Keir Starmer

So I think one of the lines that Starmer will have been pressing on all his colleagues was don't become a

the problem that this country doesn't need right now, which is more inflation, more instability, more raises in the cost of living.

And of course, you're right.

You know, Keir Starmer is in this curious position where he is at once the author of his own terrible election results and the person who believes that he can solve things.

And if there is a challenge, if somebody comes to him with a challenge...

whatever, people who support them, Keir Starmer is automatically on the ballot.

And he has now told sources that he thinks he can win a leadership contest.

So this is the unknown.

You're saying there's 80 and maybe many more who privately agree with the 80.

And Starmer is clearly thinking, well, there could be loads more who are loyal, who don't want me to go for precisely these reasons.

They think that I'm halfway through a term and...

Yeah, it's all gone to shit because that's what happens in the midterms.

But I need to be given the chance to stick at it.

And there is one more theory which we're going to talk about after the break, which is that he has come to some kind of arrangement in his own mind.

But it's not now.

So that is Keir Starmer being asked a very direct question, which he is incapable, frankly, of answering directly.

The question is, will you let Andy Burnham fight another Labour seat or will you, at the top of the NEC, the Labour Executive Committee, try and block it?

And Keir Starmer notably cannot actually confront that elephant that is staring everyone in the room.

which is Andy Burnham wants to come in and challenge you.

And so he goes on this waffle of like, well, it's about the NEC.