Voters Asked the Main Achievements of Starmer’s First Year, Answer: ‘Nothing’

It’s a year since Keir Starmer and Labour were elected to govern the UK. Much of what was said at the time now has a hollow, even laughable ring, whether it be Starmer’s own statement in Downing Street that he would lead a “government of service” which would “tread more lightly on your lives”, or the view of Andrew Marr, one of Britain’s top political commentators, that “for the first time in many of our lives Britain looks like a haven of peace and stability”. More disturbingly, Caitlin Moran, a top Times writer, wrote that “Starmer has turbo-charged my arousal levels. I feel fruity.”

One moves on with a shudder and notes what is now obvious to all, that Starmer himself had no real governing philosophy. He won a freak election victory on a third of the vote, but no real consent to do anything much economically or politically. So once voters started to read what sort of man he really was – which they did in August last year as he cracked down on free expression while at the same time taking free gifts from millionaires – he suffered a crisis of confidence from which he has not recovered and is very unlikely to.

A pollster this weekend asked voters what they considered the main achievements of Starmer’s first year. The resultant word cloud contained one giant word – “Nothing”. In truth, Labour seem to have genuinely believed that all they had to do was replace the Conservatives, and all would be well again. That’s why they have made such a mess.