Missions, first steps and milestones: How Sir Keir Starmer’s priorities have changed since last year
Sir Keir Starmer’s promises to the British people have been evolving since he first outlined his “five missions” in February 2023.
In public, Downing Street denies any tensions between the missions, May’s “first steps” and today’s six “milestones” and three “foundations”.
In private, I’ve been told they have caused divisions, with the focus changing after the original architects left as Labour entered power.
But what really matters is how they have evolved. Here’s how they have changed and what that means.
Politics latest: Starmer knows he needs answer to Nigel Farage
The Plan for Change: Economy
Feb 2023 Mission: To secure the highest sustained growth in the G7 – with good jobs and productivity growth in every part of the country making everyone, not just a few, better off.
June 2024 First Step: Deliver economic stability with tough spending rules, so we can grow our economy and keep taxes, inflation and mortgages as low as possible.
Dec 2024 Milestone: Raising living standards in every part of the United Kingdom, so working people have more money in their pockets as we aim to deliver the highest sustained growth in the G7.
Analysis: The new big economic target – to raise living standards in this parliament – is already on track to be met, according to the government financial watchdog.
Some in government hope this will eclipse the existing target – to overtake the growth rate of all other G7 countries – that was promised in February 2023.
Sir Keir said today he was “doubling down” on the G7 target, despite economists doubting it could ever be achieved, with some sources suggesting it would disappear altogether.
But today it became an “aim”, not a pledge, and the PM hinted he knows it will not be achieved in this parliament by promising the living standards milestone first – do we effectively have a target that isn’t a target?
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Starmer unveils ‘plan for change’
The Plan for Change: Environment
Feb 2023 Mission: Make Britain a clean energy superpower to cut bills, create jobs and deliver security with cheaper, zero-carbon electricity by 2030, accelerating to net zero.
June 2024 First Step: Set up Great British Energy, a publicly-owned clean power company, to cut bills for good and boost energy security, paid for by a windfall tax on oil and gas giants.
Dec 2024 Milestone: Securing home-grown energy, protecting bill payers and putting us on track to at least 95% clean power by 2030, while accelerating the UK to net zero.
Analysis: The 2023 zero-carbon electricity supply mission – and the Labour manifesto – made no mention that the party believes it will have achieved the target while still having up to 5% of electricity generation powered by fossil fuels.
However, Labour did say, including in its manifesto, that a strategic reserve of gas is needed as a last resort, and while the party did not put a figure on it, other bodies suggested the 95% target is consistent with being able to claim the UK has a zero-carbon supply.
Read more
How achievable are Labour’s green priorities?
Govt pledges £22bn for carbon capture tech
Energy Secretary Ed Miliband has defended the government’s policy. Pic: PA
The Plan for Change: Building
Feb 2023 Mission: Not mentioned.
June 2024 First Step: Not mentioned.
Dec 2024 Milestone: Rebuilding Britain with 1.5 million homes in England and fast-tracking planning decisions for at least 150 major economic infrastructure projects.
Analysis: This contains the big new target of the speech – the 150 decisions on major projects. Sir Keir Starmer is on the side of the builders and the makers. But will they happen? This is the big test of whether those in Whitehall have listened to the speech and will get out of their tepid bath.
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Why hasn’t the UK built more houses?
The Plan for Change: Crime
Feb 2023 Mission: Take back our streets by halving serious violent crime and raising confidence in the police and criminal justice system to its highest levels.
June 2024 First Step: Clamp down on anti-social behaviour, with more neighbourhood police, paid for by ending wasteful contracts, tough new penalties for offenders, and a new network of youth hubs.
Dec 2024 Milestone: Putting police back on the beat with a named officer for every neighbourhood and 13,000 additional officers, police community support officers (PCSOs) and special constables in neighbourhood roles in England and Wales.
Analysis: The idea of a named officer is new and ambitious. The 13,000 target was in Labour’s manifesto and Yvette Cooper said the extra £100m next year would fund 1,200 new police officers.
Tories claim this means officers would be redeployed from other areas.
The Plan for Change: Education
Feb 2023 Mission: Break down barriers to opportunity by reforming our childcare and education systems, to make sure there is no class ceiling on the ambitions of young people in Britain.
June 2024 First Step: Recruit 6,500 new teachers in key subjects to set children up for life, work and the future, paid for by ending tax breaks for private schools.
Dec 2024 Milestone: Giving children the best start in life, with a record 75% of five-year-olds in England ready to learn when they start school.
Analysis: Labour is saying the proportion of children who are ready for school educationally and socially at five will rise from 67% to 75%.
Rolling out better early years provision is a government priority but the nursery sector has been left chronically underfunded. Tories point out there is less of a focus on schools.
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Thousands of children missing school
The Plan for Change: Health
Feb 2023 Mission: Build an NHS fit for the future that is there when people need it; with fewer lives lost to the biggest killers; in a fairer Britain, where everyone lives well for longer.
June 2024 First Step: Cut NHS waiting times with 40,000 more appointments each week, during evenings and weekends, paid for by cracking down on tax avoidance and non-dom loopholes.
Dec 2024 Milestone: Ending hospital backlogs to meet the NHS standard of 92% of patients in England waiting no longer than 18 weeks for elective treatment.
Analysis: This is an ambitious, stretching target which has not been hit for almost a decade.
It will take focus and cash, and could come both at the expense of other services like A&E and divert away from Wes Streeting’s big reform plan to move treatments from hospitals to the community.
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The Plan for Change: Migration
Feb 2023 Mission: Not mentioned.
June 2024 First Step: Launch a new Border Security Command with hundreds of new specialist investigators and use counter-terror powers to smash criminal boat gangs.
Dec 2024 Milestone: Not mentioned as a milestone but is mentioned separately.
Analysis: Not one of the milestones, which has confused some, given its prominence in political debate.
Instead this issue – of secure borders – is one of three “foundations”, alongside economic stability and national security. But six milestones plus three foundations is a lot of priorities.
Politics
Nigel Farage’s ‘fantasy’ policies will lead to Liz Truss-style economic meltdown, Sir Keir Starmer to warn
Nigel Farage’s “fantasy” policies will lead to a Liz Truss-style economic meltdown, the prime minister will warn today.
Sir Keir Starmer is set to argue that Reform UK’s pledges would cause mortgages, bills and rent payments across the country to surge.
On Tuesday, Mr Farage vowed to reverse cuts to winter fuel payments and scrap the two-child benefit cap, with an ambition to slash income tax.
But new analysis from the Institute of Fiscal Studies suggest that his party’s aim of hiking the personal allowance to £20,000 a year could cost between £50bn to £80bn a year.
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Will PM’s ‘Farage lite’ strategy work?
Visiting manufacturing workers in the North West, Sir Keir will describe Reform’s economic agenda as a “mad experiment”.
He is expected to say: “In opposition we said Liz Truss would crash the economy and leave you to pick up the bill. We were right – and we were elected to fix that mess.
“Now in government, we are once again fighting the same fantasy.”
Labour is criticising Mr Farage for betting “that you can spend tens of billions on tax cuts without a proper way of paying for it”.
The prime minister will add: “Just like Truss, he is using your family finances, your mortgage, your bills as a gambling chip. The result will be the same. Liz Truss bet the house and lost.”
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Angela Rayner ‘hoping’ for winter fuel update
Sir Keir is referring to the former prime minister’s mini-budget in 2022, which had proposed abolishing the top 45% rate of income tax.
But this policy, among others, spooked financial markets and led to economic turmoil in the UK – with a dramatic spike in the cost of government borrowing feeding through into interest rates.
Mr Farage has argued that his measures can be paid for by scrapping net zero commitments and ending the use of hotel accommodation for asylum seekers.
Recent polls have put Labour second behind Reform UK, while the local election results earlier this month saw Mr Farage’s party win a parliamentary by-election, control of 10 councils and two mayoralties, while Labour lost almost 200 seats.
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Farage could ‘definitely’ become next PM
Sir Keir has been under pressure from his backbenchers to regain the initiative, leading to the party’s U-turn on winter fuel payments last week.
Plans to scrap the two-child benefit cap have also not been ruled out by ministers, in what would be a second reversal of current Labour policy.
Dominic Cummings, the former top aide to Boris Johnson, exclusively told Sky News he believes Mr Farage could “definitely” become the next prime minister, with the right strategy.
Elon Musk confirmed that he’s quitting as the White House’s government cost-cutting czar after admitting it was an “uphill battle” trying to slash federal jobs and programs.
Musk’s status as a Special Government Employee leading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) meant that by law, he could only serve for a maximum of 130 days, which was set to finish on May 30.
Musk confirmed his exit in a May 29 X post, thanking President Donald Trump “for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending.” Reuters reported that a White House official said his “off-boarding will begin tonight.”
Musk told The Washington Post for a May 27 report that the “federal bureaucracy situation is much worse” than he expected, and it was “an uphill battle trying to improve things in DC, to say the least.”
In separate comments to CBS, Musk criticized the multi-trillion-dollar tax break package that House Republicans approved on May 22, claiming it would increase the budget deficit and undermine the work that DOGE is doing.
DOGE, which is named after the cryptocurrency, claims to have saved taxpayers $175 billion since Trump’s Jan. 20 return to the White House, a figure heavily disputed by multiple news outlets, which report the figures are overstated, have multiple errors and are inaccurate.
The project’s claimed savings are only 8.5% of Musk’s initial ambition to cut $2 trillion from the federal budget, which he later revised down to $150 billion.
According to the Reuters report, DOGE has cut almost 12%, or 260,000, of the 2.3 million federal workforce through layoffs, buyouts and early retirement offers.
Despite the criticisms, Musk said on X that DOGE’s mission will “only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.”
It comes as a federal judge allowed a lawsuit to proceed that accuses Musk and DOGE of illegally exerting power over government operations.
The lawsuit, filed by 14 states, alleged that Musk and DOGE violated the Constitution by illegally accessing government data systems, terminating federal employees and canceling contracts at federal agencies.
Musk admits he spent too much time in politics
In a May 28 interview with Ars Technica, Musk, the CEO of EV maker Tesla, admitted that he spent “a bit too much time” in politics, which some critics claim has impacted Tesla’s performance.
“I think I probably did spend a bit too much time on politics,” Musk said. However, he added that the time he spent on DOGE wasn’t as significant as many believed, and he blamed media coverage for overrepresenting his involvement.
“It’s not like I left the companies. It was just relative time allocation that probably was a little too high on the government side, and I’ve reduced that significantly in recent weeks.”
When Musk announced in Tesla’s first quarter report that his time spent on DOGE would drop significantly in May, Tesla (TSLA) shares rose over 5% in after-hours trading, despite the company reporting an 80% drop in net income.
As of March 31, Tesla still held 11,509 Bitcoin (BTC), currently valued at about $1.24 billion.
Related: Musk confirms X Money beta testing ahead of planned 2025 launch
Tesla shares are still down 5.9% year to date, in part due to Musk diverting his attention away from the company and Tesla’s sales falling considerably in the first quarter.
However, the fall is in line with other Big Tech firms, including Apple (AAPL), Nvidia (NVDA), Amazon (AMZN) and Google (GOOG), which are also in the red in 2025.
Magazine: Crypto wanted to overthrow banks, now it’s becoming them in stablecoin fight
Former Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chair Rostin Behnam has said the crypto market will remain unregulated unless the agency he led is given greater authority.
In a May 28 Bloomberg TV interview, Behnam sided with the crypto industry on its long-standing argument that cryptocurrencies are commodities.
“If you look at existing law, the few largest tokens are commodities, which means the SEC does not have jurisdiction over those tokens, which include Bitcoin and Ether,” he said.
He added that the Securities and Exchange Commission currently cannot properly regulate crypto because its law doesn’t allow it to regulate commodities, and the CFTC cannot regulate because it is a derivatives regulator.
Without new authority for the CFTC to regulate “cash markets in digital assets, non-securities,” this will remain an unregulated space, he claimed.
Behnam comments amid increasing scrutiny of the Trump family’s crypto ventures, which include the crypto platform World Liberty Financial, memecoins and a stablecoin.
On May 28, American political strategist and political commentator Sanders Townsend said Donald Trump is boosting his family’s investments in cryptocurrency and “is using the presidency to do it.”
The administration’s involvement in the regulatory process and legislative effort is “raising red flags” among some members of Congress, and there are “well-baked rules” for any elected or appointed government official that need to be complied with, he said.
“Ultimately, until we do something, the [crypto] market will remain unregulated. Customers, investors, retail and institutional, will be more vulnerable to harm, fraud, manipulation and conflicts of interest, until the market is regulated.”
Regulation critical to financial markets, says Behnam
Behnam also weighed in on Vice President JD Vance’s speech at the Bitcoin 2025 conference, backing up the need for crypto regulations.
Related: Trump’s use of presidential seal at memecoin event raises legal questions
Vance said in a speech at the event that “we reject regulators” and that crypto “has a champion” in the White House.
“Regulators are extremely important,” Behnam said. “They’re the reason American markets are the most desired in the world.”
“Consumer protections and enforcement of the law are extremely critical to the health of our financial markets,” he added.
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