Starmer says Labour can 'pull this round' as he prepares for party conference amid Reform poll surge
The Prime Minister claimed Reform UK’s policies will tear the UK apart
Sir Keir Starmer believes his Labour government "can pull this round" despite recent questions over his leadership and the party's plummeting poll ratings.
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The Prime Minister has arrived in Liverpool for this week's party conference under pressure, with Labour railing Reform in opinion polls and growing calls from backbenchers for Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, to replace him.
But Sir Keir was determined to take on Nigel Farage and the rise of the populist right, calling it the "fight of our times".
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"We've all got to be in it together," he told The Times.
"We don’t have time for introspection, we don’t have time for navel-gazing. You’ll always get a bit of that at a Labour Party conference, but that is not going to solve the problems that face this country.
"Once you appreciate the change — in the sense of the division that Reform would bring to our country and the shattering of what we are as a patriotic country — then you realise this is a fight which in the end is bigger than the Labour Party.”
The PM was adamant the next election would be fought between Labour and Reform, as he believes the Conservatives are "dead".
A recent poll by More in Common claimed Nigel Farage’s party would expand from five to 373 MPs in the next election, while Labour would suffer its worst electoral defeat in history.
In order to win, Sir Keir said Labour needed to be "much clearer about what patriotism is".
“We are a reasonable, tolerant, live and let-live country. That is who we are as a nation. That is what patriotism is. It’s capturing that essence of being British in all its senses," he added.
He also accused Farage of trying to capitalise on “grievance” politics, claiming the "last thing" the Reform leader wants to do is "fix" problems.
His comments come after he told a group of students at the Liverpool Echo’s offices that Reform's plans to remove indefinite leave to remain for legal migrants as "one of the most shocking things" the opposition party had come out with.
He said: “These are people who’ve been in our country a long time, contributing to our society, maybe working in – I don’t know – hospitals, schools, running businesses, our neighbours, and Reform says it wants to deport them in certain circumstances.
“I think it is a real sign of just how divisive they are and that their politics and their policies will tear this country apart."
Sir Keir continued: “It is what it is to be British that we are able to be reasonable, pragmatic, tolerant, live and let live. To tear away at that will destroy our country. I feel very, very strongly about this.
“I’m sorry that you’re having to grow up in a world where this politics has found a voice and almost a licence as well.”
The latest polling has placed Nigel Farage as the most likely politician to be the next prime minister, with Reform currently on track to win the most parliamentary seats if an election were held, according to YouGov.
After arriving at the conference centre in Liverpool with his wife Lady Victoria, Sir Keir said the gathering, which officially starts on Sunday, was a “really big opportunity to make our case to the country, make it absolutely clear that patriotic national renewal is the way forward, not the toxic divide and decline that we get with Reform”.
In a message aimed at rallying a divided Labour against Reform, Sir Keir told the Guardian: “History will not forgive us if we do not use every ounce of our energy to fight Reform. There is an enemy. There is a project which is detrimental to our country.
“It actually goes against the grain of our history. It’s right there in plain sight in front of us. We have to win this battle.”
Ahead of the Labour conference, backbench MPs and unions renewed calls to end the two-child benefit cap.
Several MPs from Liverpool, the host city of the conference, were among those who wrote to the Prime Minister ahead of the gathering insisting the cap “is one of the most significant drivers of child poverty in Britain today”.
Debate over the future of the cap is among a number of areas of benefits policy where ministers could be challenged by Labour members in Liverpool.
