Laura Kuenssberg

I'm told that many other ministers have also now done that.

I think that the number of people in Starmer's administration still saying to him, stand and fight, has dwindled very quickly.

So go back 24 hours, Friday afternoon, journalists like me are still getting briefings from Keir Starmer's allies saying,

that he would stand and fight Andy Burnham, who, of course, has just won the by-election, that he thought he could beat him in any leadership contest.

In fact, I was even told when Keir Starmer had decided that he would take on Andy Burnham was a fortnight ago when he saw Andy Burnham on that big Question Time special and he thought he didn't do it very well.

He watched Andy Burnham then do an interview with Victoria on Newsnight where he failed to explain the fiscal rules, the rules on spending and borrowing.

And then that Saturday, Keir Starmer phoned up his allies and said, I can beat him.

I will stand and fight.

To me and the conversations that I've been having in the last 24 hours, that mood of defiance is shifting.

And I think by Monday morning, we might feel that things have moved very fast.

They said it again and again and again.

And I'm going to do that thing today that I sometimes do is it's annoying, but I'm going to read you some of the things that people have told me because I want to explain to newscasters what's been going on behind closed doors in these conversations that people will have without revealing their identities, because it means that they can tell the truth privately.

We can report on that then to picture, to give people a picture of what is really going on at a time when nobody wants to come out explicitly who's been on Keir Starmer's side.

But there are people who are increasingly feeling that he is going to have to go.

This is, to your point, one Labour advisor who's worked for the party for a long time just said to me simply, we promised people we weren't going to do this.

And that is a big problem.

And it might be the last promise that Keir Starmer breaks.

Via some way, yeah.

Full beam message from the voters of Makerfield.

We want Andy Burnham.