Keir Starmer’s premiership is on a knife-edge after four ministers dramatically stepped down with Angela Rayner ‘willing to act’ to stop Wes Streeting in his tracks.
So far more than 80 MPs have publicly called for the PM to go – but he has told his Cabinet he won’t resign. In order to trigger a leadership race, 81 MPs need to get behind a single challenger, which is some way from happening.
The PM admitted the last few days had “destabilised” the Government, but said the process for challenging the Labour leader hadn’t been triggered, so he is going to “get on with governing”. But No10 has been rocked by the resignations of ministers Miatta Fahnbulleh, Jess Phillips, Alex Davies-Jones and Zubir Ahmed.
In a blistering resignation letter, Ms Phillips wrote: “Whilst progress has been made, we have not acted with the vision, pace and ambition that our mandate for change demands of us.”
But more than 100 backbenchers are understood to have signed a letter in support of Mr Starmer while a source said Ms Rayner could throw her hat in the ring to take on Mr Streeting if a leadership contest was called.
Follow below for all the latest updates
