
One year on from Starmer's election victory. Here's my report card
The British public say very badly indeed: Starmer's net favourability has fallen to the lowest level on record. But what's the full picture? Has he kept his promises? As I await my children's end of year reports, here's my report card for the Prime Minister.
Immigration
1) Starmer promised time and again he would 'smash the gangs'. Unfortunately for the public, the gangs are smashing him. The number of migrants entering on small boats is up 48 per cent, despite a fall in illegal migration into Europe. Only a tiny fraction of people smugglers have been arrested and sentences for immigration offences are being watered down. Despite promising to end asylum hotels, Yvette Cooper has been busy opening more.
In May it sounded as though the penny had dropped. Starmer said 'we risk becoming an island of strangers' and that mass migration had caused 'incalculable damage'. He was correct. But last week he said he regretted those comments and had just read them out like a ventriloquist's dummy. Starmer's aides were furious with him, calling his u-turn 'weak', and saying that he 'lacked moral fibre'. I couldn't have put it better myself.
Healthcare
2) Starmer boldly claimed he would fix the NHS. He has managed to increase the number of NHS appointments by 8 per cent, which is welcome. But that is a smaller increase than Victoria Atkins delivered last year – and on other metrics, things are going backwards. A&E waiting times are higher than they were last year.
Starmer has directed extra cash to the NHS, but without real reform, that money is going into a black hole of waste and inefficiency. With social care reform delayed until at least 2028, the fundamentals will remain poor. The NHS is still being treated as a religion, not a critical public service in need of reform.
Economy
3) Labour promised they wouldn't increase National Insurance or change the fiscal rules. In office, they immediately did the opposite, raking in £25bn from the national insurance increase and borrowing an extra £142bn by the end of the parliament – causing growth forecasts to be downgraded. This £167 billion lie is surely one of the most brazen cons on the electorate in history.
Ed Miliband promised to cut energy bills, yet experts say that bills are expected to increase next year. Meanwhile factory after factory is closing down. Vauxhall is closing in Luton. NEG in Wigan. Sabic in Teesside. We are haemorrhaging critical industries.
Housing
4) Angela Rayner's flagship pledge was to build 1.5m new homes by the end of the Parliament. I admire the ambition, but her plan is destined to fail. Rayner slashed London's housing target by 20 per cent; 23 of London's 33 boroughs had zero new housing starts in the first quarter of this year. In any case, Labour can't build their way out of the housing crisis when 5 in 7 of their new homes are forecast to go to migrants.
Justice
5) During the election, Starmer was happy to boast about his time as Director of Public Prosecutions. But in his first year, the court backlog increased, with 77,000 cases awaiting trial. His Justice Secretary introduced two-tier sentencing rules that were eventually defeated. Tens of dangerous prisoners were let out by mistake and thousands have been released after serving just a fraction of their sentence. Most embarrassingly, Starmer's plans to scrap short sentences for 'minor offences' prompted unprecedented warnings from MI5 that they would risk public safety.
My conclusion? Starmer is a creature of our failed elite consensus and he's going down with it. A man unable to convey any purpose for his government or unifying vision for our country. Worse, he is now beholden to his hard-left backbenchers. As bad as things are today, things can always get worse.

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23 minutes ago
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