Keir Starmer to make first public appearance since council elections U-turn

Sir Keir Starmer is heading to Wales to make his first public appearance since the Government U-turned on postponing dozens of May’s English council elections.

The Prime Minister is due in Wales, where Labour faces pressure from Plaid Cymru and Reform UK ahead of a crunch Senedd vote later this year.

Thirty English council polls had been postponed, to help town halls through a major reorganisation of local government.

But the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) on Monday reinstated the votes, after receiving advice from lawyers following a legal challenge by Reform.

It was widely thought to be the Government’s 15th major U-turn since Sir Keir arrived in Downing Street 19 months ago.

Among these was the decision to restrict the previously universal winter fuel payment to pensioner households receiving means-tested benefits, before restoring it to all pensioners earning £35,000 or less a year.

Farmers protested outside Parliament in their tractors after Chancellor Rachel Reeves unveiled plans to levy inheritance tax on their assets worth more than £1 million, a threshold which was later raised to £2.5 million in a climbdown.

Sir Keir also faced calls to resign from his party’s leader in Scotland.

Anas Sarwar, who is leading Scottish Labour into a Holyrood election later this year, said “too many mistakes” had been made in Downing Street.

But Welsh Labour leader Baroness Eluned Morgan did not follow suit, saying she supported Sir Keir “in the job he was elected to do”.

The First Minister criticised “revolving-door leadership under the Conservatives” and added she judged “any prime minister by a simple test – whether they deliver for Wales”.

Jo Stevens, the Welsh Secretary, insisted Lady Morgan is a “busy woman” when she faced questions over why it took until February 10 – a day after Mr Sarwar called for the Prime Minister’s resignation – for her to publicly offer her backing.

She told Times Radio on Wednesday: “She’s a busy woman, she’s the First Minister of Wales, she’s not going to be able to do stuff, you know, seconds after Anas Sarwar does his press conference.

“But she was very clear backing the Prime Minister.”

Travelling west of the border, Sir Keir is expected to back several railway projects.

He will commit to joint working between Westminster and Cardiff Bay on the plans, including new stations at Magor and Undy, Llanwern, Cardiff East, Newport West, Somerton, Cardiff Parkway and Deeside Industrial Park.

“This Government is turning the page on historic dither and delay with seven new stations, thousands of jobs, and a generational commitment to build a rail network fit for Wales’s future,” Sir Keir said.

“This isn’t tinkering nor sticking plasters.

“This is investment for the long term and change communities will feel.

“This is putting Wales on the front foot and getting Britain building again.”

YouGov polling of Senedd voting intentions last month suggested 37% of the Welsh public planned to back Plaid Cymru at the election, with 23% planning on voting for Reform.

Labour trailed at 10%, behind the Greens on 13%.

In England, Reform UK leader Nigel Farage claimed a win when the Government reinstated May’s elections.

“Only Reform UK fights for democracy,” he wrote on X.

The Government has agreed to pay Reform UK’s legal costs after the party challenged the initial decision to postpone the votes.

The decision to reinstate elections was made “following legal advice”, an MHCLG spokesperson said.

They added: “Providing certainty to councils about their local elections is now the most crucial thing and all local elections will now go ahead in May 2026.”

Local Government Secretary Steve Reed wrote to council leaders, telling them he recognised “that many of the local councils undergoing reorganisation voiced genuine concerns about the pressure they are under”.

He announced up to £63 million in capacity funding to the 21 areas undergoing reorganisation across the whole programme, in addition to £7.6 million provided for developing proposals last year.

“I will shortly set out further detail about how that funding will be allocated,” Mr Reed said.

But authorities now face “an unnecessary race against time to ensure elections proceed smoothly and fairly, with polling stations booked and electoral staff available”, District Councils’ Network chairman Richard Wright said.

Mr Wright, who is also the Conservative leader of North Kesteven District Council, said: “If election cancellations were deemed necessary to free up capacity for local government reorganisation to succeed, councils will now be asking where this leaves the reorganisation timetable.

“We need to have faith in the Government’s decision-making as we work on the biggest shake-up of councils in 50 years – but the Government is doing little to assure us that it has a strong grasp of the huge legal complexity involved.”

At a Norfolk County Council meeting on Tuesday, the authority’s Conservative leader Kay Mason Billig said she could not say “how awful the last few months have been”.

Devolution and local government reorganisation would have meant a “big prize for Norfolk and Suffolk, many, many millions of pounds guaranteed for 30 years”, she said.

But the proposals are “off”, Ms Mason Billig said, adding: “We cannot consent to the new statutory instrument that is necessary to set up our mayoral county combined authority in the months before our elections, so, that’s it.

“Ten years of work potentially down the pan because of this incompetent Government.”

Describing Mr Reed, Ms Mason Billig later said: “I’d really like to quote Rik Mayall at this point, what an utter, utter b*****d.”