Sir Keir Starmer has had a rocky start in his first year as Prime Minister and faces plummeting polls for Labour and struggles inside his party as he enters the second stage of his plans for a “decade of renewal”.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer is braced for the biggest rebellion of his premiership in a vote on planned benefits cuts, despite making significant concessions to discontented Labour MPs. Sir Keir and his ministers have been scrambling to convince MPs to back watered-down welfare changes in a key vote on Tuesday evening.

The question is not whether the passing of Starmer’s new welfare bill has caused damage to the government, but how much?

Sir Keir Starmer has admitted he "did not engage" properly with Labour MPs, leading to a series of damaging U-turns on his flagship welfare reforms. On Tuesday, the government avoided defeat on its proposals to overhaul disability benefits by offering late concessions to Labour MPs threatening to rebel.

By Andrew MacAskill and Elizabeth Piper LONDON (Reuters) -British lawmakers gave their initial approval to Prime Minister Keir Starmer's plans to cut disability benefits on Tuesday, after a rebellion in his Labour Party forced the government to abandon a key reform at least for now.