BBC: Wes Streeting Resigns as Health Secretary, Saying He Has Lost Confidence in UK PM Starmer’s Leadership

EXCERPT:

ZEFFMAN: "Well, the breaking news, Ben, is that Wes Streeting has resigned as Health Secretary literally just in the last two minutes. I'm going to read you some of his resignation letter to Sir Keir Starmer. I'll be honest, I'm reading this for the first time as I read it out, but I'll try and get you some of the key excerpts. He talks about progress that he has made as Health Secretary and stats that were reported today. He says there are good reasons for him to remain in post, but -- Wes Streeting continues -- as you know -- that's Keir Starmer -- from our conversation earlier this week, having lost confidence in your leadership, I have concluded that it would be dishonourable and unprincipled to remain as Health secretary. He talks about how last week's election results, those Scottish and Welsh parliamentary elections, as well as the English Council results were unprecedented, he says, both in terms of the scale of the defeat and the consequences of that failure. And the consequence he is talking about is the possibility of Nigel Farage and Reform U.K. forming the next government at Westminster. He says, we need vision, but we have a vacuum. Where we need direction, we have drift. And rather brutally, he says this was underscored by your speech -- that's Keir Starmer's speech on Monday. He says leaders take responsibility, but too often that has meant other people falling on their swords. You need to listen to your colleagues. The heavy handed approach to dissenting voices diminishes our politics. He says it is now clear that you will not lead the Labour Party into the next general election. He says there must be a debate about what comes next, a battle of ideas, not of personalities or petty factionalism. So he doesn't explicitly say there, although it's quite a long letter, so I might have missed it, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't explicitly say that he is standing for the Labour Party leadership and triggering a contest. But let's be pretty clear, that's what's happening over whatever time frame now develops."