Labour MPs had been waiting for this for months: the “Love Actually” moment when Sir Keir Starmer finally stood up to Donald Trump, just as Hugh Grant took on a bullying US president in the famous movie scene.
“This government does not believe in regime change from the skies,” Starmer told the House of Commons, as he distanced himself from Trump’s stated war aims in Iran.
Neither, Starmer added, did Britain take part in any military action which was neither legal nor had a “thought-through” objective. Labour MPs could barely believe their ears.
“I was very glad to be in the chamber to hear the PM call out Trump’s attack on Iran for what it is: illegal with no plan,” said Dame Emily Thornberry, Labour chair of the Commons foreign affairs committee.
John McTernan, a former Labour Downing Street adviser, joked: “This was Keir Starmer’s Love Actually moment — it was the most international law-adjacent Love Actually moment ever.”
It was almost archaic to hear Starmer fighting on the issue of international law, a concept apparently cast aside by many in the Trumpian world order.
But Lord Richard Hermer, attorney-general and like Starmer a prominent human rights lawyer, looked on approvingly from the Commons balcony as his old friend took his stand.
Tensions between Starmer and Trump have been building for months, with the US president lashing out repeatedly and publicly at the UK prime minister.
Trump, who initially struck up a good rapport with Starmer, has retreated on a US-UK trade deal and savaged the prime minister over his handling of the future of a joint military base at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.
On Monday Trump went a step further, telling the Daily Telegraph he was “very disappointed” in Starmer for refusing to allow American bombers to hit Iran from Diego Garcia in the initial US-Israeli strikes.
Meanwhile Pete Hegseth, US defence secretary, twisted the knife, criticising “so many of our traditional allies, who wring their hands and clutch their pearls, hemming and hawing about the use of force”.
By the time Starmer arrived in the Commons to make his statement on Iran on Monday, he was under attack from the Conservatives and Reform UK for failing to commit British forces to support the US in its aerial bombardment.
He also had to reassure some Labour MPs, who fear that Britain is getting dragged into an Iraq-style conflict, after the prime minister granted the US permission to launch “defensive” bombing raids on Iranian missile sites from UK bases.
His performance was unusually robust as he tried to tread a line between the two sides.
Starmer said Britain would defend its allies and interests in the region but would play no part in attacks on Iran. One Labour MP said: “Today he was especially good.”
Hermer and Starmer, who once worked together as lawyers on a case involving alleged war crimes by British troops in Iraq, are pilloried by some rightwing politicians and commentators for being “human rights lawyers” — a common term of political abuse.
Kemi Badenoch, Conservative leader, indicated in the Commons that the Tories would have backed the US strikes regardless of international law, in the interests of removing an abhorrent regime in Tehran.
But Starmer still believes in international law. One ally said: “I’m not sure that stating the UK acts in its own national interests and in accordance with the law should feel like a moment, but listening to the opposition I’m not so sure.”
McTernan said in this instance, Starmer was in tune with public opinion. A YouGov survey found that 21 per cent of Britons thought the UK government should condemn the Iran strikes, with 12 per cent saying it should praise them.
“The UK public has been settled for a long time in its notion that voters don’t want to commit forces for regime change,” he added.
“Tony Blair’s backing for regime change in Iraq made him unpopular, David Cameron discovered you can’t achieve regime change from the air in Libya, and the House of Commons refused to back action in Syria.”
Badenoch said the UK’s reluctance to back the US-Israeli strikes was motivated by political, not legal, considerations, suggesting that Starmer was trying to avoid upsetting Muslim voters.
“Across the UK there are groups whose political loyalties when it comes to conflicts in the Middle East do not align with British national interests,” she said, adding that Labour regarded people of such heritage as key voters.
Labour has seen its support among Muslim communities collapse — partly over Starmer’s muted criticism of Israel during the Gaza conflict — and the Green party capitalised on this in last week’s Gorton and Denton parliamentary by-election.
Many Labour MPs, anxious about where the Iran war is heading, were relieved to see their leader taking a stand against the Trump-led campaign and banged their desks in approval on Monday night as he arrived at a private meeting of the parliamentary party.
Starmer told his MPs “you can’t bomb your way to regime change”, stressing “that’s the UK position”, according to his spokesperson.
Asked whether Starmer could be expected to call out Trump more often, the spokesperson added: “There were people in the House from other political parties that were . . . saying ‘Follow the US position’ regardless of what is in our interests . . . But he is a British prime minister, setting British foreign policy, and acting in Britain’s interests.”