How has Keir Starmer fared in his first two weeks as Labour leader?

With all eyes on government at a time of national crisis, Starmer has struggled to make an impact – and he faces more Labour factionalism,​ writes John Rentoul

Public opinion on the new leader is weakly positive (PA)

In his first fortnight in the job, Keir Starmer has called for parliament to be recalled, and been ignored; demanded that the government publish its coronavirus lockdown exit strategy, which might have prompted Dominic Raab to announce “five tests” for easing restrictions; and ordered an inquiry into who leaked the inquiry into Labour’s handling of antisemitism.

The most striking thing he has said, though, was to the BBC on Thursday: “I really hated selling myself into the membership and I much prefer leadership decisions as leader of the Labour Party.”

This revelation about his feelings about the leadership election prompted Laura Kuenssberg, the BBC’s political editor, to exclaim: “You hated the campaign?”

He clarified that he meant that he didn’t like going “up against colleagues, and very good colleagues, who you like”. This is consistent with his unity schtick, depicting himself as so allergic to internal party disagreement that he found the rigours of party democracy uncomfortable.

But it was a strange thing to say out loud, as was his satisfaction with taking “leadership decisions”. The usual thing for a politician is to focus on what those decisions were, and why they were the right ones.

He has been criticised for some of those decisions. Sue Beeby, an adviser to David Cameron in opposition, and even Nicola Sturgeon of the Scottish National Party, have accused him of being too critical of the government. It may be that journalists focus more on his demands for more tests, more protective equipment and an exit strategy than on his support for extending the lockdown, but it seems that he hasn’t got the balance right yet between bipartisan support and constructive questioning.

As for managing his own party, a few people outside the party might be dimly aware that there is a faction fight going on. Even fewer would know the details of the leaked report, drawn up for Jeremy Corbyn’s general secretary Jennie Formby, which blames anti-Corbyn staff for frustrating the party’s efforts to root out antisemitism.

It is an 850-page work of factional propaganda – the “executive summary” itself is eight pages – that is controversial because it contains a lot of confidential personal information that has been dumped on the internet.

Starmer has done what he could: he had to ask for an inquiry into the breach of data protection law, while focusing on repairing relations with representative Jewish groups. The real test will come with the Equality and Human Rights Commission inquiry into the party.

It has been an odd start for the leader of a major political party, thrown into a national crisis with all eyes on the government, and with the questions of it coming not from the official opposition but from disembodied journalists on a screen within a screen.

So far, public opinion is weakly positive about him. An Ipsos MORI survey carried out last weekend, after he had been leader for a week, found 26 per cent had a favourable view of him, as opposed to 21 per cent unfavourable. The rest, 53 per cent, said “neither” or “don’t know”.

He faces a huge task, up against a popular prime minister at a time of emergency, but at least he starts by being more popular than Jeremy Corbyn.