on hold for 24 hours so that we don't overshadow the King's speech Wes, ten minutes before the speech: I'M GOING TO RESIGN TOMORROW

"You want to make sure you got your numbers right"

PM Milliband then?

As we all know, the best way to demonstrate your loyalty to the government and avoid distracting from the Kings Speech is to have anonymous allies brief every lobby journalist that you intend to resign tomorrow.

Extraordinary and unprecedented joint statement from the 11 affiliated Labour trade unions (main party funders) saying “it is clear” that Keir Starmer won’t lead Labour into the next election. Matters not just for financial reasons, it matters for Starmer’s power on the NEC…

I think this is basically wrong? Even if we accept the patronising understanding of voters as requiring immediate gratification, it requires you to agree that, given time Starmer's policies would have succeeded in addressing our malaise and...I don't think you can assume that?

Wes' theory seems to be that if you wield the knife then you get seen as a traitor and can't win, but walk around waving a big knife with 'backstabbing knife' written all over it going "hey, I'm not using it YET" you'll be a contender. What??

not to overreact but this quote made me want to buy a firearm

The rapid change of PMs is IMO a symptom of a problem, but changing PM has not in any of those cases been a problem in itself

Oh!

Labour shouldn't have spent the last two years obsessing over which voters to target, but to make matters worse, they picked literally the silliest group to do it with.

The Herald clarified that the point being made was that if someone was invisible in their role, that simply meant they were not considered to be prominent or active in carrying out their duties. Asked if that made sense, Ms Nandy said: "No. It does not really make sense whatsoever."

Asked about allegations she is invisible as DCMS Secretary, Ms Nandy said: "There is no basis for that assertion. If you think even for one second, I cannot possible be invisible. If I was invisible, how could you see me right now?"

So we’re stuck with nothing happening till Burnham wins a by election. Great.

Somehow always relevant

Smart, nuanced threat on the points of similarity and difference between the Tribune contributions published by @renewaljournal.bsky.social, and the long manifesto published by @labourgrowth.bsky.social

lol

I'm not saying this because I particularly think he should stand for leader but it does feel Quite Interesting that Labour actually has this other mayor who's been successfully running a much bigger city for a longer period of time but for some reason no one's waiting for him to save the party

Sorry I can't get over the fact that a lot of MPs apparently think it's urgent that the Prime Minister resign for the sake of the country, but not for a few months until Andy Burnham gets a parliamentary seat

You know it's the end when the IfG fire up the ministerial resignation charts