Keir Starmer is a lame duck Prime Minister whose departure is inevitable

Daily Record Political Editor says Keir Starmer does not have much time left in Downing Street.

Keir Starmer’s colleagues have given him a stay of execution rather than a pardon.

Limited Cabinet support should be enough to keep him in post for days, but hanging around for weeks is unlikely and staying on for months is a non-starter.

The Prime Minister’s temporary reprieve reflects the weakness of the rivals who covet his job.

A cloud hangs over Angela Rayner due to her decisions on tax and moderates fear sacking Starmer could lead to her taking over.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting – Labour’s best communicator – worries that knifing the PM in the back will backfire.

And Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham – the favourite, if he was an MP – has no easy route back to Westminster.

In the current climate, Labour could not be guaranteed to win any by-election manufactured for Burnham’s benefit.

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But luck does not change the fundamentals and Starmer will quit either in the short or medium term.

YouGov polling found 70% of respondents believe Starmer is doing badly as Prime Minister, with only 22% taking the opposite view.

Half of Britons say he should stand down while 29% say he should remain in the job.

Even his closest allies privately admit he has struggled with the demands of leading the UK.

Signing off the winter fuel payment cut was a catastrophe that haunts Labour to this day.

Promising economic growth while hitting businesses with higher national insurance costs was a disaster.

His inexplicable decision to appoint Lord Mandelson as the UK’s top diplomat to the US simply reinforced his unfitness for office.

Starmer’s error was in misinterpreting Labour’s historic general election win against the Tories.

Winning an incredible 174-seat majority led some in the Government to believe it was a Blair-style victory, with the Right banished for a generation.

The reality is Labour only won 33.7% of the vote and the victory was rooted in hostility to the Tories and SNP, not a love of Starmer.

Voters wanted to turn the corner on fifteen years of Tory rule but Starmer felt like he had built up the political capital for so-called tough decisions.

The public revolted early on and Starmer had been doomed from the early days of his premiership.

Even if Starmer soldiers on, Reform and the Tories have enough ammunition from this week’s soap opera to torment his party until the next election.

Around 80 of his MPs no longer have confidence in him, with eight of his Scottish contingent demanding his departure.

Starmer was already persona non grata in Scotland – voters were viscerally hostile about him during the Holyrood campaign.

The quit calls from north of the border are damning and cannot be taken back.

Alan Gemmell, the MP for Central Ayrshire, said the Prime Minister’s “unpopularity” stopped Labour from beating the SNP.

Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy MP Melanie Ward resigned as a PPS after saying voters could not back Labour “as long as Keir Starmer remains Prime Minister”.

Richard Baker, the chair of the Scottish Labour MPs, demanded Starmer walk because “too many people” believe he cannot provide the leadership the country needs.

North Ayrshire and Arran MP Irene Campbell backed an “orderly transition of leadership” while Glasgow North East MP Maureen Burke urged a “timetable” for his departure.

Glasgow South MP Gordon McKee was more direct: “If we don’t change, the outcome could be Nigel Farage in Downing Street and all of the disastrous consequences that would have.”

Party sources believe the most honourable course of action would be Starmer resigning in a way that gives Burnham a chance of entering the contest.

Shutting him out, one MP said, would cause division and deprive MPs and members of the fullest possible range of options.

The MPs now calling for Starmer’s head do so with no malice and plenty of regret.

He took over as Labour leader in 2019 from the ashes of the failed Corbyn project.

He reformed a party that had been infected with anti-semitism and put Labour back on the same page as the voters.

Overturning a huge Tory majority in one election will go down as an astonishing achievement.

But there is a big difference between being leader of the Opposition and Prime Minister.

He excelled at the first – after a few struggles – but has failed at the second job.

Starmer is on the way out and a new Prime Minister is required to defeat Farage.