Former Downing Street adviser Dominic Cummings has suggested that Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner might take over from Sir Keir Starmer as Labour leader before next summer.
Speaking to GB News presenter Steven Edgington, Mr Cummings outlined multiple factors that could lead to the Prime Minister's departure.
The political strategist, who previously served as Boris Johnson's chief adviser, indicated that traditional assumptions about Labour Party leadership stability might no longer apply.
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Dominic Cummings identified four principal arguments supporting his prediction that Rayner could assume the party leadership.
|GB NEWS ORIGINALS
Mr Cummings identified four principal arguments supporting his prediction that Rayner could assume the party leadership.
These centre on Starmer's performance limitations, broader Governmental challenges, economic pressures, and ideological preferences within the Parliamentary Labour Party.
Mr Cummings told Steven: "I had sort of assumed that the Labour Party doesn’t get rid of people, and these kinds of heuristics are historically quite sticky.
"But I now think that as this old system really crumbles, maybe these old rules of thumb become less important. It strikes me as more and more likely that he’ll be removed and that Rayner will take over.
"He can’t do the job. He doesn’t understand the job. He doesn’t like the job. He can’t face reality.
"Of course, there are always some great officials around the British system, particularly in private offices, but overall, he’s dealing with the same kind of collapse of standards that everyone else has been dealing with.
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"He’s not going to turn things around. And of course, they’re heading for a budget where the Treasury scorecard gets worse every week and flashes more and more red.
"And you’ve got a non-functioning chancellor. So the system is saying, well, there’s no option but a very depressing budget for everyone more taxes, cuts to spending, more Treasury vandalism of every long-term capital budget, and so on.
"I increasingly think that the Budget will be a disaster, and then they’ll get rid of Reeves, and then McSweeney will go, and the Prime Minister’s own authority will be under extreme scrutiny.
Angela Rayner is the Deputy Prime Minister
| PA"It wouldn’t surprise me at all if they ended up just going for Rayner, because most Labour MPs live in a parallel world. They worked in some left-leaning NGO or charity and have very tenuous connections to any kind of reality outside London.
"They just want a left-wing Government, so there’s a lot of logic for them in putting Rayner in and saying, 'Do a wealth tax. Make the billionaires pay their fair share.' That’s how we’ll balance the books.”