Starmer latest: PM defies leadership ultimatum and calls to resign with revival plan for closer EU ties – UK Times

The prime minister has laid out his plans to respond to a disastrous showing in the local elections, vowing he would lead Labour into the next general election.

He said he would be “full-throated” about the need for closer ties with Brussels as he sought to win back his wavering MPs and address the drift of voters from Labour to the Greens in many former strongholds in London and cities across England.

The Independent’s Dan Haygarth reports:

The election results have revealed stark differences in how the parties fared in the capital compared with the rest of England.

Labour successfully defended a higher percentage of its seats than it did elsewhere, while Reform UK won a much lower proportion of seats in which it stood candidates than it managed outside London, according to Press Association analysis.

Sir Keir Starmer’s party has won 67 per cent of the council seats in the capital that it held just before the elections took place.

This compares with a win rate of 30 per cent for seats it defended outside London.

Reform has won just 5 per cent of the seats in the capital in which it fielded candidates, compared with a rate of 43 per cent for the seats it contested across the rest of England.

Other parties have seen contrasting fortunes inside and outside the capital, with the Greens winning 19 per cent of seats in London, in which it stood candidates, higher than the 10% it managed in the rest of England.

The Conservatives won 46 per cent of the seats they defended outside London, while the party saw a net increase of 6 per cent in its number of councillors in the capital compared with just before polling day.

Labour MP Catherine West has called on members of Sir Keir Starmer’s cabinet to challenge him for the leadership, warning that she will do so herself if they fail to step up.

She told The Independent that the party needs “to take on Reform and put forward a centrist vision of the country that people can really get behind”.

Labour Party rules state that a leadership election will only take place if the prime minister resigns or if 20 per cent of the party nominate a candidate to replace them.

That means 81 MPs would need to back a challenger. West has said she will seek another 80 names to trigger a contest if no one from the cabinet does so.

But as of now, West says she has only 10 MPs willing to back her. She has nonetheless said she is “confident” others will come forward if needed.

Chloe Combi has been speaking to young people in the aftermath of Thursday’s election. She writes that she works with this generation every day, and struggles to find one young adult who thinks the current political system has made even one meaningful and positive change in their lives.

Out of this desperation, a hunger for an alternative is growing, she says. There was an early assumption that Zach Polanski’s Green Party was going to “do a Zohran Mamdani” in the 2026 council elections and the hysterical portrayal of the leader in some quarters of the press as a kind of political bogeyman was telling. But, while the Greens made some significant gains, it’s how this generation is relating to Farage’s party that is just as telling.

The results of this year’s local election in London have sent historical records tumbling, while revealing stark differences in how the parties fared in the capital compared with the rest of England.

Labour successfully defended a higher percentage of its seats than it did elsewhere, while Reform UK won a much lower proportion of seats in which it stood candidates than it managed outside London, according to Press Association analysis.

Sir Keir Starmer’s party has won 67% of the council seats in the capital that it held just before the elections took place.

This compares with a win rate of 30% for seats it defended outside London.

Reform has won just 5% of the seats in the capital in which it fielded candidates, compared with a rate of 43% for the seats it contested across the rest of England.

Other parties have seen contrasting fortunes inside and outside the capital, with the Greens winning 19% of seats in London, in which it stood candidates, higher than the 10% it managed in the rest of England.

The Conservatives won 46% of the seats they defended outside London, while the party saw a net increase of 6% in its number of councillors in the capital compared with just before polling day.

The results show clearly how people in the capital voted for a wider range of parties than ever before, with nearly four in 10 council seats (39.3%) won by someone other than Labour or the Conservatives.

A Labour MP has urged would-be leaders in the cabinet to challenge Sir Keir Starmer by Monday – or she will – following the party’s disastrous local election results.

Catherine West, the MP for Hornsey and Friern Barnet, who was sacked by Sir Keir as a junior minister in the Foreign Office, said the cabinet should “reorganise themselves” and, to avoid a contest, put forward their “best communicator” to replace the prime minister. If that did not happen she would seek the 80 names needed to trigger a contest, she said.

Speaking to The Independent, Ms West said: “We had cataclysmic election results last week and our response so far does not match the emergency that faces us. I am terrified we will end up with prime minister Farage.”

The outcome of these elections provides more evidence of a country pulling away from a traditional two-party system, with strong support coming in for other parties, at least at local elections so far. Here are some of the towns and cities that highlight the trend:

Keir Starmer’s premiership is teetering on the brink, but his rivals cannot give him the final push, writes John Rentoul. Read below.