Starmer: Foreign affairs delayed me dealing with welfare rebellion
Sir Keir Starmer has said he did not get to grips with the growing rebellion over welfare reforms earlier as he was focused on international affairs.
He also said he took ownership for his decisions and believed as leader he should 'carry the can' when things do not go well.
Advertisement
The UK prime minister said he was occupied with the G7 and Nato summits and the escalating tensions in the Middle East for much of the past two weeks.
He said he was 'heavily focused' on what was happening with Nato and the Middle East all weekend and that his 'full attention really bore down' on the welfare bill on Thursday.
He defended the eventual U-turn, which came after more than 100 MPs launched a bid to kill the legislation with an amendment.
UK prime minister Sir Keir Starmer speaking at the British Chambers of Commerce Global Annual Conference at the QEII Centre, London. Picture date: Thursday June 26, 2025.
'Getting it right is more important than ploughing on with a package which doesn't necessarily achieve the desired outcome,' Mr Starmer told The Sunday Times.
Advertisement
He said all the decisions were his and that 'I take ownership of them'.
There have been reports that rebel MPs blamed Mr Starmer's chief of staff, Cork native Morgan McSweeney, for the UK government's approach.
Mr Starmer said: 'My rule of leadership is, when things go well you get the plaudits; when things don't go well you carry the can.
'I take responsibility for all the decisions made by this government. I do not talk about staff and I'd much prefer it if everybody else didn't.'
Advertisement
Ministers had hoped the reforms would get more people back into work and save up to £5 billion a year, but the concessions made leave chancellor Rachel Reeves needing to find money elsewhere and point to possible tax rises in the autumn.
On Saturday, the prime minister told the Welsh Labour conference the 'broken' welfare system must be fixed 'in a Labour way'.
He said: 'We cannot take away the safety net that vulnerable people rely on, and we won't, but we also can't let it become a snare for those who can and want to work.'
Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch will hit out at Mr Starmer as 'incapable of sticking to a decision' after he backed down on his plans.
Advertisement
Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch in conversation with Lord Moore of Etchingham during a Policy Exchange event in London. Picture date: Monday June 23, 2025.
The reforms would only have made 'modest reductions to the ballooning welfare bill', but the prime minister was 'too weak to hold the line', the Conservative Party leader is expected to say in a speech next week.
The UK government's original welfare package had restricted eligibility for Pip, the main disability payment in England, as well as cutting the health-related element of universal credit.
Existing recipients were to be given a 13-week phase-out period of financial support in an earlier move that was seen as a bid to head off opposition.
Now, the changes to Pip will be implemented in November 2026 and apply to new claimants only, while all existing recipients of the health element of universal credit will have their incomes protected in real terms.
Advertisement
The concessions on Pip alone protect some 370,000 people currently receiving the allowance who were set to lose out following reassessment.
As a year in office nears, more than half of voters think Labour has underperformed in that time, polling released on Saturday showed.
The Opinium survey showed 54 per cent think Labour has done a worse job than expected, while 18 per cent think the party has exceeded expectations.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
BBC News
37 minutes ago
- BBC News
Chris Mason: Labour still has a big persuasion job ahead
"I've not had as much quality time with my colleagues since the Brexit wars," a minister told me with a wry smile.A remark that gets to the heart of this benefits row within the Labour Party: this is a government with a big majority, that has already performed a big U-turn and yet is still involved in a big persuasion is not meant to happen, one year into government, with a working majority of prime minister himself will be getting stuck into some persuading today, making the case that these changes are, as he sees it, not only in keeping with Labour values but essential to ensure the long-term stability of the welfare if Monday's Commons statement from Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall was intended to reassure Labour MPs, it is an open question as to whether it worked."It turned a fair few colleagues off. I think it will get through, but it'll be close," said one MPs press Kendall on rollout of benefit changesWelfare cuts: What are the Pip and universal credit changes?What has been driving the rise in disability benefit claims?Faisal Islam: How much will U-turn on disability benefits cost?There has been plenty of talk of there being 40 to 50 Labour MPs who are opposed, but things remain the size of the working majority, rebels would need to amass around 80 of their colleagues to vote against the government to defeat them, everything else being a key factor could be how many choose to abstain in the vote on Tuesday Prof Philip Cowley of Queen Mary University of London notes that the biggest backbench rebellion Sir Keir Starmer has suffered so far is largest rebellion in Tony Blair's first year in Downing Street was 47 and also on the welfare state - over lone parent largest backbench rebellion for any governing party in 200 years was in 2003, over the Iraq the heart of plenty of the concern over these benefits changes is what is being proposed for the Personal Independence Payment (Pip) at the end of next November 2026, the plan is the eligibility criteria for the main disability benefit will be Labour MPs and ministers had hoped a review of Pip, conducted by Work and Pensions Minister Sir Stephen Timms and involving disabled people, would reassure colleagues the government's intentions were something they could over and over again in the Commons concerns were raised that the timeframe of the review - itself due to report in the autumn of next year - would mean it would be too late to have an influence on the eligibility criteria for Pip beginning that beneath that there is an underlying critique: that the reason the plans for late next year remain in place is because that way it makes it (a bit) easier for Chancellor Rachel Reeves' numbers to add up - and, to use the jargon, for the measures to be "scored" by the Office for Budget Responsibility when it produces its forecasts, which are so central to the government's management of the plenty of Labour MPs this is wrong-headed, topsy turvy and an increasingly hard-to-defend approach to it is also worth emphasising, as it always is when there is a debate dominated by noisy people, that there are quieter Labour MPs, many keeping their heads down right now, who find this whole row gratuitous and fundamentally naive - and, they argue, it is Labour's duty to grapple with a spiralling benefits Sir Keir and Rachel Reeves have long argued that Labour being seen as credible custodians of the economy is the building block upon which everything else is Chief Whip, Sir Alan Campbell, in charge of winning the vote for the prime minister, has issued a plea for unity - something that only happens when there isn't a surplus of it - and told Labour MPs they should "act as a team". The party, he said, would have to come back together after this difficult vote for will debate the plans all over again later, and the vote is expected early this even if the government does win, that won't be the end of the arguments and votes are expected in the next few weeks.
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
Starmer has no energy, vision or strategy for Britain on the world stage. He offers only weakness, decline and a disregard for the sovereignty of this nation: NILE GARDINER
Keir Starmer has been a disaster as British Prime Minister. Don't just take my word for it. In the week of the first anniversary of Starmer moving into No 10, the polling guru Sir John Curtice said that he has had 'the worst start for any newly-elected Prime Minister, or Conservative'. By this he means the Starmer government has suffered the biggest fall in public support for a new administration in history.
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
QUENTIN LETTS: Lisa flew into a prolonged riff tearing into Glastonbury and the BBC... Nandy was jammin'!
Well that should have Glastonbury 's founder Michael Eavis chewing his silly beard. Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy came to the Commons to debate the BBC 's hate-rapper incident. Rather than excuse it, the minister flew into what I understand (guitar-speak) is called a prolonged riff. Nandy was jammin'! Both Glastonbury and the BBC were torn off a strip. For years the centre-Left has grovelled to Glastonbury, hailing it as a pinnacle of our culture. Labour MPs have attended its foetid mosh pits and chanted 'oooh Jeremy Corbyn ' alongside spliffy rich kids boogying in the mud and mire. MPs such as Tom Watson (now a Lord) sucked up to these designer-grungies and their ghastly eco-glamping. But all that was forgotten when Ms Nandy stood at the despatch box. She seized on this foul-up and on wider conduct at the festival, where terrorist flags and Nazi symbols were seen. Things were so bad that Jewish festival-goers had felt it necessary to create their own 'safe space'. All this from a venue that claims to be liberal. 'I have levers at my disposal,' Ms Nandy told the Commons, 'and I will not hesitate to use them.' She was 'exasperated' by the BBC and its poohbahs. 'I'm not satisfied with the explanation so far,' she cried. Not since the row over Blairites 'sexing-up' the case for war in Iraq has a Labour politician torn into the corporation in such a way. For Ms Nandy to sound cross is quite something. Normally she is as menacing as Sooty's little friend Soo. For all the harrumphing, do we believe the Starmerites would ever pull the ultimate 'lever' over the BBC and put it out of existence? Invited to do that by Reform's Richard Tice (Boston), she froze. But she certainly did well with this Commons display and even managed not to be booed – a miracle –when she made a reference to Sir Keir Starmer. It may or may not be worth noting that the Culture Secretary has been much tipped for demotion in a coming ministerial shuffle. After this performance she has made it harder for No 10 to sack her. The Conservatives' Stuart Andrew claimed that music festivals 'must appeal to the highest standards of social cohesion'. There speaks a man who plainly packs a chip butty for his picnic at Glyndebourne. No MP asked the obvious question: can the director general, Tim Davie, survive? But Peter Prinsley (Lab, Bury St Edmunds), fanning himself with a scrap of paper, did ask 'who on earth will be held accountable?' and John Glen (Con, Salisbury) said the public would expect 'people to be held individually to account'. Dame Caroline Dinenage (Con, Gosport) noted that the editing failures could hardly be for lack of staff. The Beeb had 400 people at Glastonbury, averred Dame Caroline, who chairs the culture select committee. 'What were they all doing?' They were surely in the beer tent. Or, being the BBC, it may have been the Pimm's tent. Or something more powdery. Sarah Sackman, justice minister, wandered in to listen to the debate. So, upstairs in the peers' gallery, did Luciana Berger, who has rejoined Labour after the anti-Semitism of the Corbyn years. Jim Allister (DUP, North Antrim) spoke of 'an appalling pro-terrorist broadcast on our national broadcaster'. Andrew Murrison (Con, SW Wilts) had written to the super-rich Eavises at Glastonbury – 'no reply, none expected'. The only dissent to the Beeb-knocking came from Ayoub Khan (Ind, Perry Barr), who wondered why the Government did not criticise 'death to all Arabs' chants by Israeli football crowds. Ms Nandy firmly told Mr Khan that was because it had not been broadcast by the BBC. Sammy Wilson (DUP, E Antrim) described Glastonbury-goers as 'young, middle-class, educated morons'. Rap may not be Sammy's thing. He is possibly more of a Dolly Parton fan. I must say, I can seldom understand a word rappers say or sing. No subtitles. Maybe that was why the BBC failed to cut the feed.
