Lucy Fisher

And again, this is going to be a key moment for Starmer on Wednesday too.

I think this King's Speech, in large part, needs to convince the public that, you know, these are measures that tie together into a coherent vision and really quell the sort of despair of restive MPs in the Labour Party that Starmer can deliver and start to make a difference, or else MPs who will be worrying about whether they'll hang on to their own seats might start to think again about whether the leadership needs to be changed.

Well, look, I think inertia is underpriced when it comes to Starmer's future, but that's not necessarily anything to do with him.

I think it could be the case that we see no action taking place, but that's in part because many of the Labour MPs who aren't happy about the direction of the party in the government

can't agree on who should replace him and in that scenario you know they might decide it's better not to act so that's another reason that you might hear slightly phony praise for starmer or people briefing that you know he's done enough to keep the show on the road for now no lack of political drama then to digest this week lucy fisher covers whitehall for the ft and hosts our political fix podcast lucy thanks so much for your time thanks for having me victoria

Hello.

It's lunchtime on Friday.

Results are still coming in, but Labour have taken a hammering, Reform are on the march, the Greens are up, and the Tories have suffered heavy council losses but clinched several wins in London.

I'm Lucy Fisher, and this is Political Fix from the Financial Times.

Let's get straight to it with our panel.

Jim Pickard, who's been up since 4am.

Hi, Jim.

How dare I minimise your sacrifice of sleep?

Stephen Bush, who eclipses you, Jim.

He's been up all night, haven't you, Stephen?

And down the line from Manchester, it's Jen Williams.

Hi, Jen.

Did you get much sleep?

Okay, well, you're all slightly showing me up.

I feel a bit embarrassed because I had 40 winks and I woke up at 7am to check in on all the results, dash to the office and get on it.