On the eve of the local elections, voters need a wake-up call: the reason Keir Starmer fears losing voters to Nigel Farage is that they are exactly the people he is governing for. If they abandon him, then he is failing.
Many voters don’t get it, because they still think Labour is a left-wing party, in the face of all the evidence that has mounted up since July 2024’s general election.
But the reason Labour’s strategists are reportedly fixated on the threat from Reform UK is not because Reform appeals to disillusioned Labour left-wingers (that would be a nonsense) — but because it threatens the socially conservative, ex-Tory voters Keir Starmer has made his core constituency.
That’s the real story.
Help fund great articles! We’re aiming for £50 to cover research and reporting time this week.
Can you chip in £3 today?
👉 https://ko-fi.com/voxpolitical
And Labour isn’t losing votes to Reform despite its rightward shift — it’s losing them because of it.
Having mimicked right-wing populist rhetoric in opposition, Labour now finds itself in power with no results to show the public and nothing but rhetoric to offer the voters it once sought to appease. The result? Support is draining from all sides — not just to Reform, but to the Greens and Lib Dems as well.
And voters aren’t wrong. On Brexit, immigration, spending, taxation — Labour talks like the Tories and governs like them too.
This isn’t a tactical shift. It’s a direction of travel.
But voters don’t judge a government by how well it plays the political game. It judges by what changes for the better — and under Starmer, very little has.
Buy Cruel Britannia in print here. Buy the Cruel Britannia ebook here. Or just click on the image!
The argument some commentators make — that Labour must mimic the right to protect its flank — falls apart the moment you remember that Labour is in power.
Governments aren’t judged on promises or positioning. They’re judged on delivery. And Starmer’s government is delivering… nothing that breaks with the Conservative past.
Labour was elected in July 2024 on a single, bold slogan: “Change.” But since then, it has delivered none.
-
The two-child benefit cap remains in place — a cruel policy born of Tory austerity, still defended by Labour despite overwhelming evidence of its harm.
-
Tax breaks for the wealthy introduced by successive Conservative chancellors have not been reversed.
-
Labour’s fiscal rules forbid borrowing for anything other than capital projects, effectively blocking the investment needed to repair crumbling public services.
-
Immigration rhetoric is indistinguishable from that of the previous government.
-
Brexit policy is frozen in place, with only vague promises of “pragmatic” improvements that never seem to arrive.
The result? Even sympathetic voters say they see no difference from the last government. And they’re not wrong.
Labour today is not a social democratic party experimenting with compromise.
It is a centre-right party, committed to many of the same principles that defined Tory rule from 2010 to 2024: fiscal austerity, low taxation for the wealthy, hostile messaging on immigration, and a refusal to challenge the economic damage of Brexit.
Get my free guide: “10 Political Lies You Were Sold This Decade” — just subscribe to our email list here:
👉 https://voxpoliticalonline.com
If Labour is losing votes to the Lib Dems and Greens, it’s not because it’s misjudged the “trade-off.” It’s because there is no trade-off left. The party is no longer even pretending to represent progressive interests. Those voters aren’t confused — they’re responding rationally to what Labour has become.
Take the economy. Labour promised “Change” — but imposed fiscal rules that all but guarantee continuity.
The party won’t raise income tax on the rich. It won’t touch wealth taxes. It won’t even reverse the most regressive tax breaks handed down during the Conservative years. It talks endlessly about “growth” — but refuses to invest in anything that might actually stimulate it.
The result is the same as it’s been since 2010: stagnant wages, underfunded public services, and a working population that becomes worse off, year after year.
This isn’t just timidity. It’s ideology.
Starmer has chosen to govern within the limits set by austerity-era thinking. That choice betrays precisely the voters Labour claims to represent — the people crying out not just for competence, but for transformation.
And then there’s Brexit — the issue that helped deliver Boris Johnson’s 80-seat majority in 2019, and which Labour now seems terrified to even mention.
Why? Because it was Keir Starmer, as Shadow Brexit Secretary, who shaped the disastrous second-referendum policy that shattered Labour’s electoral coalition under Jeremy Corbyn.
That policy made Labour appear indecisive and elitist — exactly the ground Farage wanted to fight on — and helped deliver a wipe-out in Leave-voting seats.
Starmer gambled that he could pin the blame on Corbyn and ride the wave of anti-Tory sentiment later. And in 2024, he did.
But now he’s in government, and the Brexit chickens have come home to roost.
Businesses are struggling, growth is flat, the NHS and universities are losing vital staff and funding, and the public is finally waking up to the real costs of Britain’s departure from the EU.
Starmer’s refusal to confront this failure — out of fear it might expose his own role in it? — leaves a political vacuum that Farage is more than happy to fill with bluster.
If Labour had the courage to call out Brexit as the root of many of the UK’s current economic problems, it could at least offer a contrast — a sense that it sees reality and will try to fix it.
But by parroting Tory lines on “respecting the referendum” and talking tough on immigration, Labour validates the same broken politics that delivered the mess we’re in.
The irony is that Starmer believes he’s playing it safe. But in trying to outflank the right on its own territory, he’s fighting a battle he cannot win.
Voters who are drawn to Farage’s nationalism will always prefer the real thing. And voters who want real solutions will go looking for them elsewhere — or simply stay home.
Help fund great articles! We’re aiming for £50 to cover research and reporting time this week.
Can you chip in £3 today?
👉 https://ko-fi.com/voxpolitical
That’s why these local elections matter.
They’re not just a test of Labour’s popularity — they’re a signal of whether the public still believes in “Change”, or whether they’ve already seen enough to know it was an empty slogan.
If Labour continues down this path — chasing right-wing voters with right-wing rhetoric while delivering Tory-lite policy — it will keep bleeding support. Not because people are confused, but because they understand all too well what’s happening.
So if you are casting a vote this week, remember: Starmer is not failing to stop Reform UK. He is governing in a way that makes Reform UK possible.
If that’s not the future you want, then send Labour the message it still refuses to hear and vote for someone else — before it’s too late.
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And do share with your family and friends – so they don’t miss out!
If you have appreciated this article, don’t forget to share it using the buttons at the bottom of this page. Politics is about everybody – so let’s try to get everybody involved!
Buy Vox Political books so we can continue
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Cruel Britannia is available
in either print or eBook format here:
The Livingstone Presumption is available
in either print or eBook format here:
Health Warning: Government! is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
The first collection, Strong Words and Hard Times,
is still available in either print or eBook format here:
Labour’s problem with Reform UK is it’s trying to BE Reform UK
On the eve of the local elections, voters need a wake-up call: the reason Keir Starmer fears losing voters to Nigel Farage is that they are exactly the people he is governing for. If they abandon him, then he is failing.
Many voters don’t get it, because they still think Labour is a left-wing party, in the face of all the evidence that has mounted up since July 2024’s general election.
But the reason Labour’s strategists are reportedly fixated on the threat from Reform UK is not because Reform appeals to disillusioned Labour left-wingers (that would be a nonsense) — but because it threatens the socially conservative, ex-Tory voters Keir Starmer has made his core constituency.
That’s the real story.
Help fund great articles! We’re aiming for £50 to cover research and reporting time this week.
Can you chip in £3 today?
👉 https://ko-fi.com/voxpolitical
And Labour isn’t losing votes to Reform despite its rightward shift — it’s losing them because of it.
Having mimicked right-wing populist rhetoric in opposition, Labour now finds itself in power with no results to show the public and nothing but rhetoric to offer the voters it once sought to appease. The result? Support is draining from all sides — not just to Reform, but to the Greens and Lib Dems as well.
And voters aren’t wrong. On Brexit, immigration, spending, taxation — Labour talks like the Tories and governs like them too.
This isn’t a tactical shift. It’s a direction of travel.
But voters don’t judge a government by how well it plays the political game. It judges by what changes for the better — and under Starmer, very little has.
Buy Cruel Britannia in print here. Buy the Cruel Britannia ebook here. Or just click on the image!
The argument some commentators make — that Labour must mimic the right to protect its flank — falls apart the moment you remember that Labour is in power.
Governments aren’t judged on promises or positioning. They’re judged on delivery. And Starmer’s government is delivering… nothing that breaks with the Conservative past.
Labour was elected in July 2024 on a single, bold slogan: “Change.” But since then, it has delivered none.
The two-child benefit cap remains in place — a cruel policy born of Tory austerity, still defended by Labour despite overwhelming evidence of its harm.
Tax breaks for the wealthy introduced by successive Conservative chancellors have not been reversed.
Labour’s fiscal rules forbid borrowing for anything other than capital projects, effectively blocking the investment needed to repair crumbling public services.
Immigration rhetoric is indistinguishable from that of the previous government.
Brexit policy is frozen in place, with only vague promises of “pragmatic” improvements that never seem to arrive.
The result? Even sympathetic voters say they see no difference from the last government. And they’re not wrong.
Labour today is not a social democratic party experimenting with compromise.
It is a centre-right party, committed to many of the same principles that defined Tory rule from 2010 to 2024: fiscal austerity, low taxation for the wealthy, hostile messaging on immigration, and a refusal to challenge the economic damage of Brexit.
Get my free guide: “10 Political Lies You Were Sold This Decade” — just subscribe to our email list here:
👉 https://voxpoliticalonline.com
If Labour is losing votes to the Lib Dems and Greens, it’s not because it’s misjudged the “trade-off.” It’s because there is no trade-off left. The party is no longer even pretending to represent progressive interests. Those voters aren’t confused — they’re responding rationally to what Labour has become.
Take the economy. Labour promised “Change” — but imposed fiscal rules that all but guarantee continuity.
The party won’t raise income tax on the rich. It won’t touch wealth taxes. It won’t even reverse the most regressive tax breaks handed down during the Conservative years. It talks endlessly about “growth” — but refuses to invest in anything that might actually stimulate it.
The result is the same as it’s been since 2010: stagnant wages, underfunded public services, and a working population that becomes worse off, year after year.
This isn’t just timidity. It’s ideology.
Starmer has chosen to govern within the limits set by austerity-era thinking. That choice betrays precisely the voters Labour claims to represent — the people crying out not just for competence, but for transformation.
And then there’s Brexit — the issue that helped deliver Boris Johnson’s 80-seat majority in 2019, and which Labour now seems terrified to even mention.
Why? Because it was Keir Starmer, as Shadow Brexit Secretary, who shaped the disastrous second-referendum policy that shattered Labour’s electoral coalition under Jeremy Corbyn.
That policy made Labour appear indecisive and elitist — exactly the ground Farage wanted to fight on — and helped deliver a wipe-out in Leave-voting seats.
Starmer gambled that he could pin the blame on Corbyn and ride the wave of anti-Tory sentiment later. And in 2024, he did.
But now he’s in government, and the Brexit chickens have come home to roost.
Businesses are struggling, growth is flat, the NHS and universities are losing vital staff and funding, and the public is finally waking up to the real costs of Britain’s departure from the EU.
Starmer’s refusal to confront this failure — out of fear it might expose his own role in it? — leaves a political vacuum that Farage is more than happy to fill with bluster.
If Labour had the courage to call out Brexit as the root of many of the UK’s current economic problems, it could at least offer a contrast — a sense that it sees reality and will try to fix it.
But by parroting Tory lines on “respecting the referendum” and talking tough on immigration, Labour validates the same broken politics that delivered the mess we’re in.
The irony is that Starmer believes he’s playing it safe. But in trying to outflank the right on its own territory, he’s fighting a battle he cannot win.
Voters who are drawn to Farage’s nationalism will always prefer the real thing. And voters who want real solutions will go looking for them elsewhere — or simply stay home.
Help fund great articles! We’re aiming for £50 to cover research and reporting time this week.
Can you chip in £3 today?
👉 https://ko-fi.com/voxpolitical
That’s why these local elections matter.
They’re not just a test of Labour’s popularity — they’re a signal of whether the public still believes in “Change”, or whether they’ve already seen enough to know it was an empty slogan.
If Labour continues down this path — chasing right-wing voters with right-wing rhetoric while delivering Tory-lite policy — it will keep bleeding support. Not because people are confused, but because they understand all too well what’s happening.
So if you are casting a vote this week, remember: Starmer is not failing to stop Reform UK. He is governing in a way that makes Reform UK possible.
If that’s not the future you want, then send Labour the message it still refuses to hear and vote for someone else — before it’s too late.
Vox Political needs your help!
If you want to support this site
(but don’t want to give your money to advertisers)
you can make a one-off donation here:
Be among the first to know what’s going on! Here are the ways to manage it:
1) Register with us by clicking on ‘Subscribe’ (bottom right of the home page). You can then receive notifications of every new article that is posted here.
2) Follow VP on Twitter @VoxPolitical
3) Like the Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/VoxPolitical/
Join the Vox Political Facebook page.
4) You could even make Vox Political your homepage at http://voxpoliticalonline.com
5) Follow Vox Political writer Mike Sivier on BlueSky
6) Join the MeWe page at https://mewe.com/p-front/voxpolitical
7) Feel free to comment!
And do share with your family and friends – so they don’t miss out!
If you have appreciated this article, don’t forget to share it using the buttons at the bottom of this page. Politics is about everybody – so let’s try to get everybody involved!
Buy Vox Political books so we can continue
fighting for the facts.
Cruel Britannia is available
in either print or eBook format here:
The Livingstone Presumption is available
in either print or eBook format here:
Health Warning: Government! is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
The first collection, Strong Words and Hard Times,
is still available in either print or eBook format here:
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