TUC chief warns Labour should ‘converse human’ to counter Farage – and voters ‘impatient for change’

People are “impatient for change” and Keir Starmer must “speak human” to win over wavering voters, the head of Britain’s trades union movement has said.

TUC General Secretary Paul Nowak said Labour had won a “thumping mandate for change” and warned it would take time to unpick 14 years of Tory chaos. But he put the Prime Minister on notice, saying people need to feel a “tangible difference” to their lives in 2025.

In an interview with the Mirror, he said Labour needs to “call out” Nigel Farage and speak directly to people to combat the threat of Reform.

Mr Nowak said: “You can’t put right 14 years of Tory chaos overnight – and the Government have only been in for seven months – but 2025 does absolutely have to be the year that they prove they can deliver that mandate for change, and that means a tangible difference in people’s lives and lived experiences.

“They’ve done a lot of the groundwork. Now they have to deliver and prove to the British people that they are delivering.” This means improving public services, such as more GP appointments, classrooms fit for purpose and getting more bobbies on the beat.

But it also means more money in people’s pockets,” the TUC leader said. “No one cares if GDP is going up, if your wages aren’t going up, and if your living standards aren’t going up,” he said.

“People are impatient for the change that Labour promised to actually be delivered, and you can’t blame them, because we had 14 years of stagnant living standards. We had 14 years of our public services getting worse year on year and 14 years with no industrial strategy and the Government has had to pick up the pieces.”

He said Mr Farage and Reform UK “thrive when people become cynical about politics”. Mr Nowak went on: “This is why the Government has to prove that they’ll take that massive majority and turn it into something that makes a real difference in people’s lives.”

Ministers need to “call him out, call his bluff”, pointing to the Reform leader’s decision to vote against Labour’s landmark workers rights bill in October. On how to combat Farage, the TUC leader said: “Speak human. It’s ironic as someone who was brought up in a working class family, in a working class community, to have Nigel Farage cosplaying as a working class man of the people. It sticks in my throat slightly.

“But you’ve got to tell it to people straight. Undoubtedly, Farage has an appeal in the same way that Boris Johnson had an appeal. I hope that people will see, just because (he’s) the sort of fellow you think you might want to have a pint with down the pub and he’s good on social media, it doesn’t make them fit to be Prime Minister.

“Labour have got to be prepared to call his bluff and call him out.” The Government and the union movement need to focus on “what matters to people stood at bus stops, in pubs or down the local community centre,” he said.

It comes as ministers face their first clash with unions over public sector pay after hikes of 2.8% were recommended for teachers and NHS staff. But Mr Nowak expressed hope that there wouldn’t be a repeat of the mass strike action under the Tories.

He said: “I think both the Government and our public sector unions will say we’ve got a recruitment and retention crisis in public services. I’ve got real concerns, and I know unions have got concerns as well, that that 2.8% won’t help resolve that recruitment and retention crisis, and it certainly won’t help it if it’s not properly funded.”

He went on: “My hope would be that the Government will get round the table and have that sort of grown up conversation in the way the Tories didn’t.”

Pressed on whether there would be major industrial action, he said: “I don’t think that’s where any of our unions want to be, and I don’t think it’s where millions of public sector workers want to be. And I would stress that point, that we’re at the beginning of the process, and the best way to sort of resolve disputes is to get round the table and negotiate and negotiate positively.”

He also warned that driving up productivity in public services was complicated, saying: “You’re not producing widgets on a factory line or just selling more products.” He added: “The best way of delivering services more effectively, more productively, to drive up public service productivity is to talk to the staff on the front line in delivering those services, because they know exactly where the inefficiencies are in the system.”