The battle to define Labour’s grim inheritance

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You can’t knock Labour’s narrative consistency. This morning, Keir Starmer delivered a speech in central London in response to the Lord Darzi report on the NHS, which concluded the health service is in a “critical condition”.

Starmer, like Lord Darzi’s scathing report, did not mince his words. He warned the NHS needed to “reform or die” and stated firmly that there will be “No more money without reform.”

The prime minister went on to reflect that the NHS is “broken but it is not beaten”, restating his belief the health service can still be saved. But not without radical, root and branch upheaval: he promised Labour’s remedies will amount to the “biggest reimagining of the NHS since its birth”.

Starmer duly identified the government’s three priorities for reform, namely: “moving from an analogue to a digital NHS” (technology), “shifting more care from hospitals to communities” (primary care), and “moving from sickness to prevention”.

Viewed in full, this was a speech focussed more on policy challenges and prescriptions than it was political point-scoring, (although he did reference a “lost decade” for the health service under recent governments and suggest his opponents “broke the NHS”).

Still, any unspoken subtext was lifted explicitly by health secretary Wes Streeting, who clarified the Conservatives “squandered a golden inheritance” on the NHS. Speaking to Sky News as part of typically combative morning media round, Streeting rubbished the last government as guilty of “not just failing to fix the roof while the sun was shining, but effectively pouring petrol on the house, turning the gas on.”

As I have stated on many occasions in this newsletter, Labour’s condemnation of the Conservative record is not merely politically viable, and therefore prudent — but ultimately necessary in forging popular and parliamentary consent for the actions Starmer intends to take over the coming months.

In turn, Starmer admitted in his post-speech Q&A section that the preventative health measures his government will enact “will be controversial”. Already, Westminster has borne witness to a media and political furore over the government’s reported plans to ban smoking in some outdoor spaces, including pub gardens and outside restaurants, after the proposals were leaked to The Sun newspaper.

But for Starmer, fixing the NHS is so worthwhile because of how it opens up other avenues to national regeneration. He argued today that “the NHS is not contributing to national prosperity as it could”, adding: “Getting people back to health and work would not only reduce the costs on the NHS, it would help drive economic growth and fund public services.”

This strikes me as a far more compelling story than Labour has told recently about its bitter inheritance, laser-focused as that has been on fiscal matters and the government’s strict constraints.

As such, Starmer’s recent speeches have been criticised — including by Labour politicians privately — for relying too much on doom and gloom and too little on hope and possibility. So far, Starmer has foregrounded his dire inheritance to justify inaction over the two-child benefit cap, prompting a Labour rebellion, and controversial action on the winter fuel allowance, prompting a Labour rebellion. Starmer’s words today arguably point to a subtle reconfiguration of Labour’s messaging: yes, doom and anti-Tory admonishment — but coupled with a strong restatement of the government’s reforming zeal.

On the other side of this debate, it is the job of the Conservative Party and Rishi Sunak to hijack Starmer’s story-telling and proffer an equally compelling counter-narrative. Sunak, for a departing Tory premier, has prosecuted his party’s case pretty effectively over recent weeks. In the two PMQs since parliament returned from summer recess, Sunak has defended his record in government — with specific regard to the winter fuel allowance — staunchly indeed.

Meanwhile, shadow chancellor Jeremy Hunt — the primary political casualty of Labour’s messaging on a fiscal “black hole” — has today dismissed this narrative as “a political smokescreen”. Read his full comments here. They were delivered after a freedom of information request from the Financial Times newspaper, asking for an exact breakdown of the £22 billion “black hole”, was declined by government officials.

Soon enough however, there will be a new Conservative frontbench sparing with Labour across the commons despatch box and critiquing its alleged caricature of recent Tory governance. Indeed, this is the mould British politics will remain locked in until Starmer can realistically point to green shoots of success. That is Labour’s plan, in any case.

In a sense then, this means the Conservative Party — and whoever leads it — will continue to operate on the back foot for some time still. Of course, the individual who succeeds Sunak as leader may care rather less about defending his record and those of his predecessors. But it’s nonetheless easy to see how a future Tory premier could become trapped in a cycle of litigation and re-litigation, endlessly spieling about the past at the expense of addressing the future.

How a future Tory leader navigates this dilemma, especially with regard to an issue as potent as the NHS, will be their first key test. It could be summed up like this: own the Conservative Party’s record in government and fight, or disown and move on? Expect a future Tory chief to land somewhere in between.

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Lunchtime soundbite

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The speaker interjected: “Can I just say, ‘he tried to cover up’, that’s suggesting that a member is lying.”

Reed continued: “I withdraw that comment, perhaps I should have said he could have been more open and transparent.”

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