Keir Starmer must create the conditions for government to deliver

Establishing a conviction among the public that the UK state is “broken” is an achievement for which all political parties should take credit. But Labour’s 18 months in office have cemented widespread gloom about the ability of the mainstream political system to address the country’s problems. And exclusive new polling from Ipsos – to be released tomorrow at the Institute for Government’s Government 26 conference – confirms that 75% of the public are sceptical the government will make progress on its top priorities this year. 

Since coming into government, ministers have emphasised the difficulty of their inheritance and focused on the (undoubted) inadequacies of the government machine in turning things around. But the government’s gloomy framing of the problems it faces has left ministers struggling to pivot to a positive vision for the country. And while that lack of vision is often put down to communication failures – the latest being Morgan McSweeney’s reported view that government has failed to be sufficiently “emotive” in its language – it has become increasingly clear that it also reflects both an absence of strategic substance and lack of key skills at the top of government.

Political vision is a key ingredient that makes government work

Labour's achievements from its first year in office prove the role of strong political direction in effective government. Prior to her departure from cabinet, Angela Rayner’s leadership of MHCLG was one of the best recent examples of how clear political direction and drive can yield results, with notable progress across a number of policy areas including leasehold and planning reform, local government reform and, before her resignation, the continued development of the mayoral system established under previous governments. 

Similarly, Ed Miliband’s focus on achieving zero-carbon electricity by 2030, including by setting up a dedicated “mission control” unit led by Chris Stark at his Department for Energy and Net Zero, has been instrumental in driving the government machine to work towards this target. And Shabana Mahmood’s single-minded approach to her time as justice secretary successfully focused the people and resources of the MoJ on staving off the impending breach of prison capacity which she inherited from her Conservative predecessors. 

Starmer himself has also achieved successes in foreign policy. Perhaps that is because the international moment has called for painstaking, reactive, carefully calibrated responses. History may yet show that Starmer’s caution missed the mark, that real defence spending is rising too slowly, and Donald Trump’s America demanded a far bolder response, but the prime minister has, with his foreign and security policy team, built coalitions and shown leadership in Europe, NATO and with other allies.

That these achievements are, by their nature, politically contestable is a good thing. Political consensus does have its place, but governments that achieve their objectives do contestable things. Whether Rayner, Miliband, Starmer or Mahmood’s approaches have been the right ones in policy terms is for others to judge, but they are achieving – or had begun to achieve – the changes they sought in government.

An absence of vision hampers government effectiveness

But strong political direction has been far from consistent across government over the past 18 months. Labour’s heavy focus on campaigning and consequent neglect of detailed policy-making while in opposition has meant that many policy-areas have been in a state of suspended animation since the election, awaiting the outcome of dozens of policy reviews and government decisions on their findings. Only now is the government starting to pass the legislation needed to implement reforms, for example on employment and renters’ rights, planning and infrastructure, which means that only towards the end of the parliament – at the earliest – will they start to yield results. 

Elsewhere, attempts to make tough policy decisions have been reversed – with high profile u-turns on issues including the winter fuel allowance, farmers’ inheritance tax, welfare reform and now business rates for pubs. The government failed to build a sustainable coalition inside its own party for the choices it was making to ensure policies stick in the face of internal and external challenge. In other places, a lack of prioritisation across a broad sweep of ambition – such as in the Department of Health and Social Care – has limited progress on any single measure.    

And despite his foreign policy successes, on the domestic agenda Starmer does not appear to have articulated a clear set of priorities for his centre of government to transmit. Government works best when politicians and officials have clearly understood ‘rules of thumb’ for how their leaders will approach questions – what they are likely to think, ask and prioritise. The most administratively successful prime ministers – Thatcher, Blair and, in his own way, Cameron – had defined priorities and predictable ways of doing business. The same does not appear to be true for Starmer, with politicians and officials grumbling about slowing decision-making, dissipating momentum, and a need to refer key decisions up to the centre where capacity is inevitably limited. And where new political direction is lacking – from ministers or the centre – the complex and cumbersome bureaucracy of government has inevitably defaulted to the status quo, much to the frustration of politicians.

The civil service faces an existential risk if it cannot make change happen 

Political direction, and clearly defined priorities, need a government machine that is built to deliver – but Starmer and his team have also been slow to understand the shortcomings of the structures and mechanisms for communicating and enforcing what he wants to achieve (despite the clear diagnosis and recommendations set out in the IfG’s Commission on the Centre of Government). The appointment of Darren Jones as chief secretary to the prime minister and tackling the bloated Cabinet Office, which began in late 2025, may yet bring improvements. But Starmer missed the opportunity as Labour entered government to make bigger reforms to the centre, such as creating a department for the prime minister and cabinet and separating out the role of head of the civil service from that of cabinet secretary.

But if strong central direction and structural reforms need to come from the prime minister, it is the job of the civil service to step up and make them happen. Too often, since the start of Boris Johnson’s premiership, the cabinet secretary and head of the civil service has either allowed himself to be marginalised or been unable to muster the authority needed to oversee the complex system that is the civil service. In the year ahead, cabinet secretary Sir Chris Wormald must do far more to play his part in forcing through improvements across government. Starmer and his advisers, in turn, must realise that a strong and authoritative cabinet secretary is essential to their success.

The leadership of the civil service needs to wake up to what is fast becoming an existential crisis for the institution. New permanent secretaries may still be getting their feet under the table, but they have no time to waste in identifying the strengths and shortcomings of their own teams and galvanising their departments to deliver. Minister after minister, initially sympathetic to officials who had been disempowered and battered by previous governments, is coming to the conclusion that the operation room of British government is lacking in drive and ability to deliver and demonstrating neither the energy nor the aptitude needed to reform the way it works. 

There are gaps in leadership skills across government 

A substantive strategy, a positive vision, and the right structures are essential, but there is also a lack of emphasis on leadership skills among politicians and officials. Gaps in such skills – including the ability and experience to bring people with you, build coalitions, create strong teams, and acknowledge and learn from mistakes – have long been a contributory factor in many of the things which have gone wrong in UK government.

Leadership is about choosing the right team, understanding your own strengths and weaknesses and making appointments that enhance and mitigate your skills and shortcomings. Starmer’s central team – political and official – has already been through a number of iterations, with multiple resignations and sackings over the first 18 months. In some cases, this reflects missteps in appointments, and in others, individuals who struggled to make the transition to government. The cabinet is now settling down after its first merry-go-round, with new political talent injected into the wider ministerial ranks in late 2025. Yet as 2026 begins, Westminster and the media continue to obsess about personalities over substance – with rumours of challenges to the prime minister, briefing against his chief of staff Morgan McSweeney, and widespread reports of political dissatisfaction with Chris Wormald. 

Leadership doesn't just mean announcing bold policies, or new appointments to fix all problems – it means doing the work to create teams and coalitions, so that those policies are accepted and take root. Radical policy decisions mean nothing if they are subsequently unpicked or defeated, which is why making progress in government requires different forms of coalition building. Labour’s mission-led approach – as articulated in opposition – acknowledged this, recognising the need to bring together people across government, business and civil society in pursuit of society-wide objectives. 

But there has been frustratingly little evidence of this aspect of missions being implemented now that Labour is in government. Insufficient thinking before the election about how to translate the five high-level missions into a concrete set of deliverable outcomes, and how to organise government to achieve them, means that missions have not operated as the galvanising force they could have been. Opportunities to embed missions, especially through last year’s spending review, were squandered. And attempts to get government working differently – such as through the Test, Learn and Grow initiative led by the Cabinet Office – have so far been limited and patchy, not adding up to a convincing programme of government reform.  

Government needs to understand where to build coalitions and where to pick battles

Ministers have struggled even to build effective coalitions with their own backbenchers, demonstrated in July 2025 by Labour MPs’ major rebellion against plans for welfare reform (which had been developed rapidly in response to an apparent hole in the government’s finances). Keir Starmer and his team must ensure that backbenchers’ more recent reports of improvements in engagement from No.10 continue through 2026. Instead of complaining about stakeholder society, the government needs to do better at stakeholder strategy. Progress in challenging policy areas such as SEND won’t happen unless ministers bring enough of the relevant stakeholders on board, or on politically contentious issues such as social care reform unless it makes the effort to build cross-party consensus.    

But while coalition building is an important leadership skill, being a leader is not about avoiding disagreement and conflict. It is about picking the right battles and preparing to win them rather than stumbling into them unprepared. Almost all policy choices involve creating winners – who will often remain silent while banking their advantage – and losers – who will complain loudly. 

Different political leaders will have different constituencies they are prepared to go into battle against. Ahead of the election, Labour decided that removing the VAT exemption on school fees was a fight it was prepared to have. Their political management of the issue worked because most of the losers were a small group of relatively well-off families whose complaints would not trouble the party’s supporters. It was also a well-trailed policy included in the manifesto. By contrast, Rachel Reeves’s unexpected decision immediately after the election to remove pensioners’ winter fuel payments created a large group of losers whom Labour’s supporters were inclined to defend. 

Too often, before going into battle with contentious policy choices, this government has not practiced and prepared its arguments or lined up its defensive troops. Its opponents have pressed their advantage and found it possible to force ministers to retreat. 

Starmer needs to give his party and the country reasons to follow him

The geopolitical drama which started 2026 seems unlikely to diminish. The prime minister is right to prioritise managing the UK’s position in this unstable new world order, including our future relationship with the EU – a conversation the prime minister now seems willing to entertain. But he must be realistic about the burden that international diplomacy will place on his own capacity for domestic leadership, as well as on leadership capacity within government more generally.

Too much time has passed now since the general election for the government to simply blame all problems on the previous government, and negative campaigning about the risks of a Reform UK-led government is unlikely to discourage despondent voters who are willing to risk a throw of the dice. Nor can the prime minister simply triangulate his way through 2026, responding to international events and using his incumbency power to cling on. He will not make it to the next election without picking more battles and creating more losers.

Even if the economy ticks up, the government is going to have to make more hard choices about tax and welfare and which public services to prioritise. Enough time has passed for Starmer to have learned from his early mistakes – and know what he must do to avoid repeating them. But he needs to set his sights far higher than simply holding onto his job and keeping party factions happy. He needs to convince a deeply sceptical public that government can deliver change – and create the conditions for his government to do so in 2026.