Labour's fantasic night

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Defeat for leading Labour campaign manager Jonathan Ashworth sets the terms for how Sir Keir Starmer juggles foreign policy demands despite the untrammelled nature of his majority.

Just a few weeks ago, Mr Ashworth, the son of a casino worker, was declaring he would be at the heart of the most working class cabinet in British history. So far as the claim was true it spoke to the traditional concerns of the socialist movement.

With his defeat, Mr Ashworth’s legacy on the politics of the new government will be on its foreign policy. ?

He fell to an independent who campaigned strongly on Gaza. It was a story that was reflected across a series of seats. Some went to independents, others were held by Labour at some cost. The now independent former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn won back his north London seats as Palestinian chequered scarves were waved by his supporters.

A second Labour frontbencher Thangam Debbonaire lost her seat to the resurgent Greens, who make the Gaza-Israel war a key plank of their manifesto. That party of the Left has grown from one to three MPs and will know radical policies can benefit its candidates further.

The 400 seats plus won by Labour give it on the surface an impregnable majority. Hundreds of those MPs will feel that they hold their seats on borrowed time.

Mr Starmer can take away the knowledge that there will be rebellions. In part he has been steeled for these and taken pre-emptive actions.

The former Conservative leader Iain Duncan Smith owes his continuing place in parliament to Mr Starmer purging the Corbynite Labour candidate Faiza Shaheen. She ran as an independent and split the vote with Labour.

Gaza pressures

But the vulnerabilities of the victorious will be not far away. Even with a majority to compare with Tony Blair’s in 1997, Mr Starmer will have to be careful not to be knocked off course by doubts from within.

The outcome of the election was not impacted by the series of pro-Palestine independent challenges that emerged. There were high profile victories and some nerve-shredding close runs. If new MPs, particularly the very many on the backbenches, start to feel that the party’s foreign policy is likely to cost them seats next time round there will be a corrosive impact.

Rebellions even for dominant governments are not a good look. The conflict in Gaza-Israel has already lasted for months and each week its impact on politics is likely to grow. Further escalation against Hezbollah and Iran would intensify matters yet further.

The Labour Party has been trust into power at an extraordinarily uncertain moment. The increasingly dark geopolitical environment as Europe faces both the rise of the far-right governments and the return of Donald Trump in the White House.

Mr Starmer is determined to embrace the Trump administration in whatever way it can even though that will mean a rough ride in domestic politics. With Europe fracturing it has an opportunity to achieve some post-Brexit rehabilitation.

At a time of uncertain, five years of a mainstream government is something of an asset in itself. The strong UK military base and its nuclear deterrent are something valuable to put on the table.

That’s why afterall one of the most important first acts by the new prime minister on Friday is to write letters of last resort to the submarine commanders who control the UK nuclear weapon.

France’s force de frappe is called into question by its divide politics and the UK can take the role that the US once took in Europe, offering a kind of guns trade off with butter. The nuclear deterrence is a means to better economic ties with Europe.

The old adage of Westminster politics that the opposition is on the benches opposite and the enemy is behind will have a big impact on how exactly Mr Starmer achieves his foreign policy goals. Will he be able to carry forward a commitment to open trade and free trade agreements.

While deals are on the table for the GCC and India, Labour is almost certain to face pressures over how these agreements are structured.

What the new prime minister will be able to do is to trade off the collapse of the Conservatives.

Rishi Sunak has now topped the table of leaders who have lost most seats, with a forecast 236 MPs forfeited to opposition winners.

The opposition benches will be a place for the most successful Western democratic party to regroup. Much depends on the name of the new leader. Figures such as Tom Tugendhat and ex-foreign secretary James Cleverly have been returned.

With the entry of Reform UK in parliament, the impulse for the members will be to fight the nationalist fire with fire. In doing so it will have even less to say to the voters who backed Labour to an overwhelming degree. ?

Where you up for Truss?

I was and the slow hand clap before she appeared on stage was the soundtrack of the night. Shout out to Jeremy Hunt who was the big beast who defied the domino effect that swept away so many prominent faces in UK politics.

James Cleverly is also back as in potential leadership contender Tom Tugendhat. The next leader is very important in terms of how the Conservatives face up to the Reform UK challenge and rebuild into an opposition.

Meanwhile a useful cheat sheet of who lost is here in this picture.