Why Labour incompetence created welfare Bill disaster – and worse is to come

Labour looks set for another damaging split over the two-child benefits cap

As a former Chief Whip, I often tell colleagues that the first rule of politics is to know how to count. You have to be able to add up the votes on your side of the aisle and the numbers on the opposite side – and make sure that your figures add up.

That may appear to be a pretty low bar to clear but it is one that Keir Starmer’s government has spectacularly failed to pass this week. Incompetence at the top of the government created utter chaos over the welfare Bill – but there may be far worse yet to come.

A Bill that set out to cut back support for people with disabilities and health challenges was always likely to meet resistance from both inside and outside of Labour. That is why it is astonishing that the government only began to realise the scale of its miscalculation towards the end of last week, when more than 100 Labour members – led by several senior, moderate MPs – signed an amendment which would have brought down the Bill entirely.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves was clearly emotional as Keir Starmer was grilled about the Labour rebellion over the welfare Bill (Picture: House of Commons/UK Parliament) | PA Wire

High-handed ministers

In one fell swoop, the massive Labour majority in the House of Commons was gone – and all because of the high-handed, contemptuous approach taken by those at the top. For a government to be blindsided in this way is a total failure of party management.

It suggests that whips are either not doing their job, or are being ignored by those above them. Above all, it smacks of a government that thinks it is a lot cleverer than it really is, and that does not believe it is accountable to the MPs who make up their majority.

What is so concerning about this week’s debacle is that ministers appear to be unwilling to make the case for their policies, either with the public or with their own MPs. To govern, after all, is to choose.

Sometimes cuts have to be made, tough decisions taken. If the planned cuts in the welfare budget were so necessary, as the government claimed up to the last minute, why were ministers so unwilling to win the argument with their colleagues?

A lack of conviction

This matters, because now that the government has shown that it cannot control its own party, every difficult vote becomes that much more difficult. The rebels have had a taste of successful rebellion – why would they stop here?

What we are witnessing is a government that does not have the courage of its convictions. It may, in truth, not even have convictions to begin with – and a government that has neither the ideas nor the votes has a rocky road ahead of it.

All indications, however, are that this poor management is going to continue. Just hours after the government turned tail on the welfare Bill, anonymous messages were circulating from the higher-ups, threatening that the two-child limit on benefits – one of the greatest drivers of child poverty in this country – would have to be kept in place to teach a lesson to rebellious MPs.

If the government think they have the numbers to bully their MPs, they may have another thing coming. The first rule of politics is to know how to count.

Alistair Carmichael is the Scottish Liberal Democrat MP for Orkney and Shetland