The mantra of party unity is wearing thin when no one knows what it is they are supposed to be unifying around
Keir Starmer is more likely than most people in Britain to be prime minister, but the odds are still stacked against him. Most opposition leaders fail to reach Downing Street. The ones who make it tend to start with more than 197 MPs. That will be Labour’s tally if, as widely expected, the party loses the Batley and Spen byelection on Thursday.
Starmer’s route to No 10 is arduous by any historical measure. He has to repair a fractured electoral coalition or discover a new one. He needs a message that works in heartland seats lost to Boris Johnson in 2019 and also in places that have been Tory since 2005 or longer, while simultaneously unseating Scottish Nationalists. He has less than three years; probably two. It would be easier to imagine him completing that mission if he wasn’t going backwards.
