UK Labour Party meets after difficult start to government and clothing scandal

LONDON – It should be a moment of celebration for Britain’s Labour Party, which opens its annual conference on Sunday, less than three months after winning power by a landslide after 14 years in opposition.

But it is not a victory lap for Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

His government is facing a struggling economy and an electorate impatient for change. The mood among Labour Party members gathered in Liverpool, northwest England, was further dampened by the storm caused by Starmer’s acceptance of gifts at a time when millions are struggling to keep up with the cost of living.

Starmer insisted he was following the rules by accepting designer clothes and glasses from Waheed Alli, a media entrepreneur and long-time Labour donor. But after days of negative headlines, the party said Starmer would no longer accept free outfits.

“I understand people are angry,” said Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, who also accepted donations to buy clothes.

“But donations in the form of gifts, hospitality and money have been a feature of our politics for a very long time,” she told the BBC. “People can look at the information and see what people have received donations for, and transparency is really important.”

Starmer won the July 4 election promising to “restore politics as a force for good” after years of scandal under the Conservatives. He pledged to revive the country’s sluggish economy and restore crumbling public services such as the state-funded National Health Service.

Since then, he has adopted a pessimistic stance, claiming there was a £22bn ($29bn) “black hole” in the public finances left by the Conservative government, and warning that “things are going to get worse” before they get better. One of the government’s first major measures was to deprive millions of pensioners of an allowance intended to help them heat their homes in winter.

Starmer has also had to deal with the anti-immigrant unrest that erupted after three children were stabbed to death in Southport, near Liverpool, in July. Starmer responded with toughness, promising swift justice and tough sentences for the rioters. But prison overcrowding, a legacy of the last government, has forced hundreds of inmates to be released early to make way for newly convicted rioters.

Then came the clothing scandal, dubbed “frockgate” after the dresses given to the prime minister’s wife, Victoria Starmer.

Keir Starmer is also facing grumblings among his own staff over the salary of his chief of staff, Sue Gray. The BBC has revealed that she is paid £170,000 ($225,000) a year, about £3,000 more than the prime minister’s salary. The government says it has no say in setting the pay scale for political advisers.

Labour says the criticism is being whipped up by the Conservatives and their supporters in the media. But polls suggest it has hurt. An Ipsos poll published on Friday found that 25% of respondents thought Starmer was doing a good job – down from 36% in July – while 42% thought he was doing a bad job, up from 14%. The company surveyed 1,082 adults by phone and the margin of error is plus or minus three percentage points.

“He promised to be different, but he hasn’t been,” Conservative MP Chris Philp told the BBC. “He’s not running a service government, he’s running a self-service government.”

The avalanche of bad news has alarmed many in the Labour Party, who fear the worst will come in the form of tax rises and spending cuts when the government announces its first budget on October 30.

Labour leaders will try to send a more positive message when Treasury Secretary Rachel Reeves delivers a televised speech on Monday, followed by Starmer on Tuesday. They hope to bring some cheer to the four-day conference, a mix of pep rally, policy forum and boozy party that plays a key role in keeping party members’ spirits up.

The government says it has already implemented a series of positive changes, including ending a wave of public sector strikes. In the coming weeks, it plans to legislate to take the railways public, create a state-owned green energy company, impose stricter rules on water companies that dump sewage and strengthen workers’ and tenants’ rights.

Victoria Honeyman, professor of British politics at the University of Leeds, said Labour’s first months in power were likely to be difficult because voters’ expectations were so high.

“But they made mistakes,” she said. “The clothes thing, it’s not a fatal blow, but it’s the kind of thing that sticks in people’s minds for a while and could have been so easily avoided.

“It looks like a lack of attention or a lack of caution, which is not a very good look.”