Louise Gilmour: Actual change takes time but Starmer must make hay while the sun shines

Maybe Keir Starmer’s speech writer had enjoyed a glass or two?

In the wee hours of election night, after six weeks of buttoned-up campaigning so deliberately dull it made dullards doze, the Labour leader finally tore loose.

“Walk into the morning,” he exhorted jubilant supporters as dawn broke on Labour’s victory party at London’s Tate Modern.

“The sunlight of hope, pale at first but getting stronger through the day, is shining once again.”

A little of that can go a long way and, after revealing his poet’s soul, Starmer should quickly hide it again and revert to the serious-minded, task-focused achiever capable of propelling a beaten and bedraggled party into power in just five ruthless years.

The sunlight of hope sounds lovely but our country was promised change and needs it urgently, like yesterday.

Having said that, GMB trade union enjoyed some sunshine of our own last week as we rallied outside Amazon depots across Britain.

In Scotland, beneath rare blue skies, we were at the gates of the company’s biggest UK warehouse in Dunfermline, all 93,000 square metres of it.

It was where, in a revelatory Sunday Post investigation, a reporter went undercover in 2022 to hear his new colleagues describe relentless supervision, oppressive security and a culture of uncertainty and fear.

At one point, after asking an instructor about union membership, he was quickly hushed: “Don’t mention the unions – that’s like a swear word in here.”

He earned £450 before tax for a week of shifts dealing with up to 500 items a night while, that same week, Amazon owner Jeff Bezos, the world’s second richest man, banked £450 million.

On Monday, we were there to mark the start of a landmark ballot at Amazon’s Coventry warehouse.

The vote could force the company to recognise a union for the first time in the UK but, at every turn, Amazon – with income of £8 billion in the first three months of 2024, up 228% – has put its thumb on the scale.

Its concerted attempt to repel unionisation is just one reason why, from Coventry to Dunfermline, Land’s End to John O’Groats, workers need real change more than hopeful sunlight.

They need what Labour promised: a New Deal For Working People delivering security, curbing exploitation, improving pay, strengthening unions and boosting growth.

We are told Team Starmer has a plan for the first six weeks and the first six months.

Good, because not a day can be wasted. The first 100 has become the traditional milestone for new governments but, from here, November feels a long way off.

Before MPs hit the beach next month, our new prime minister could secure his legacy by triggering transformative reform to improve the lives of workers and rebuild public services.

Actual change may take longer but the process cannot begin soon enough because time is a luxury Labour cannot rely on.

Once, the scale of its victory would make a second term inevitable but that was then, when voters were red or blue for life, not now when political tides hurtle in before sweeping out just as suddenly.

The vote was wounding for the Tories but not fatal and, in five years, according to professors of swingometry, a shift of just 6% could wipe out Labour’s majority.

So Starmer must act without fear while still bathed in hopeful sunlight and before the skies darken, pelting ministers, including new Scottish Secretary Ian Murray, with unexpected events and everyday crises.

He must – as John F Kennedy famously advised – repair the roof while the sun’s out because, in Britain, the clouds are never far away.

Louise Gilmour is GMB Scotland secretary