Wes Streeting prepares to launch leadership challenge against Keir Starmer

Allies of Miliband, the energy secretary, said they believe he also has the required backing among MPs, while Rayner could also launch her own bid – although sources said she is still not dead set on being the left’s candidate.

Downing Street has insisted that Starmer would fight any challenge from Streeting and other candidates, having just set out a programme for government in the king’s speech that contains 30 new bills.

However, Starmer supporters were also hinting that Downing Street may increasingly be coming round to the idea that they could drop opposition to Burnham becoming an MP later in the parliament.

His closest friends say that if the polls still show Labour is floundering on 15% in the polls in May 2028 and Burnham’s term in Greater Manchester is at an end, then an accommodation may be reached that Starmer will stand down.

One cabinet minister supporter of Starmer said: “If you get to the point, closer to the election, where he can’t win the election but somebody else could …. if he reaches a point that he’s clear in his own mind that it can’t be done then he’d make sure there was an orderly transition. But he’s not there yet.”

However, other cabinet ministers have been telling Starmer that he should not fight a contest while still in office, and that it would have been better to set a timetable for his resignation.

One senior Labour source pointed to Starmer’s missteps in dealing with the crisis as a reason why he should not contest a challenge, highlighting his interview from over the weekend suggesting he wanted to stay in power for 10 years and decision to bring back Gordon Brown and Harriet Harman to refresh his government.

If Starmer does decide to run against Streeting – and an alternative candidate from the left – the prime minister would have a major advantage because of Labour’s voting system, which is preferential.

MPs say they are deeply concerned that because Starmer would likely collect most second preferences, in a three-way contest he could even come second and still remain leader and prime minister.

There could also be a number of wildcard candidates from the cabinet and other MPs, including Lucy Powell, Bridget Phillipson, Yvette Cooper, and Al Carns.

With Burnham out of the race in the immediate future, his allies in parliament have begun casting around for alternative plans. “Stopping Wes is the top priority,” said one.

“MPs won’t take the chance that Starmer could win – the soft left will not allow that. There will be a candidate, the idea of Wes losing to Starmer is absolute madness,” another MP allied with Burnham said.

“Wes could end up like Owen Smith, that is absolutely the end of your political career,” one MP said.

While Streeting could gain support from some more resigning ministers on Thursday, some MPs were furious at what they saw as him destabilising the party when it was meant to be presenting its programme for government. “Colleagues are very, very, very angry with Wes,” said one MP supporting Starmer to stay on in the job.

Earlier on Wednesday, Zubir Ahmed, a close ally of Streeting who quit as a minister on Tuesday, renewed calls for the prime minister to resign, saying his authority had “irretrievably ebbed away”.