Starmer attacks Greens, saying vote for Labour rivals puts new workers’ rights at risk | Keir Starmer
Keir Starmer used a raft of new workers’ rights that came into force on Monday to attack the Green party, saying a vote on Labor rivals would put progress on sick pay, parental leave and zero-hours contracts at risk.
The Prime Minister also lashed out at business figures and opponents of what he described as the biggest strengthening of workers’ rights in a generation: to dismiss the “vested interests” who warned against them.
But in an indication of how he sees the threat from the populism of Zack Polanski’s Greens and Nigel Farage’s Reform UK ahead of May’s local elections, Starmer said having a “serious, credible economic strategy” sets Labor apart.
“No other party offers both the economic credibility and political will to do this,” he wrote in an article for the Guardian.
“A vote for another party risks that progress through elections that will set us back or approaches that are not based on the realities of governance.”
The measures to come into force on Monday include removing the two-child benefit limit, a key demand of child poverty campaigners and Labor MPs. Starmer described the move as one of his government’s proudest moments.
Other measures to come into effect on Monday include a 4.8% increase in the state pension to £241.30 a week and a 2.3% increase in the universal credit standard allowance.
Under the Employment Rights Act 2025, statutory sick pay becomes an entitlement from the first day of illness. Workers will also be entitled to paternity and unpaid parental leave from the first day of work.
Labor is keen to portray the measures as significant successes as it braces for potentially heavy losses in the English council and mayoral elections on May 7 amid challenges from Reform on the right and the Greens on the left. National parliamentary elections are also being held in Scotland and Wales.
While Labor has been worried about Reform since the general election, it has increasingly turned its sights towards the Green Party since winning Greens seats in previously safe Labor strongholds such as Gorton and Denton.
Latest YouGov polls Westminster’s voting intentions The Greens came in second place behind Reform. The poll, released by former Tory treasurer Michael Ashcroft on Sunday, showed a three-way split between the Greens, Conservatives and Reform. They were each on 21%, Labor on 17%.
A spokesperson for the Green Party responded to Starmer’s comments by saying the party was now the party of the working class. “It’s a hopeless situation for our interim prime minister, who woke up this morning to a poll showing Labor in fourth place and the Greens in first place.
“The reality is that Labor was forced to give diluted new workers rights after working on corporate lobbying. The embarrassing two-child limit only ended when Starmer was finally dragged into it under pressure from Green MPs and anti-poverty campaigners.”
Starmer’s comments appear to confirm an imminent turn to the left, amid pressure from potential leadership candidates including Angela Rayner and Andy Burnham.
“At every stage we encountered the same voices of opposition,” the prime minister wrote of the measures, which were met with resistance from some business leaders. This opposition focused on so-called “day one rights”, which gave workers greater power to seek unfair dismissal and flexible working.
Starmer said: “They warned about costs, disruptions, said that the time was not right. But we made a different choice again. We chose working people.
“Nothing Labor has achieved has come easily. Every success has been hard-fought and hard won against the pull of vested interests. And each time those warnings have proven wrong.”
The Prime Minister this week introduced a series of measures in line with the Blair government’s tradition of introducing the minimum wage 27 years ago.
At the same time, Starmer’s leadership continued to face harsh criticism from the left wing of Unite, traditionally one of Labour’s biggest union supporters. General Secretary Sharon Graham described He sees the Employment Rights Act as “a shell of its former self”. Last month the union significantly reduced Labor membership fees, mainly due to the Birmingham bin strike.
The removal of the two-child benefit cap, introduced by then Conservative Chancellor George Osborne in the 2015 budget, was criticized by Conservatives who said it would cost billions of dollars and “reward unemployment”.
The party has published analysis showing that at least £1bn would go to an extra 186,000 unemployed households each year, with a family of two unemployed adults and three children receiving an income boost of £6,400.
He added that the gains were heavily concentrated in a handful of cities, with Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham, Bradford and Glasgow receiving more than £200 million more a year.
Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch said: “While workers struggle with rising fuel costs and food prices, Keir Starmer is handing out a new round of aid to welfare recipients.” .
Labor accused the Conservative Party of publishing “fake figures” by using a family with two disabled adults as a case study and pretending they were unemployed. Both adults were listed as having limited capacity for the work-related activity element of universal credit; This means they have an injury or health condition that limits their ability to work.
