Starmer Hopes Lifting The 2-Child Benefit Cap Will Cheer Up His Unhappy MPs. But Is It Too Late?

Keir Starmer is under pressure as the Labour conference looms.Labour’s unhappy MPs are already voting with their feet.Party members gather in Liverpool this weekend for their annual conference, but some have already decided to either miss it entirely or visit for as little time as possible.“I’m not going now, better to spend time in my patch and do an extra surgery,” one frontbencher told HuffPost UK.“After being strongly encouraged to defend the Lord Mandelson fiasco, colleagues are still seething. Loads are doing one night or just in and out in a day, if at all.”It’s not difficult to see why the Merseyside get-together is taking place against such a gloomy backdrop.Labour’s first 16 months in power have been, by any measure, a fairly depressing experience for Keir Starmer.Starting with the controversy over the prime minister’s penchant for free clothes, other self-inflicted wounds like removing winter fuel payments from 10 million pensioners have reinforced the view that this is a uniquely accident-prone government.The last month alone have seen the PM lose his deputy to a tax scandal and then sack his ambassador to Washington – the aforementioned Lord Mandelson – over his close ties with a convicted paedophile.As if to further emphasise the seemingly chaotic atmosphere inside No.10, director of communications Steph Driver resigned on Thursday, the third holder of such a job title to leave Downing Street this year.Throw in Andy Burnham’s blatant leadership manoeuvring – the Manchester mayor will be appearing at numerous fringe meetings – and it is easy to see why many are seeing this as a make-or-break conference for Starmer.The PM will make his big speech on Tuesday afternoon, where he will accept that things have been tough for Labour since July last year, but insist that better days lie ahead for the party and the country.His main aim, however, will be to present the next election as a clear choice between Labour and Reform UK, who have held a consistent poll lead for months as voters’ register their discontent with the government and the Tories.Starmer gave a flavour of what to expect on Friday as he addressed a centre-left summit in London alongside, among others, Canadian PM Mark Carney and the Australian premier, Anthony Albanese.Labour and Reform are, he said, engaged in a “battle for the soul of the country”.“We’re going to face a very different election next time to any of the elections we’ve fought in the United Kingdom certainly for a very long time,” he said.“That’s certainly why I want this to be out as an open fight now between Labour and Reform, and I’ll be majoring on this on my conference speech next week.”“Keir’s speech has got to draw a line under whatever’s gone on in the last few months, like Rayner and Mandelson, and turn the page,” a cabinet minister told HuffPost UK.“The big battle is with Reform. He’s got to set out why a centre-left project is a better one for Britain than the right-wing platform being set out by Nigel Farage. Why a government focused on delivery is better than one focused on division.”A Labour source said: “What MPs need to see is what the country needs to see: a sense that we are building towards something. No one expects everything to improve overnight, but they do need to know that Britain can rise again, and that Keir has both the vision and the fight for it.”Senior Labour figures believe Nigel Farage made a major error this week when he vowed to scrap the indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status given to millions of immigrants who have made the UK their home.This could potentially see people who have lived, worked and had families in Britain for decades being deported if they fail to meet the necessary criteria.“I think that what Farage did this week is un-British,” said one senior government figure. ”These people have been here for many years, paid their taxes, done nothing wring and been given ILR.“Then all of a sudden the government says it will break that up and you’ll have to renew your visa or we’ll kick you out. That is not a British way of doing things and it’s not a decent way to treat people, who will now be living in fear.”Conference delegates will pass a motion calling on the government to lift the two-child benefit cap, a policy which has come to symbolise the cruelty of the Tory years of austerity.Having previously ruled out lifting it on financial grounds – doing so would cost the Treasury £3 billion a year – HuffPost UK understands that it will be scrapped ahead of the Budget on November 26.Doing so will make life even tougher for chancellor Rachel Reeves as she tries to fill a black hole in the public finances already estimated to be around £30 billion, but the politics of the situation dictate that Starmer needs to do something to cheer up his unhappy MPs.“The big question is how it would be paid for,” said one minister. “But if you meet any charity or anyone in this field, they will tell you that the most effective way of lifting hundreds of thousands out of child poverty, it’s to end the cap.”One MP said: “We just need to get on and do it. It will mean making cuts elsewhere in the welfare budget, but that’s the quid pro quo.”Allies of Starmer hope that the move will buy him some breathing space amid the ongoing speculation about his leadership.Many MPs expect the PM to face a challenge, especially if next May’s elections go as badly as the polls are currently predicting.One Labour insider said the current political situation, challenging though it is for the government, could be turned to Starmer’s advantage over the next few days.He said: “There are huge, politically difficult challenges that will need taking on.“Keir should use his current situation to his own advantage and tell some hard truths about soft thinking on both the left and right. This conference may feel fraught with risk - but it’s actually an enormous opportunity.”A cabinet minister had a clear message for Starmer’s critics.“People need to rememer this is the first person to win an election for Labour since Tony Blair, and only the fourth ever in history,” he said. “It’s not an easy thing to do and to be talking about him like this after just 14 months really annoys me.”Whether the PM’s antsy MPs are in the mood to listen will become clear in the days ahead.Related...Keir Starmer Faces Furious Backlash Over Plan To Force Every Brit To Have Digital ID CardKeir Starmer Compares Andy Burnham To Liz Truss As Labour War Of Words EscalatesMajor Blow For Starmer As Another Member Of Top No.10 Team Quits

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