Starmer tries to stay focused on his domestic agenda

When the Conservatives won the 2019 UK general election with their largest majority since the victories of Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s, party leader Boris Johnson had high hopes of remaining in power for another decade.
Within a few weeks, however, the political landscape was upended by the COVID-19 pandemic, and at the general election in July this year, the Conservatives were defeated by Labour in a landslide.
It is now more than a month since UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer marked his first 100 days in office, and he will be aware that Johnson’s experience illustrates the truth of the famous political maxim from former Conservative Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, who said it is often “events, dear boy, events” that decide the fate of governments.
Though Macmillan is widely credited as the originator of this insight, others voiced it before him. After the 1918 general election, for example, future prime minister Winston Churchill asserted that the main concern for the then dominant coalition government was the “opposition of events.” That government enjoyed a 283-seat majority; even with the historic nature of Labour’s overwhelming win on July 4, Starmer’s majority is more than 100 seats less than this.
Even during a relatively short time in power, Starmer’s government has already faced several significant, unexpected developments. The standout example was perhaps the riots across several UK urban areas in August following the murder of three young girls in Southport, England.
However, the biggest obstacles to the smooth running of the Labour government might prove to be international in nature. As the experience of the pandemic underlined, the global challenges the new government might face could be largely, if not entirely, unexpected.
Perhaps the biggest defined uncertainty is the dawn of a second Donald Trump US presidency. The full scale of the challenges Trump could create for bilateral relations are huge. These include issues related to economic factors such as sanctions, environmental and climate change matters, and defense and military challenges in, for example, Ukraine and the Middle East.
Disagreements between the countries, traditionally close allies, were legion when Trump was president from 2017 to 2021, and might be worse during the next four years.
The best that Starmer can probably hope for when Trump takes office in January is to largely set aside their political differences and try to forge some sort of constructive partnership, even if it is much more transactional in nature than he would prefer.

Starmer’s goal of redefining the UK’s polity and economy into the 2030s reveals huge ambition that will require more than a single term in office.

Andrew Hammond

It could be best built on emphasizing the traditional ties between the two nations, which are founded on demographics, religion, culture, law, politics, and economics. This could be supplemented by highlighting the longstanding security cooperation that has traditionally been at the core of the bilateral relationship, given the close partnership between the nations in areas such as intelligence and defense.
The UK, and indeed other key states in western Europe, could send a signal to Trump that the region is serious about this agenda in particular. In 2023, Britain was the biggest military spender in Europe in absolute terms. A strategic defense review ordered by Starmer’s government is expected to make the case for increasing defense spending, sooner rather than later, to meet Britain’s commitment of 2.5 percent of gross domestic product (it is currently estimated to be about 2.3 percent).
As he seeks a potential upside to his government’s relationship with Washington, however, Starmer would be wise not to overestimate the UK’s ability to shape US power under Trump. He will not be unaware that Trump might care little about core British interests unless they align with his “America First” vision, despite his connection to Scotland as the birthplace of his mother.
As we move into what might, once again, be a much more volatile period for transatlantic ties, now is therefore the time for the UK to plan ahead for some very difficult decisions. That there will be bilateral tensions under Trump is inevitable, the only question is when.
Given this volatile international backdrop, Starmer probably spent more time on foreign policy during his first few months in office than any other prime minister in living memory. This has continued into November with, for example, his trips to Azerbaijan for COP29, followed by one to Brazil for the G20 summit.
Despite this, Starmer knows he must also try to push ahead as quickly as possible with his domestic agenda so that it is not derailed. He will be acutely aware that although Democratic President Joe Biden achieved a wide range of significant accomplishments in the past four years, his administration’s record has been trashed by Trump, and Kamala Harris lost the presidential election by a clear margin.
Starmer’s goal of redefining the UK’s polity and economy into the 2030s reveals a huge ambition that will require more than a single term in office. He has repeatedly warned the British public that his government inherited a “societal black hole” from the Conservatives and “things are worse than we ever imagined.”
The prime minister has promised to “fix the foundations of this country” but warned that “change will not happen overnight. When there is rot deep in the heart of a structure, you can’t just cover it up. You can’t tinker with it or rely on quick fixes. You have to overhaul the entire thing. Tackle it at the root. Even if it’s harder work and takes more time.”
One example of this is the government’s ambition to transform the UK into a “clean energy superpower.” Some down payments on this have already been made, including the creation of Great British Energy, a new state-owned generator of green electricity, and the reversal of a Conservative ban on new onshore wind farms. However, this will be a long-term, generational project.
Labour therefore has a big agenda it hopes to deliver in government, which will require intense focus amid the growing international flux. While the party enjoys a huge majority in the House of Commons, whether or not it succeeds with its agenda might ultimately depend, to a critical degree, on events and factors that are not fully within its control, including those created by Trump’s second presidency.

• Andrew Hammond is an associate at LSE IDEAS at the London School of Economics.