Who could replace Keir Starmer as prime minister if he resigns?
Keir Starmer faces the biggest challenge yet of his time as Prime Minister, after calls for him to resign burst into the open.
Former ally Anas Sarwar, the leader of Scottish Labour, became the highest-profile party figure to say the PM needs to go after a dire week prompted by the Peter Mandelson scandal.
Now, Starmer faces struggling forward in the knowledge that a sizable – if not overwhelming – number of his own MPs want him to quit.
And he will have to do it without his top adviser and political strategist Morgan McSweeney, who stepped down on Sunday over his own role in advocating for the appointment of Mandelson as ambassador to the US.
The Prime Minister’s travails have, unsurprisingly, led to questions about who would take over if he did decide to make a dash for the door.
Here’s a breakdown of the runners and riders.
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Who could replace Keir Starmer?
Wes Streeting
Health Secretary Wes Streeting has long been among the favourites to replace Keir Starmer.
Streeting grew up on a council estate, and was the first member of his family to go to university – funding this, he says, through retail jobs.
After Starmer was elected Leader of the Labour Party, the MP for Ilford North was made shadow exchequer secretary to the Treasury, then shadow schools minister.
In July last year, Streeting was made health secretary, and he has since made much of falling waiting lists while accepting there’s a long road ahead to securing the future of the NHS.
He has faced accusations of plotting against the PM after it emerged he spoke to Anas Sarwar over the weekend, but his team has denied this.
There have also been swirling questions around his own links to Peter Mandelson, which he attempted to squash by publishing months of messages between him and the Labour grandee.
Shabana Mahmood
As Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood is also high on critics’ lists to replace Starmer.
MP for Birmingham Ladywood since 2010, Mahmood held various shadow minister roles in Ed Miliband’s shadow cabinet, including shadow prisons minister and shadow financial secretary to the Treasury.
Following Jeremy Corbyn’s election as Labour leader, Mahmood stepped down. She returned to the Shadow Cabinet in 2021 and was then appointed as shadow justice secretary by Starmer in 2023.
She became Justice Secretary after the last election and was made Home Secretary in the September reshuffle.
Her drive to overhaul the asylum system and bring down immigration has won admirers on the right of Labour, who could back her in a future race.
Angela Rayner
Rayner, who resigned as Deputy Prime Minister, Housing Secretary and Deputy Labour Party leader in September after paying incorrect stamp duty, is the MP for Ashton-under-Lyne.
She grew up in poverty with a mother was had bipolar and could not read, and left school without any qualifications at 16 after becoming pregnant.
Starmer has described his former deputy as ‘the best social mobility story this country has ever seen’.
Jeremy Corbyn appointed Rayner shadow education secretary in 2016, the year after she was first elected. She became Labour’s deputy leader in 2020, and was seen as a soft-left counterbalance to Starmer.
While she is regarded as one of the frontrunners – if not the frontrunner – to replace the PM should he stand down, a run for the top job would be difficult before we know if she has been cleared over her tax affairs by HMRC.
Ed Miliband
Miliband has been a Labour MP since 2005, and was previously the leader of the party from 2010 to 2015.
After resigning as leader, Ed Miliband remained an MP, and Starmer appointed him to his shadow cabinet in 2020 as business secretary.
In a curious case of continuity, he returned to the role of Energy Secretary after the July 2024 election – the same job he had in the last Labour government when it lost the 2010 election.
Miliband has made a point of emphasising how much he doesn’t want to return to his previous role as party leader – even if it means also becoming PM.
Asked the question on LBC last year, Miliband said: ‘I had the best inoculation technique you could have against wanting to be leader of the Labour Party, which was being leader of the Labour Party.
‘Been there, done that, bought the T-shirt.’
But there is speculation that his experience could make him a ‘safe pair of hands’ option – or that one of the other contenders could pick him as their chancellor.
Andy Burnham
Burnham sat as an MP for Leigh in Greater Manchester from 2001 to 2017 and was promoted to the Government in 2005.
In Gordon Brown’s cabinet of 2007, he was made Chief Secretary of the Treasury, then promoted to Culture Secretary. He was then appointed Health Secretary.
After serving in the opposition, Burnham announced he would be running for Mayor of Greater Manchester in 2016. He was elected to the position in 2017.
Burnham has been more critical of the government’s current approach than anyone else on this list – which may be why Labour’s ruling committee blocked him from running in next month’s Gorton and Denton by-election.
It was a controversial decision, with Keir Starmer being accused of putting his own job security above the potential for victory in the seat.
But whatever the motivation, it ensured the popular mayor will not be in a position to challenge the PM any time soon.
Yvette Cooper
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper has been a familiar face in British politics for the best part of three decades, first being elected in Tony Blair’s 1997 landslide.
Like Miliband and Burnham, she was serving in Gordon Brown’s Cabinet at the time he lost the 2010 election, in her case as Pensions Secretary.
Cooper kept a high profile throughout the opposition years, and started her term in Keir Starmer’s government as Home Secretary before being moved to replace David Lammy in the FCDO.
In spite of her longevity – and the fact she ran for leader in 2015 – the Foreign Secretary is rarely considered a top contender to replace Starmer, though she could run as something of a known entity.
Lucy Powell
Lucy Powell has already won a significant Labour contest in the past six months, replacing Rayner as deputy party leader last October.
She went up against Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson and was seen as the soft-left candidate who could keep Starmer in check.
Though the Manchester native is popular among Labour figures in the north of England, she’s unlikely to be recognised by many members of the public.
Even so, her winning momentum has given her odds of 16/1 to be the person who steps up if Starmer steps down.
John Healey
Another strong option for the ‘safe pair of hands’ candidate, John Healey is the current Defence Secretary.
In that role, he has been credited with securing a bumper increase in defence spending by the government – even if questions remain over the timeline.
And polls suggest national security is one of the few issues that a significant portion of the British public believes the government is handling fairly well.
First elected at the 1997 election, Healey is one of the three longest-serving MPs in the Cabinet – along with Yvette Cooper and Leader of the House of Commons Sir Alan Campbell.
As question marks hover over Starmer’s future, he’s been picked out by some as someone who could step in to keep a steady hand on the tiller until a permanent replacement comes along.
Al Carns
You’ve probably never heard of Al Carns, unless he’s your local MP – but the Scot has been generating an unusual amount of buzz in Westminster recently.
The square-jawed soldier joined the Royal Marines in 1999 and rose to the rank of colonel over the next 22 years. In 2011, he was awarded the Military Cross for his actions in Afghanistan.
Carns retired to run for Labour in 2024, and was immediately appointed Veterans Minister after winning his Birmingham Selly Oak seat. He’s since become Armed Forces Minister.
Presumably feeling a little left out, he joined the Royal Marines again as a reservist in November 2024. He has since climbed Mount Everest in a week and gone training in Norway in -18°C.
If you’re thinking ‘bloody hell’, you’re not alone – which is why he’s being talked about as a potential leader less than two years after becoming an MP.
That lack of experience will probably put an end to any premature bid, but keep an eye out for the future.
Starmer’s approval rating
The public’s opinion of Starmer has been pretty dire for a while.
A YouGov poll from the end of January suggests he’s had a small boost to lift his job approval to 19%.
However, that is still drowned out by the 71% of the public who think he is doing a bad job as Prime Minister.
His all-time low rating thus far came at the start of December, when 76% said he was doing badly and 15% thought he was performing well.
Which top figures have left Downing Street recently?
Keir Starmer’s Chief of Staff Morgan McSweeney announced he was leaving his job on Sunday.
He was followed on Tuesday morning by the PM’s Director of Communications Tim Allan – the fourth person to hold that position since Labour’s 2024 victory.
The Guardian has reported Cabinet Secretary Sir Chris Wormald could be the next to leave Downing Street amid a major shake-up.
Is Keir Starmer likely to resign?
Speaking to his MPs yesterday evening, Starmer was bullish and determined to remain as PM, telling them he was ‘not prepared to walk away’.
His performance in front of the Parliamentary Labour Party is thought to have bought him time, but it is uncertain how long that goodwill might last.
Labour is predicted to face tough challenges at the local elections in many parts of England, and the devolved elections in Scotland and Wales, in May, which could in turn see pressure increase on Starmer.
However, the uncertainty surrounding most of the top potential candidates for the job might make his MPs hesitate before pulling the trigger.
Under the party’s rules, 20% of the party’s MPs must nominate a new challenger for the party leader to change. Losing party leadership means losing the role of Prime Minister too.
That would be 81 members, given the party’s size in the House of Commons, and could (in theory) happen at any time.
Aside from resignation (or death), the only other way for a prime minister to lose their job at any time is for a vote of no confidence to be called.
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