Keir Starmer doesn’t see himself as the leader of a coalition government. With 399 MPs and a working majority of 156, why should he?

One reason is that those numbers mark a high tide of anti-Tory feeling that receded as soon as Rishi Sunak’s rotten administration was swept away. Voters from diverse places with disparate grievances embraced Starmer’s promise of change, often uncertain what it meant in practice. They needed reasons to be glad of the choice they had made and haven’t found them. Support for the government has tanked as a result.

Labour MPs are miserable. There is disaffection in every faction. It afflicts even the cadre of ultra-loyal “Starmtroopers” whose selection as parliamentary candidates was supposed to guarantee a compliant Commons. Ambitious newbies who thought they were embarking on a political career are doubtful of survival at the next election. They are less easily induced to obedience by whips.

This is another reason why Starmer needs to get into the bridge-building trade. Labour, like all parties, is a coalition of divergent opinions held together by an intuitive sense of common history and purpose. A leader can alienate some supporters for the sake of election success if pragmatic compromise doesn’t look like dissolution of core principle, and as long as it works. Starmer passed those tests in opposition. Now, not so much.

Cabinet changes hastened by Angela Rayner’s resignation are supposed to consolidate the prime minister’s grip on policy, promoting people who will drive the Starmer agenda harder and faster. Shabana Mahmood is tasked with getting immigration, legal and irregular, under control with more alacrity than Yvette Cooper. Pat McFadden must transform “economically inactive” benefit claimants into productive workers by some method that eluded Liz Kendall. That will free up money for Rachel Reeves, one of the few cabinet members not to have been shuffled, to invest in public services and........

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