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News - 8 September 2025

Rayner resignation is another grim victory for the Labour right

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Willem Moore

@willem_moore


On Friday 5 September, Angela Rayner resigned after it became clear her housing scandal had broke Labour’s code of ethics. Her resignation prompted a cabinet reshuffle, with the clear ideological winners of this being the Labour right. While we’re sure Starmer and .co are very happy about this turn of events, let’s not pretend they weren’t already the Tory Party Mark II. With that in mind, we shouldn’t expect things to significantly change now that the cabinet is 3% more right-wing than it was a week ago.

In other words, things cannot only get better.

Rayner out

As Rayner was considered to be a member of Labour’s ‘soft left’, some have speculated she may have been pushed into resigning by Keir Starmer’s sinister (yet ultimately incompetent) chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney.

The media reported that McSweeney was in a power struggle with Rayner in 2024, but it’s worth noting Rayner has towed the line when needed to since then:

As Steve Topple reported in the above piece:

Speaking at Palace Fields Primary Academy in Runcorn ahead of the crucial Runcorn and Helsby by-elections, Rayner sought to justify the government’s decision to slash DWP spending by approximately £4.8 billion, despite mounting backlash from charities and vulnerable communities that warn these cuts endanger disabled people and struggling families.

As the Liverpool Echo reported, Rayner framed the controversy as a necessary step towards economic growth, with a heavy focus on job creation and youth engagement.

He added:

In a cynical personal anecdote, Rayner referenced her 17-year-old son’s visual impairment to underline her argument against “writing off” people on lifelong DWP benefits. This attempt at empathy, however, rings hollow given the stark reality that the very cuts she defends jeopardise the fragile safety nets disabled individuals depend on.

In return for this behaviour, Rayner got to do a little bit of employment rights, as a treat. Unions are worried that with Rayner gone, the Employment Rights Bill will be further watered down, so it’s not like she did nothing; the problem is she supported Starmer taking us ten steps back in exchange for half a step forwards.

Hard on the soft left

You might think Rayner was pushed to resign by the Labour right; you might believe her fuck up was so consequential she simply had to go; you might think it’s a little from column A and a little from column B. Regardless of how things have shaken out, however, Labour’s right flank is undoubtedly happy with the result.

In the past, McSweeney was concretely linked to a member of Labour’s soft left resigning, and that was Louise Haigh. McSweeney and Starmer have also conducted what Labour MPs have described as “punishment beatings”, with Adam Bienkov reporting:

I’m speaking to a Labour MP who voted against the Government’s recent disability benefit cuts and now fears they will be the next victim of what they describe as the “punishment beatings” currently being dished out to Labour MPs

“I’m on a hair trigger. I know that”.

“And you can go around worrying about it, but I think there’s a sense now that it’s going to happen, and it probably doesn’t really make much of a difference what I do.”

Bienkov further noted:

Starmer, under the advice of Chief of Staff Morgan McSweeney, green-lit the suspension of four more Labour MPs for their roles in recent parliamentary rebellions.

The suspensions, which included the well-liked moderate soft-left MP Rachael Maskell, have been a clarifying moment for many in the party.

“I think when it was only happening to the hard left, most MPs thought ‘oh it’s fine, it’s not my problem’.

“But now with what they did to Rachael, the soft left are beginning to realise what’s really going on here.”

If you’re wondering what ‘hard left’ and ‘soft left’ equate to in Labour terms, it’s ‘hard left’ when you want a fully nationalised NHS that’s operated for people instead of profits, and it’s ‘soft left’ when you want the same failing health system we have now but with 10% more murals or some shit.

Speaking on Labour’s soft left in a recent video, Novara’s Aaron Bastani said:

I simply don’t buy the nonsense there is a ‘left’ or ‘soft left’ in the Labour party anymore… It doesn’t exist… It is a pure phantom.

He added:

They are the most useless people in British politics.

There’s another reason why the right will have wanted Rayner gone, and that’s her popularity with Labour members. As Left Foot Forward reported in June:

The full results of the poll of Labour members are below. The percentages listed indicate the net favourability ratings of each cabinet minister.

  • Ed Miliband (74%)
  • Angela Rayner (71%)
  • Hilary Benn (38%)
  • Lisa Nandy (32%)
  • Shabana Mahmood (31%)
  • Bridget Philipson (31%)
  • John Healey (30%)
  • Jonathan Reynolds (29%)
  • Heidi Alexander (25%)
  • Yvette Cooper (23%)
    Darren Jones (19%)
  • David Lammy (16%)
  • Pat McFadden (14%)
  • Baroness Smith (13%)
  • Steve Reed (11%)
  • Jo Stevens (10%)
    Ian Murray (8%)
  • Lucy Powell (8%)
  • Wes Streeting (7%)
  • Ellie Reeves (4%)
  • Alan Campbell (4%)
  • Lord Hermer (2%)
  • Baroness Chapman (-5%)
  • Keir Starmer (-7%)
  • Liz Kendall (-23%)
  • Rachel Reeves (-28%)

This means that if Starmer does step down, there’s one less soft left candidate to worry about (unless she runs against the Labour right’s wishes and the members vote for her anyway, which has happened in the very recent past).

The deputy prime minister leadership contest will be interesting anyway, and potentially a headache for Starmer. The Labour membership clearly don’t like Starmer or his policies, and given all the ‘punishment beatings’, you’ve got to hope at least one MP is spiteful enough to run on an anti-Starmer platform.

Interestingly, considering the reason Rayner resigned, McSweeney himself has been accused of not declaring things as they relate to large sums of money, as another Novara contributor noted:

Blue Labour, new danger

There was another clear victory for the Labour right in the reshuffle, and that was the promotion of Shabana Mahmood to home secretary:

Steve Topple wrote the following on Blue Labour in 2020 in response to the contradictions between Starmer’s then-mixture of left and right policies:

Starmer is not the biggest socially left-wing liberal going: his muted support for trans rights has been criticised, and during the leadership election he didn’t sign a pledge card committing to expel “transphobic” members. Moreover, he’s come out recently and said Labour should be “proudly patriotic”. And he even got a front page in the Telegraph.

Yet he conversely pledged to renationalise rail, water, energy and the Royal Mail during his leadership bid. So, it seems Starmer’s brand of triangulation might be a ‘fourth way’: taking more socially conservative policies and combining them with left-wing economics. This is all a bit “Blue Labour”, a concept founded by Maurice Glasman based on socially conservative values of ‘family, faith and flag’ but more socialist economic policies. It is rooted in the values that Glasman perceived existed in the party pre-WWII. So far, Blue Labour hasn’t endorsed Starmer. It’s merely given its opinion on what he should do.

This contradiction was later explained by Starmer abandoning his socialist policies, exposing the fact he never believed in them in the first place.

Given that Starmer has made flag shagging a key pillar of his government, it’s unsurprising to see him elevating a member of Blue Labour to home secretary. It doesn’t seem like he’ll have any more success with Mahmood than Yvette Cooper, however, as the racist goons that Starmer yearns to impress have responded exactly as anyone would expect:

Rayner resignation: a titanic success

While this might leave a bitter taste in your mouth, don’t forget that the biggest obstacle to the Labour right’s success is the Labour right. Just look at what Britain thinks of Labour after a year of Starmer:

There are three key things you have to remember about the Labour right:

  • They have bad ideas (e.g. cutting Winter Fuel Allowance).
  • In trying to convince people why bad ideas are actually good, they make things even worse.
  • They never learn from their mistakes (e.g. rolling from the Winter Fuel cuts to PIP cuts).

As such, it’s almost heartening to see them consolidating power – like watching your worst enemies give you the finger then shut themselves in a fridge that won’t open from the inside.

Featured image via UK Parliament





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