Is Labour’s aversion to short term decisions affecting its long term electoral prospects?

In the build-up to last year’s election, Labour leader Keir Starmer pledged an end of the ‘sticking plaster politics’ which he said characterised the ‘short-termist mindset’ of successive Conservative governments. By this, Starmer’s view was that too much focus has been given on the here and now, taking short term decisions to reap the political benefits at the cost of the long-term national interest.  

Eight months into Starmer’s premiership - and with much of that early momentum from July’s election now seemingly lost (until, perhaps this week’s intervention on the global stage) - questions are being asked of the government’s approach to policymaking and whether they have the balance right between those short, medium and long term policy priorities.  

Labour’s five missions – the overarching framing for the party’s ambitions to ‘renew’ Britain – as well known enough in Westminster circles, but a clumsy attempt to build these out with six milestones at the end of last year contributed to a sense that this is a government that wants to do everything and nothing at the same time. Long term ambitions around reaching net zero, reforming the NHS and restoring law and order are easy enough to understand in the bigger picture, but the shorter-term steps needed to get there are less clear.    

Interesting new research by the New Britain Project provided a comprehensive breakdown of Labour’s manifesto commitments, classifying these against the timeframes in which they could realistically expect to be delivered. The research found that just 1 in 20 falls into the category of ‘quick wins’ – those ‘immediate, highly visible policies that can be delivered to show voters that the government is working for them’.  

Those policies that fall under the umbrella include ending the VAT exemptions on private schools, introducing free breakfast clubs across primary schools, fixing 1 million potholes per year, raising the minimum wage, blocking bonuses for the bosses of polluting water companies, and raising the minimum wage. Eight months in and the government has made varying degrees of progress in delivering on each of these, with the consequences (particularly on the VAT exemption on private schools) to reveal themselves in the coming months.  

Away from this, much of Labour’s policy platform falls under what the research describes as ‘heavy lifting’ – requiring sustained effort, likely across government departments and briefs – and ‘long haul’, those transformational goals such as addressing inequalities and delivering on large scale targets such as delivery of new homes and infrastructure. A balance of all of these types of targets is needed, but the government will no doubt be considering whether they have landed in the right place so far.  

Delivery of quick wins can help a government to build a sense of momentum and convey to the public that it is being decisive and taking the steps to enact the change that the public voted for. Many will have been looking across the Atlantic at the number of executive orders signed by President Trump upon his inauguration as a classic case of this, wasting little time to devise long term strategies, draw up White Papers, and pull together industry commissions and task forces to deliver the platform which he was elected upon.  

While it is true that the Presidential model in the US lends itself to this kind of decisive action, steps taken by the UK Government this week in increasing defence spending and slashing the foreign aid budget – to some criticism from his own side - are reminders that when the government wants to act decisively, it can do so. 

This is politics, and any matter of course will carry its own implications. In the context of challenging approval ratings for Starmer and his government, and with the looming threat of Reform in much of Labour’s traditional base, strategists in Number 10 will be acutely aware of the need to start delivering policies that showcase the benefits of a Labour government. The government will no doubt point to these already delivered ‘quick wins’, including hitting targets such as the delivery of two million extra NHS appointments, as evidence that its approach is working.  

But politics can be a fickle business. For all that the government can announce long term plans for projects such as a third runway at Heathrow and other major infrastructure investment, it will only be able to achieve this by continuing to demonstrate to the public that it is making a meaningful difference to improve the country.  

This is the challenge for the government, and one that the government must meet if Starmer is to come good on his promise of a decade of national renewal.