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Sir Keir Starmer will warn this week that he inherited a “rot deep in the heart” of British politics and institutions, and that the UK’s economic situation will get worse before it gets better.
“When there is rot deep in the heart of a structure, you can’t just cover it up . . . You have to overhaul the entire thing. Tackle it at the root. Even if it’s harder work and takes more time,” Starmer will say on Tuesday. “This project has always been about fixing the foundations of this country.”
In his first keynote speech since walking into Downing Street on July 5, the new Labour prime minister will say that his government has done more in seven weeks than the former Conservative government did in seven years.
He will point to the creation of a National Wealth Fund to boost public and private investment, and a state-owned energy group, Great British Energy, along with changing planning regulations so that 1.5mn new homes can be built, and bringing an end to some industrial action.
“These are just the first steps towards the change people voted for. The change I’m determined to deliver,” he will say, adding: “I defy anyone to tell me that you can grow an economy when people can’t get to work — because the transport system is broken — or can’t return to work — because they’re stuck on an NHS waiting list.”
The prime minister will be speaking in the rose garden at Downing Street ahead of MPs’ return to parliament on September 2.
He and other cabinet ministers have set the groundwork in recent weeks for an Autumn Budget — to be delivered in late October — that will introduce tax rises even as chancellor Rachel Reeves cuts spending on some existing capital projects.
Starmer and Reeves said repeatedly ahead of polling day that they had no plans to increase taxation beyond a few measures that were outlined in the Labour party manifesto.
The prime minister will say on Tuesday that violent unrest that spread across the UK earlier this month was caused in part by the fact the UK’s criminal justice system was under huge strain, which rioters took advantage of.
“Not having enough prison spaces is about as fundamental a failure as you can get,” he will say. “Those people throwing rocks, torching cars, making threats — they didn’t just know the system was broken. They were betting on it. They were gaming it. They saw the cracks in our society after 14 years of populism and failure — and they exploited them.”
Starmer will say that he did not want to release prisoners early in order to free up space for convicted individuals involved in the unrest, adding that it went “against the grain of everything I’ve ever done”. But if he had not, the government would have been unable to respond to the riots quickly, he will say.
He will point to the £22bn black hole his government said it found in the UK’s finances last month, saying “things are worse than we ever imagined”.
“Don’t let anyone say that this is performative, or playing politics,” he will say, referring to allegations that the Labour administration has hammed up its shock in order to push through politically motivated tax rises in the autumn.
He will say that, just last week, his government discovered that the previous government had borrowed £5bn more this year than the Office for Budget Responsibility had forecast.
“We have inherited not just an economic black hole but a societal black hole. And that is why we have to take action and do things differently. Part of that is being honest with people — about the choices we face and how tough this will be,” Starmer will say. “Things will get worse before we get better.”
