‘A shift has taken place’: Starmer faces the music after weekend of reflection

O n Friday, as the dust settled on Andy Burnham’s thumping victory in the Makerfield byelection, Keir Starmer was in defiant mood. “I have said repeatedly, I am not going to walk away,” the prime minister said, adding: “Let’s pull together as a party and a movement.” Just 48 hours later, one of his most loyal ministers was on the BBC sending a very different message. “I don’t want to come on here and be delusional that there is no process, there are no forces at work which are challenging the prime minister as leader – that is clearly the case,” said the business secretary, Peter Kyle . What changed in that intervening period will be picked over for months, if not years. The business secretary, Peter Kyle, acknowledged to the BBC on Sunday that there was a clear threat to Starmer’s leadership. Photograph: BBC By Sunday afternoon, Starmer’s allies were coming to terms with the fact that despite weeks of denials, the prime minister was about to announce his resignation, and the country was heading towards its seventh prime minister in 10 years. ‘I must serve the people’ Throughout the Makerfield campaign, Starmer insisted he would resist any attempt by the Greater Manchester mayor to unseat him. “I’m not going to walk away,” Starmer said on 18 May . “I feel very strongly I must serve the people who voted me into office.” Allies said Starmer had defied his critics before and would do so again. But privately, they admitted much would depend on the size of Burnham’s majority. …