Labour ‘lacks coherent story’ and is leaving door open to Nigel Farage’s Reform, warn top pollsters

Figures from inside and outside the Labour ranks have warned Keir Starmer to stop governing like a technocrat and build a coherent story to take on Nigel Farage

Sir Keir Starmer has been warned that his government lacks a coherent story and is leaving the door open to Reform UK, as he faces urgent calls to fix his faltering communications operation.

The prime minister has been accused of ruling like a technocrat, relying on the belief that if living standards improve, voters will stick with him at the next general election.

But critics of the PM from inside and outside Labour’s ranks have warned him that the party needs not just to deliver, but to be seen to be delivering.

Keir Starmer has made a series of hugely unpopular decisions since taking over as PM (PA Wire)

And while Sir Keir has suffered the biggest post-election fall in popularity of any modern British prime minister, Nigel Farage’s populist party Reform UK is surging in the polls, opening a three-way split at the top of British politics.

At the weekend, a poll suggested that Sir Keir could lose his majority and nearly 200 of the seats he won in July’s landslide victory – including 67 to Reform.

Such a result would see seven cabinet ministers lose their seats, including Wes Streeting, the health secretary, while those losing to Reform would include the deputy prime minister Angela Rayner, the home secretary Yvette Cooper, and the energy secretary Ed Miliband.

On top of its polling success, Reform has now overtaken the Conservative Party as the second-biggest political party in Britain by membership, with more than 140,000 members.

After a war of words with Kemi Badenoch over the claim, Mr Farage opened up Reform’s books to confirm that it has outgrown the Tories. He said that his party is now “the real opposition” to Labour.

Britain’s top polling guru, Professor Sir John Curtice, told The Independent that Reform is “very good at articulating that sense of discontent, lack of direction, lack of progress and lack of trust” in politics.

And he warned that Sir Keir “doesn’t do story, he doesn’t do narrative”, adding: “He’s a technocrat, he is not really a politician; he believes that if Labour delivers, then voters will applaud them.

“That avoids the basic point that you have to persuade voters you have delivered, instead of just delivering.”

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage is prepared to tap into discontent at Labour and the Conservatives (PA Wire)

Prof Curtice said Sir Keir does not have a vision of what he is trying to do, beyond arguing “We are going to clear up the cr** the other lot left us.”

And he warned that Reform’s recent pivot, in which it called for the nationalisation of Thames Water – moving beyond immigration and culture-war issues to tap into voters’ economic discontent – could see it take even more votes from traditional Labour voters.

Prof Curtice’s warning came as a senior Labour MP told The Independent that Sir Keir has focused too heavily on “taking tough decisions”.

So far in government, Labour has hiked national insurance, implemented a hugely unpopular tax on farmers and family businesses, scrapped winter fuel payments for millions of pensioners, maintained the two-child benefit cap, and denied compensation payments to Waspi women.

But the MP said Sir Keir must explain how making tough choices now will directly benefit the public, and that the prime minister should not be “ashamed of taxing the wealthy”. “It’s death for us: there is no story, there is no coherent story,” he warned.

The MP also pointed to Reform’s pivot, saying: “Farage and Richard Tice [the deputy leader of Reform], they’re now talking about vulture capitalism, and we are left holding the baby.”

Richard Tice has called for Thames Water to be nationalised (PA Wire)

They said: “Reform and the alt right, they have a story, and it is evolving to be able to take on Labour seats, tapping into the systemic failures of the last 60 years.

“Their story is basically ‘too much immigration, we’ve got to cut the green crap, we’ve got to stop the woke s***, then we can make our country better again’. And they point to the political elites, vulture capitalists and international finance.”

They added: “Labour are busy cosying up to BlackRock one day and kicking the Waspi women the next. There just doesn’t seem to be any kind of narrative people can follow or make sense of.”

One of Sir Keir’s ministers told The Independent that Labour has done a lot of good work since the general election, including overseeing the biggest overhaul in workers’ rights in a generation. But the minister added: “We are just really s*** at communicating it.”

They continued: “It’s doom and gloom; where is the joy? Why are we doing things? We are really bad at storytelling, which is something the right, Donald Trump and all those lot, are really good at. And those are the lessons we need to learn.

“That is the new year’s resolution I would give to the party: do comms better and learn about that storytelling.”

Rachel Reeves’s Budget has faced mounting criticism (PA Wire)

Pollster Luke Tryl, UK director of More in Common, also said there “has not been a good enough story”, adding that voters in focus groups see Labour as “going after pensioners, farmers and small businesses”.

He told The Independent that it is unclear what Sir Keir is trying to achieve, and that it appears he is just making “quite mean decisions on groups the public quite like”.

“We know people elected Labour because they were sick of the Tories and wanted to fix the country, and yet there has not been enough of what the fixing looks like,” Mr Tryl said.

He added that the prime minister’s “almost obsessive” narrative around “tough decisions” is damaging the government, as “that is all the public hear”.

“Toughness isn’t a virtue... [they] almost seem to think being unpopular is the job,” he said.

Mr Tryl added: “You can be unpopular, and make unpopular decisions, but you have to thread it together ... saying it is so that we can see the GP, fix the potholes ... which they have sort of said, but it is not coherent and they have not landed the narrative yet.”

Labour has been contacted for comment.