Keir Starmer has told allies that he will stand against Wes Streeting for the Labour leadership with the health secretary poised to resign from the cabinet and force a contest as the crisis within the Labour Party deepens.
The Independent first revealed on Monday that Mr Streeting was expected to launch a leadership bid as his supporters led the way in urging the prime minister to step aside.
But a defiant Sir Keir has told his remaining supporters he will fight any challenge, but it is now understood that as many as five other ministers, all allies of Mr Streeting, are on a resignation watchlist to deliver a further blow to their embattled leader, joining the four who quit on Tuesday.
One Starmer loyalist minister told The Independent: “They [Mr Streeting and his supporters] will want to hit as hard as possible. There will definitely be other ministers resigning with him.”
The prime minister stayed late in his office in parliament instead of returning to Downing Street holding emergenncy meetings with a series of ministers to persuade them to stick by him.
But supporters of defence minister Al Carns, who is thought to be eyeing his own leadership bid, suggested he may also quit if the health secretary enters the contest.
Backers of energy secretary Ed Miliband, who was defeated as Labour leader in the 2015 general election, say he also has the numbers to launch a bid, while former deputy prime minister Angela Rayner could also challenge despite still facing questions over her tax affairs. There were also fresh reports that Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham might have found a seat to run in, with the hope he could return as a potential leadership candidate.
There were reports that Burnham ally Afzal Khan would vacate his Manchester Rusholme seat for the Manchester mayor but this was later denied by the MP. An added problem is that the seat is also predicted to be won off Labour by the Greens.
One north west MP who backs Mr Burnham insisted: “Politics always find a way whatever the rules. We cannot have a Streeting versus Starmer contest, the party just won’t accept it. Miliband and Rayner just won’t get the support so the NEC [Labour Party national executive committee] will have to find a way for Andy to run.”
Early on Wednesday, Mr Streeting had a crunch meeting with the PM at No 10. Billed as a showdown over the leadership crisis, it ended after just 16 minutes. Later, Downing Street insisted the prime minister had “full confidence” in his health secretary.
Mr Streeting did not dampen speculation over a leadership bid, with a post on X failing to deny briefings that he was about to quit government. “Under Labour, NHS waiting lists are falling, ambulances are arriving faster, there are more GPs, and higher patient satisfaction,” he wrote. “Lots done, lots to do.”
However, a minister loyal to Sir Keir said that if Mr Streeting “bottles out again” and does not resign, “it will be the end of his political career”.
Former shadow chancellor John McDonnell posted on X a reminder that the health secretary had been an ally of disgraced former peer Peter Mandelson as well as Sir Keir’s sacked former chief of staff Morgan McSweeney, and had ties to the controversial thinktank Labour Together, which has been accused of smearing Labour politicians and journalists.
He wrote: “Just a thought. Wes Streeting owes his political status to the support he’s received over [the] years from Peter Mandelson and Morgan McSweeney at Labour Together. He wouldn’t make a move against Keir Starmer without Mandelson’s say-so. So look on this as Mandelson’s and Morgan’s revenge.”
The Independent has been told that Sir Keir has made it clear he will not simply resign if a leadership election is triggered but will “fight to win” against Mr Streeting.
In the Commons after the King’s Speech, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch mocked Sir Keir for being “in office but not in power”.
Turning to Mr Streeting, she asked if he had “been a bit distracted lately” over his failure to scrap NHS England, 14 months after the PM announced the move.
She added: “He’s chuntering now. Why don’t you just do your job? … There’s no point in him giving me dirty looks. We all know what he has been up to.”
The row overshadowed the second King’s Speech of Sir Keir’s premiership, which laid out 35 bills for a new legislative session, 22 months after Labour won the 2024 general election.
Even the speech hinted at Sir Keir’s weakened authority, containing no plans for welfare reform – following last summer’s humiliating rebellion in which the prime minister was forced to retreat on plans to cut benefits – and no mention of increased spending on defence.
As the Commons sat for the start of the King’s Speech debate, Labour MPs were noticeably stony-faced.
Sir Keir tried to make light of the situation with a joke; as he took to the podium, he referred to backbench MP Naz Shah’s opening address: “Members across the House will have read her remarkable new book. Her list of endorsements is truly impressive, reaching well over 100 members – at last, a list that we could all get behind.”
More than 90 Labour MPs have publicly demanded that he quit, while another 100 have signed a letter asking him to stay as the party splits over his future.
But looking ahead, Sir Keir told the Commons that the government was proposing “bills to increase the pace of change in our NHS, in law enforcement, in controlling our borders and more”.
He added: “Whilst immigration is down, we need to do more. Whilst violent crime is down, it needs to be lower. Whilst NHS waiting lists are down, we must go further – a rewiring of the state so the working people of this country feel that it serves their interests.”
But in a sign of the strife within the party, Labour MP Barry Gardiner could be seen sitting behind the prime minister in the Commons holding a copy of The Fraud by Owen Jones, a book highly critical of Sir Keir’s leadership.
