'Incompetent' Keir Starmer blasted by historian for 'worst start by Labour PM in 80 years'

Sir Keir Starmer has been ripped apart by one of the country's foremost political historians, who told Newsnight: "No Labour prime minister, certainly not since 1945, has begun so badly." Sir Anthony Seldon has written biographies of every PM's time in No 10 since Sir John Major and has written several books about the office of prime minister.

But he told the late-night BBC current affairs show that Sir Keir's first year in office ranked worse than the starts made by Clement Attlee, Harold Wilson, James Callaghan, Sir Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. Callaghan's first year was marked by Labour going cap in hand to the International Monetary Fund for a large loan to keep Britain afloat during financial turmoil. Mr Brown was widely ridiculed for "bottling it" months after he arrived at No 10 in 2007 by failing to call a general election.

Sir Anthony's comments on Friday suggested that Sir Keir's start in Downing Street has been worse than both of those.

The historian said the PM, who was forced into U-turns on winter fuel payment cuts and a national grooming gangs inquiry, had "begun with such ignorance of history and how you conduct yourself as prime minister".

Sir Anthony pinpointed two main faults with the current occupant of Downing Street - firstly, that he is "incapable of telling a story", and secondly that "he doesn't understand that the prime minister is only there if you keep and carry your MPs with you".

Referring to this week's U-turn on benefits cuts after a massive rebellion of Labour MPs, he said: "If there was a clear vision that he'd laid out, a story about where he is taking the Labour Government and the country, people perhaps might understand why this cut was necessary. But there have been so many flip-flops, they don't get it.

"It tells a story of a fundamentally incompetent prime minister. He's repeating the same mistakes."

In a particularly wounding jibe for the PM, given his support for Arsenal, Sir Anthony said it would be like manager Mikel Arteta worrying about the seating in the stands rather than his team's performance on the pitch.

Sir Keir's personal popularity has plummeted since he took office after last year's thumping General Election victory.

In May, his net approval rating plunged to -46%, although it has since improved to -36%. Labour has also been overtaken in the polls by Nigel Farage's insurgent Reform UK.

A damning YouGov poll this week showed that if a general election were held now, Labour's majority would be wiped out with a loss of 233 seats. Reform UK would emerge as the largest party in a hung parliament.