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Sir Keir Starmer has told colleagues that he now sees Nigel Farage’s reform in the UK as “his true opponent”, at the end of a week in which he sharply his message of migration and faced accusations that he was using the language of the distant right.
The prime minister has told his team that he believes that the conservatives we have Badenoch can reach the “end of the way” and that Britain can witness the great reassessment of its politics.
A senior work official said Starmer would be ready to argue in Farage before the next elections, with polls suggesting that the public also see the UK reform as the most reliable opposition to his work government. Farage said on Friday: “I accept the offer”.
Despite the threat of reform and criticism from his MPs for planned welfare cuts, Starmer has insisted that the UK swollen receipt should be under control. He also told colleagues that he is not ready to reorganize his cabinet.
Starmer on Friday ended a two-day visit to Albania, during which he tried to strengthen his message of migration, before being a delicate political political summit EU in London on Monday.
The prime minister knows that Farage and Badenoch will portray his promised “restoration” of post -Brexit relations as a “surrender” for Brussels and will seek to paint a proposed youth mobility scheme as a return to free movement.
Badenoch, who has said that Britain should not be a “prayer” in the talks, has promised to “obtain any legislative or judicial power submitted to the EU by the current government.”
Starmer is more concerned about Farage, mentioning friends that while he faces Badenoch every week beyond Despatch’s box in the Municipal House, “his real opponent” is the UK reform, whose five MPs are now for a small uprising in parliamentary subdivision.
He is worrying about Badenoch, whose party was humiliated by reform in this month’s local English elections, and its decision to criticize the trade agreements made by Starmer with India and the US in the last two weeks.
“Now without knowing what is in agreement with the EU, she says she is against him,” Starmer told Financial Times. “The only grace of saving is that no one in Europe takes it seriously, so it doesn’t make a blind change.”
Starmer claims that none of his European interlocutors, who he met in Tirana at a European political community summit on Friday, believes that Badeno will never be able to return the deepest links of security and trade with the EU that he will begin on Monday.
An IPSOS/MOR poll this month revealed that the British public is now more likely to take into account the UK reform (37 percent) as the main opposition party, ahead of conservatives (33 percent).
Youugov’s latest survey showed Farage’s party leading surveys to 28 percent, with laboratories in 23, Conservatives 18 and Liberal Democrats 16. The Farage party won more than 670 council seats in this month’s elections, but by wiping conservatives in traditional Tory Heartlands such as Kent.
Starmer appointed plans this week to strengthen the rules for legal migration, claiming that Britain risked becoming a “island of foreigners”, a phrase that critics claimed to have echo of the infamous “River Rivers” speech of Enoch Powell. Downing Street has pushed the request again.
Starmer is also discussing with third places unnamed a plan to create “return centers” to allow Britain to quickly expel the failed asylum seekers, though Albanian embarrassing Prime Minister Edi Rama said his country would not be part of it.
The prime minister’s toughest stance on migration and his decision to continue with controversial welfare cuts – widely seen as a solution to the right – has done nothing to arrest his assessments of personal approval, with the work voters who leave him in motion, according to Youugov.
A new survey published on Friday revealed that Starmer’s Favourability’s net rating fell 12 points in a month to -46, its lowest level, including a 34 -point drop among people who voted in last year’s elections.
Meanwhile, he remains poorly exposed to Farage’s criticism that he has not brought unlawful migration under control; The UK Reform leader this week called for a “national emergency” to declare due to high levels of channel crossings.
Despite Starmer’s promise to “hit gangs” by promoting asylum seekers throughout the channel, 2025 has seen the highest levels of small boat crossings in record.
A total of 12,700 people have arrived in small boats this year, with 33 percent in the same period last year, and Starmer has been warned by colleagues not to expect any early decrease in numbers.
Government insights admit that the problem is “endemic” that criminal gangs are well embedded, and that international cooperation intensified to address the problem would take time to produce results.
There are also concerns about a large increase in arrivals from Africa’s horn, including Eritrea and Somalia, and that migrants from these countries are ready to take greater risks to reach Britain, filling with boats.
For Starmer it is a reminder that identifying a problem is not the same as its treatment, whether it is dealing with high levels of net migration or trying to defeat political parties that thrive in it.
