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U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer could face a leadership challenge as soon as next week after his Labour Party suffered major losses in Thursday’s local elections.
Labour MP Catherine West told the BBC that if a Cabinet minister does not challenge Starmer by Monday, she will trigger a leadership contest herself.
West said she was putting the Cabinet “on notice.”
“I’m putting people on notice — if I don’t hear by Monday morning of some leadership hopefuls, I will be asking everybody in the Parliamentary Labour Party to put a name against my name, because we need to get this ball rolling,” she told the outlet.
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UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer provides an update on the Middle East situation during a news conference at Downing Street in London on March 5, 2026. (Tolga Akmen/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“But my preferred option is for the Cabinet to do a reshuffle within itself, where there’s plenty of talent and for Keir to be given a different role, which he might enjoy, perhaps an international role, and then for others to come to the fore, who can communicate the message, who are very able, so we can have minimum fuss,” she continued.
West, a former junior Foreign Office minister, would need support from 20% of Labour MPs — or 81 members — to trigger a contest.
She said about 10 MPs are backing her effort and expressed confidence more would join, according to the report.
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(left to right) Attorney General Lord Richard Hermer, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, Met Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley, and Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer during a meeting with representatives from criminal justice agencies at number 10 Downing Street, Westminster, following a terror attack in Golders Green on Wednesday morning in which two Jewish men were stabbed. Picture date: Thursday April 30, 2026. (Dan Kitwood/PA Images via Getty Images)
Labour suffered roughly 1,400 losses across the U.K. in this week’s elections, with Reform UK making significant gains, according to GB News.
Starmer accepted responsibility for the losses but resisted calls to resign, saying he was “not going to walk away and plunge the country into chaos.”
Still, he has not explicitly ruled out a managed exit and is expected to address the situation on Monday.
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U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer faces growing pressure within his Labour Party following losses in local elections. (Kin Cheung/AFP)
As of late Friday, 22 Labour MPs had publicly called for the prime minister to step down or set a timeline for his exit, the BBC reported.
West did not name a preferred replacement.
“I don’t have a candidate,” she said. “That’s part of the problem.”
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“But I think there are several people who would like to do it, who have been planning for months, but I’m very surprised that none of them has popped up today to say ‘I will do it’,” she added.
Digital’s Robert Schmad contributed to this report.
