6th Prime Minister in 10 Years: Starmer Leaves Downing Street

Keir Starmer has left the post of Prime Minister of Great Britain. In the last ten years, the country has had six prime ministers: Blair, Cameron, May, Johnson, Sunak and Starmer.

The first rumours about his resignation appeared in February. The leader of Scottish Labour called on him to step down due to low ratings.

As it turned out later, the British government is not a submarine, but rather a drifting boat — there is somewhere to escape from it, so there is no need for everyone to go down together; one can simply throw overboard the one who is rocking it. And that turned out to be Starmer.

He began his premiership basking in an overwhelming electoral success. It was in 2024. Labour under Starmer literally crushed the Conservative Party, which had ruled the country for 14 years.

Keir Starmer, Prime Minister of Great Britain:

“This is the end of my six-year political journey, which went from a historic defeat in 2019 to a historic victory in 2024. And after two years in office, I leave the country in a better state than when I came. To all those present in the gallery whose lives have changed or improved thanks to the Labour government, and to everyone across the country who fights to be seen or heard — you are the reason I entered politics.”

He noted that he leaves the country in a better state than it was before he came to power and expressed gratitude to his government colleagues for their work.

Only recently had history textbooks come off the press, capturing the Olympic triumph, when that very triumph somehow disappeared. “Was there even a boy?” One of the reasons for the departure of the sixth prime minister in ten years was Labour’s catastrophic defeat in the local council elections in England, as well as in the parliaments of Scotland and Wales.

After the May electoral failure, key ministers (including the Health Secretary) began resigning, and rank-and-file Labour MPs directly told Starmer that with him the party would lose the next general election.

The scandal involving Peter Mandelson delivered the final blow to the sixth prime minister in ten years. Starmer had appointed him to the key post of UK Ambassador to the United States.

It later emerged that the diplomat had long-standing ties to the notorious financier Epstein. Despite Mandelson’s subsequent dismissal, the prime minister’s reputation was destroyed.

Yegor Toropov, Americanist, Candidate of Political Sciences, analyst at the Higher School of Economics:

“Having not served even half of his five-year term, the five-year mandate that was allotted to him at least until 2029, until the next regular parliamentary elections in Great Britain, he resigned. And now I predict that Labour, apparently, will not stay in power for more than one five-year electoral cycle, and in 2029 they will be replaced by the Conservatives. At the same time, in the United States, Republicans will most likely be replaced by Democrats, and in all three branches of power.”

And finally, of course, the economic impasse that became political for Starmer. The government failed to cope with the cost-of-living crisis, the decline in the standards of public services (including the healthcare system, which in two years was brought to a state where waiting times for planned operations and emergency appointments reached historical highs). The British government did not ensure the promised economic growth, did not solve problems with high inflation and exorbitant mortgage rates, and introduced a controversial inheritance tax on agricultural land. Starmer went down in history as the prime minister of endless concessions.

And what was achieved during this time? During his premiership, he strengthened the course of unconditional support for Kyiv. The annual aid figure under him reached a maximum. Sponsoring the Armed Forces of Ukraine and improving the lives of his own citizens are two mutually exclusive processes.

But, as we know, a person with hyperkyphosis is corrected by the grave. So Starmer went to Kyiv four days before his resignation to negotiate with Zelensky