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The widespread unpopularity of Sir Keir Starmer and his government – largely fuelled by “psychodrama” in Westminster – is hitting Labour hard on the doorstep, three regional mayors have warned as they brace for major losses in next month's local elections.
In a stark warning to the prime minister, Liverpool city region mayor Steve Rotheram, London mayor Sir Sadiq Khan, and West Midlands mayor Richard Parker say public dissatisfaction with the government is distracting from local issues and hampering the party’s slim chance of success.
They say repeated Labour U-turns, failure to communicate successes, and the ongoing scandal over Peter Mandelson’s failed security vetting have been cited as key factors that are pushing voters away.
The party has been told to prepare for “existential” results on 7 May, and the embattled prime minister, already bruised and expected to face a vote this week on a parliamentary inquiry over what he knew about the Mandelson saga, is expected to face more pressure to step down.
open image in gallery The ongoing saga of Peter Mandelson’s appointment as US ambassador continues to plague Sir Keir Starmer ( AFP/Getty )
In a bleak warning to Sir Keir, leading pollster Sir John Curtice said Labour was “heading for a horrendous set of results” as it bids to keep hold of town halls in its English heartlands, with the prime minister’s unpopularity a driving force behind that.
Sir John told The Independent: “The Labour Party's at 19 per cent in the opinion polls. They're running at a half of the level of support they got in 2022, which is when two-thirds of the seats were last contested. Starmer is deeply unpopular in the polls.”
“Labour and the Tories are heading for a horrendous set of results. They may be bad, they may be very bad, and they may be existential.”
In the Liverpool City Region, all-out elections will be held in the boroughs of Sefton and St Helens. Nigel Farage, whose Reform UK election slogan is “Get Starmer out”, has set his sights on Labour’s majorities in the area, which is one of the party’s most loyal cities.
open image in gallery Labour mayors Steve Rotheram and Richard Parker with Sir Keir Starmer ( Getty )
Mr Rotheram, who won the biggest vote share of the country’s metro mayors in 2024 when he was re-elected with 68 per cent of the vote, told The Independent that U-turns made by Sir Keir’s government are “overshadowing the good stuff”.
“There's definitely a feeling that the ‘own goals’, the number of U-turns that the party made, have reflected really badly on everything else”, he said.
“It's all overshadowing all the good stuff. So I do think there's an issue around that, and we need to address it. In some people's minds it's almost a referendum on what's happened nationally, and it's really not.”
He added: “I think the way in which we need to approach these elections is a hyper-local, a really granular level – knocking on every single door and explaining that it's not currently an election for national issues”, he said. “It's who's going to run your town hall.
“Once we break beyond the people who are not supporting the likes of Keir Starmer, when we get beyond that and explain the type of town hall that Labour are proposing, then we get a much fairer hearing.”
Meanwhile Richard Parker, Labour mayor of the West Midlands, where a number of votes, including all-out elections in Birmingham, will take place, said that Labour’s main problem is communication.
He believes the party has not reinforced to voters what it has done since its landslide general election win in 2024, citing lifting the two-child benefit cap as an example of its successes.
“The issue of a frustration with the national government, rather than the PM, has come up on the doorstep”, Mr Parker told The Independent.
“Whilst we could and need to do better, we've also done some great things, but we've got to be a lot better at telling people about them,” he added.
In London, Labour is on course for its worst local result in more than four decades, with both the Greens and Reform set to eat into its vote share.
A new MRP poll of the 32 boroughs which make up the capital, conducted by YouGov for Sky News and Politico, shows Labour is on course to win the highest vote share in 15 councils – six fewer than in 2022 and its lowest level since 1982.
open image in gallery Sadiq Khan warned that dissatisfaction with the Labour government was hindering the local elections campaign ( AFP/Getty )
Sir Sadiq this week warned that Westminster politics, particularly the ongoing Mandelson crisis, was affecting the party’s campaigning.
He told the Financial Times he was “really frustrated” that the scandal was distracting from the party’s local achievements.
“I’d rather be talking about that than be on the defensive talking about the omnishambles of the Mandelson saga.
“I’m afraid what will happen is that rather than saying to voters ‘listen, this is the difference that a Labour council, working with a Labour mayor and a Labour government, can make’, people may decide to punish the imperfections of the government.”
Sir Keir is widely expected to face a leadership challenge after the local elections results in May, and some of the party’s exasperated MPs have spoken about the damage his reputation is doing to Labour’s chances in May.
Jonathan Brash, the MP for Hartlepool, this week called on the government to “get a grip” as he became the first Labour MP to call for Sir Keir to go over the Madelson saga.
“I am completely fed up to the back teeth of this psychodrama in Westminster, the own goals that are coming from the heart of this government,” he said.
“Meanwhile, we have got fantastic Labour councillors, canvassers, activists up and down the country working hard and delivering for their constituencies like mine in Hartlepool, facing local elections in the shadow of this absolute mess.”