00:00Keir Starmer's leadership crisis just got deeper.
00:03Wes Streeting is gearing up to challenge the Prime Minister
00:05as more than a fifth of his own MPs have called on him to go.
00:08So who is Wes Streeting and what kind of Prime Minister would he be?
00:12Keir Starmer and Wes Streeting both became MPs after the 2015 general election.
00:16Fast forward to 2024 and Keir Starmer leads the party to a landslide victory.
00:20He takes the keys to 10 Downing Street and appoints Wes Streeting as his health secretary.
00:25Insiders say the pair were not particularly close allies
00:27and Streeting has long been tipped as a future leadership candidate.
00:31But the scandal around the appointment of Peter Mandelson
00:33and a disastrous set of local election results for Labour
00:36have brought Keir Starmer's premiership to the brink.
00:39On policy, Streeting comes from the Tony Blair-aligned wing of the Labour Party.
00:43He said he's uncomfortable about the levels of taxation.
00:46Labour's first two budgets included major increases.
00:49He's also kept the door open to the UK joining a customs union with the EU.
00:54Now, it is by no means guaranteed that if Streeting does trigger
00:57a leadership contest, he could win it.
00:59Keir Starmer has said he will fight on.
01:01And the left of the party would much prefer to have Greater Manchester Mayor
01:05Andy Burnham as their candidate.
01:07But uncertainty around Starmer's position has already agitated the bond markets,
01:11with a 30-year yield touching its highest since 1998 this week.
01:16An open leadership contest with all of the uncertainty that brings
01:19is the last thing investors are going to want,
01:21particularly as the UK deals with the fallout of the conflict in the Middle East.
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