Internal Criticism of Starmer Before Welsh and Scottish Elections

Welsh First Minister Eluned Morgan stated that Prime Minister Keir Starmer could cost the Labour Party control of the Senedd for the first time in its history. Morgan, speaking to the Telegraph, said Starmer 'comes up as an issue on the doorstep' during campaigning.

She refused to back Starmer as Labour leader beyond 'this point in time' and declined to say whether he would lead the party into the next general election, though she added that ousting him now would not be 'helpful'.

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar stated that a vote for Labour in Scotland is not an endorsement of Starmer. Sarwar said he is 'angry and disappointed' about Westminster politics. He had called for Starmer to quit in February and described the upcoming Holyrood election as 'the first opportunity to change the government in Scotland for 20 years,' warning it is 'not an election without consequence, about protest or some kind of free hit'.

Elections are scheduled for Thursday, with almost 25,000 candidates competing for more than 5,000 seats on 136 councils across England. All 129 seats are up for election in Holyrood, Scotland, while voters in Wales will choose 96 members of the Senedd. Current polling puts Labour in third place behind Plaid Cymru and Reform UK in the race for the 96-seat Welsh parliament.

Morgan stated 'I’m certainly hoping that they won’t do that' in response to the possibility of a Reform or Plaid-led government due to protest votes. She added 'there is a danger that that could happen, and I don’t want to see that happening' regarding such votes handing power to rival parties.

Morgan further stated 'I do hope people will reflect on what this election is really about – and it isn’t a time, I think, to pick a fight with Starmer.

Labour MPs who won seats in the 2024 election are planning to push for Starmer's resignation in an open letter, according to The Times. Housing minister Steve Reed told Sky News on Tuesday that MPs 'want this psychodrama to stop' and warned against the party 'doomscrolling through leaders'.

Starmer vowed to go into polling day 'fighting for every vote' and acknowledged Labour could be in for a 'challenge'.

Plaid Cymru campaigners knocked on doors in Llanedeyrn, north-east Cardiff, on a sunny Friday afternoon ahead of Thursday’s Senedd election. The Llanedeyrn estate is in the constituency of Jo Stevens, the UK Labour government’s Welsh secretary. Among 30 or so residents who answered the door in Llanedeyrn, none planned to vote Labour.

A YouGov and Barn Cymru poll in January found that 26 percent of respondents would vote for an independent Wales, while 54 percent would vote against. Labour has been Wales’s biggest party at every Senedd vote since devolution in the late 1990s, and in UK-wide elections since 1922. Labour has controlled the Senedd for 27 years.