Keir Starmer is on the brink of announcing his departure from Downing Street as early as today after spending the weekend weighing up his political fate with his wife Victoria at the Chequers countryside retreat in Buckinghamshire.
An announcement this morning would allow the Prime Minister to get ahead of Andy Burnham's entrance to Parliament this afternoon. The former Greater Manchester mayor will be sworn in as an MP, paving the way for him to challenge Starmer for the Labour leadership.
Starmer's Weekend at Chequers
The Prime Minister spent the weekend with his wife, whom he refers to as Vic, at his grace-and-favour Chequers retreat in the Chiltern Hills of Buckinghamshire. Vic has long been known as Starmer's key sounding board and was the person he turned to as crunch time on his premiership approaches. She has been credited with encouraging him to fight on after he faced a barrage of calls to resign following last month's catastrophic local election results.
Vic is said to have been angry at what she saw as treacherous behaviour from Andy Burnham and Wes Streeting, who resigned as Health Secretary to apply pressure on her husband. Starmer in recent weeks had repeatedly pledged to fight any leadership challenge, but Burnham’s emphatic victory at the Makerfield by-election has turned the tide even further against him.
Mounting Pressure from Labour MPs
More MPs have called on Starmer to go, and some Cabinet ministers in his top circle have privately admitted his time is up. Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper and Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander are among those who have urged the Prime Minister to resign in private conversations. Starmer was understood to have been genuinely still deciding his next move over the weekend, as he took advice from close allies and his wife. Vic also accompanied him to the G7 summit in Evian-les-Bains in France last week.
Luke Sullivan, a former aide to Starmer, told The Mirror: “She [Vic] is a key sounding board and somebody he trusts, loves and respects very deeply. I suspect what the Prime Minister has done has spent the weekend on the phone with colleagues, advisers, and had some time with his family just to digest what I think is a very sad situation.”
Historical Context and Future Timetable
According to a biography of Starmer by Tom Baldwin, Vic was among those in 2021 who urged the then-Labour leader not to quit as he considered his position over the party’s defeat to Boris Johnson’s Tories at the Hartlepool by-election. One ally later told The Mirror last night: “My understanding is that PM is still genuinely deciding and taking advice.” The source called for calm, adding: “It’s not in the country or party's interest to tear ourselves apart or brief against each other in public.”
Some reports on Sunday evening suggested Starmer's exit timetable could include staying in post until Labour's conference in September. On Monday morning, education minister Baroness Jacqui Smith said the Prime Minister will “make his own decisions” about whether to resign. She told Times Radio: “My understanding from those I’ve spoken to who are close to the Prime Minister yesterday is that the Prime Minister has spent the weekend thinking really carefully about the future of the country, about what’s the best thing to do for the British people. He’s also, by the way, been of course engaged in government, responding to the terrible train crash, talking to the chief executive of the East Midlands Ambulance Service, responding to the attack in Edinburgh. But he always thinks carefully about the future of this country and the interests of the British people – he puts them, by the way, ahead of the interests of the party – and he will make his own decisions in the light of what obviously everybody can see is a considerable amount of pressure and turbulence.”
Trump's Bitter Parting Message
In an extraordinary intervention, US President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly lashed out at the Prime Minister over his war with Iran, issued a bitter parting message on Sunday. As speculation mounted over Starmer’s position, he posted on Truth Social: “Keir Starmer will resign as Prime Minister of The United Kingdom.” He then launched into a grumpy tirade about Starmer's failures, from his perspective. He wrote: “He failed badly on two very important subjects- IMMIGRATION AND ENERGY (OPEN NORTH SEA OIL!). I wish him well!”
