Starmer finds his voice confronting Farage but still faces a winter of trials, writes Andrew Marr
The only way was ever up.
Listen to this article
Keir Starmer arrived at the Labour conference in Liverpool facing terrible opinion polls, hideous economic choices, a pugnacious challenge to his leadership and with a badly depleted Number 10 team at his elbow.
More serious than all of them was a widespread perception, in the public as well as the media and much of the Labour Party, that he no longer knew what he stood for or, really, in which direction to face.
Party conferences don't turn around opinion polls. They can’t magically resolve economic crises. But one problem, Andy Burnham's leadership challenge, collapsed. The Manchester mayor found a wall of hostility in the neighbouring northern city as Labour people, an emotional lot, rallied to their leader.
He sensibly repacked his bags, went home and remains to fight another day. The Treasury, by the way, claimed his intervention, when he told the party not to take the bond markets so seriously, cost the British state £1.75 billion in instantly higher borrowing costs.
However, despite his perceived vagueness, the prime minister found his voice by the Mersey docks, and an enemy, giving him an energy we hadn't heard before. He will never be a great speech maker but this was Starmer at his best so far. He genuinely loathes and despises the Reform leader Nigel Farage; since Farage feels the same way about him, British politics now has an electric, head-to-head confrontation to keep us occupied all winter.
From the Prime Minister’s point of view, the Farage problem is as much about talking the country down, spreading a sense of national despair and local hopelessness, as it is about racism. Big chunks of his speech were devoted to personal stories about community heroes and good neighbourliness, designed to answer the online pessimism and division being sold directly to voters by social media attack films.
His words were a much more effective response, I thought, than the cringe-making order to ministers and MPs to wave little plastic flags throughout his speech. Reclaiming the flags of Britain from nationalism and extremism may be a good thing, but this was like a school monitor had been ordering the audience what to do and the grown-ups in the room looked uncomfortable.
Overall this was a more confident and united party gathering than any of us had expected. But the conference glow doesn't last long, particularly at a time when one of the most difficult budgets in a generation looms ahead, followed by very difficult elections in Scotland, Wales, London and elsewhere against Reform.
There are still persistent worries about the effectiveness of the Downing Street machine, which I heard time and again from senior ministers. Announcements on ID cards, Palestine, the new NHS app, and further education have, they say, not been properly stress-tested through internal discussions ahead of time and may be being launched publicly despite still having serious questions about the details.
They like Sir Keir in the Labour Party; much more than the country does. Delegates from normal backgrounds around the country find they relate quite well to this modest, decent, dogged man who talks a lot about the dignity of the working class and who seems instinctively more to the left than Tony Blair.
But in his final speech to the party as leader, Blair said - denying he had ever been any kind of Tory - the only Labour tradition he hated was losing. If, over the winter and early summer, Starmer still seems to be losing the country to Farage, the leadership challenge will return, whether from Andy Burnham or someone else.
This may be exciting for journalism but it is bad for the nation. In housing, energy, education, health and transport, Britain needs stability to rebuild and grow. The country requires years of stability without much political turbulence, with a consistent direction. Poor country. Poor us.
____________________
Watch Tonight with Andrew Marr exclusively on Global Player and the new LBC app every Monday to Thursday from 6pm to 7pm.
LBC Opinion provides a platform for diverse opinions on current affairs and matters of public interest.
The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official LBC position.
To contact us email opinion@lbc.co.uk