UK PM Keir Starmer delivers speech on ‘shared struggle’ to fix the UK – Technologist

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said fixing the country after 14 years of right-wing rule would be a “long-term project,” in his first Labour party conference speech as the country’s leader, on Tuesday, September 24.

Starmer, 62, rebutted criticisms levelled at some of his new government’s first steps by insisting it was his “duty to the British people to face up to necessary decisions.” The Labour leader has faced growing calls to offer a more positive outlook since ousting the Conservative party from government in a landslide election win in July.

He said Britain must embark on a “shared struggle” and that he would resist “easy answers” during the nearly one-hour-long speech, the first by a Labour premier at the conference in 15 years. Yet he also tried to insert some optimism, declaring that there was “light at the end of this tunnel.”

After guiding the centre-left Labour Party back to power for the first time since 2010, Starmer soon faced flak for scrapping payments to help the elderly pay for winter heating bills. The buildup to the conference was also overshadowed by a row over gifts Starmer and other Labour parliamentarians had accepted.

The controversies have dampened celebrations at Labour’s four-day gathering in Liverpool, in northwest England, but Starmer sought to retake control of the narrative by arguing it will take time and sacrifice to fix Britain.

“The politics of national renewal are collective. They involve a shared struggle,” he said. “A project that says, to everyone, this will be tough in the short term but in the long term it’s the right thing to do for our country. And we all benefit from that.”

Starmer alluded to recent criticism aimed at him and his finance minister, Rachel Reeves, alleging that they are affecting economic growth and investment in Britain by being pessimistic about the state of the country.

Starmer has spent much of his first weeks in power blaming the Tories for leaving everything in a messy state, from public finance to prisons and the state-run National Health Service.

Tax increases

The Tories have accused him of scaremongering over the state he found the country in, and of laying the groundwork for tax increases in the October 30 budget.

Starmer has already warned that the budget will be “painful.” “I know that the cost-of-living crisis drew a veil over the joy and wonder in our lives and that people want respite and relief – and may even have voted Labour for that reason,” Starmer said. “Our project has not and never will change. I changed the Labour Party to restore it to the service of working people,” he added, continuing: “And that is exactly what we will do for Britain. But I will not do it with easy answers. I will not do it with false hope.”

He said “bad faith advice from people who still hanker for the politics of noisy performance” and “the weak and cowardly fantasy of populism” was “water off a duck’s back.” Taking “tough long-term decisions now” will mean the “light at the end of this tunnel” can be reached “much more quickly,” he added.

Starmer highlighted Labour’s early legislation including a new national wealth fund, a publicly owned green energy company and the renationalisation of Britain’s railways. “We’re only just getting started,” he said.

Freebies row

Labour is looking to move on from a row over expensive gifts, including clothes and concert tickets given to Starmer and other senior Labour figures. All of the donations were within parliament’s rules, but Starmer has been forced to fend off accusations of hypocrisy, as the furore has come as he is asking ordinary Britons to tighten their belts.

Meanwhile, Momentum, a pressure group that campaigns for Labour to be more left-wing, has called for Starmer to “change course urgently and implement policies based on real Labour values.”