According to BBC reporting, Sarwar said he was proud of what he and Starmer achieved together even after Starmer announced his resignation as prime minister. Sarwar had publicly urged him to go in February, citing repeated government mistakes. Andy Burnham, the newly elected MP, is now the leading contender to succeed him.
Sarwar is trying to keep the wins tied to Scottish Labour while distancing himself from the errors that made Starmer untenable. Every Labour faction is now rewriting where loyalty ended and self-preservation began, which sets the tone for how the party will frame its record heading into the next election cycle.
Labour will either settle on a clean handover or open a bruising argument about what went wrong under Starmer. Burnham's position matters most: front-runners don't just inherit a government, they inherit its debts with voters.
Sarwar's move is politically smart and ruthless. He wants credit for ending Tory rule and policy wins, but he also wants the receipt showing he saw the collapse coming early. That's the template for the rest of Labour now: praise the legacy, isolate the mistakes, move fast to the next leader. If Burnham takes over, he'll find the party has already decided Starmer's record is something to keep at arm's length.
Filed to the Politics desk · Jun 22