Prime minister should make use of 2nd chance

There are always arguments against having a reshuffle, chief among them a desire to project stability and avoid the impression of a panicked response to short-term difficulties. Sometimes, however, needs must. And this is certainly true now.

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Sir Keir Starmer has been in No IO for more than a year; he swept to office on the back of a big majority and broad public goodwill. With his ratings plummeting and Reform UK riding high, a lot of that early political capital has gone. And while some of the blame attaches to events beyond his control, much of the rest can be traced to a sense of dysfunction and drift at Downing Street, so it is quite right that he has begun there, according to The Independent.

At the top of the list had to be strengthening the economic policy side and drastically improving the government’s messaging. The appointment of Darren Jones, the well-regarded chief secretary to the Treasury, the replacement of his principal private secretary, Nin Pandit, with Dan York-Smith, from the Treasury, and the recruitment as economic adviser of Minouche Shafik, formerly of the Bank of England, the IMF and a host of other institutions, would seem to add considerably to No IO’s economic firepower - although the risk of openly divergent thinking at No IO and No II will have to be avoided.