FORMER LABOUR LEADER Ed Miliband has insisted that he is “not going to run” for the party leadership in any potential contest.

It comes as British prime minister Keir Starmer attempts to move on from speculation about his future in No 10 after surviving renewed calls for his resignation.

Starmer will take part in a community visit today in an attempt to show he is focused on easing the cost-of-living burden after chairing a routine meeting of his Cabinet, a day after his top ministers rallied round him.

The public display of Cabinet support came after Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar urged him to quit amid the fallout from the Peter Mandelson scandal.

Mandelson was appointed to Washington as British ambassador by Starmer, despite knowing that Mandelson’s links with Jeffrey Epstein continued after the financier’s conviction for child sex offences.

Starmer is expected to continue efforts to shake up his No 10 operation, with top civil servant Chris Wormald rumoured to be on his way out in the coming days.

His chief of staff Morgan McSweeney and communications chief Tim Allan have already departed as Starmer seeks to revive his fortunes after a bruising start to 2026.

Speaking to BBC Breakfast, former Labour leader and current Energy Minister Ed Miliband acknowledged that Starmer had faced a moment of “peril” yesterday.

“I make no bones about that but, as a collective body, the Cabinet, the Labour Party looked at the alternatives of going down this road of a chaotic leadership election, trying to depose a prime minister, and they said ‘no, that’s not for us’,” he added.

Miliband also insisted he did not agree that Starmer would not be in post much longer, and said the Prime Minister had shown a determination to fulfil his mandate after a “very, very damaging episode”.

He said that the Labour Party had “looked over the precipice and thought the right thing to do is to support our leader”.

“I think what Keir has done after a very, very damaging episode, by taking responsibility, by showing that there needs to be change, is shown a determination to fulfil the mandate on which he was elected,” Miliband added.

Miliband, who said he had “very limited contact” with Mandelson, further remarked that Starmer is “somebody who is in politics for 100% the right reasons”.

Speaking later on Sky News, it was put to Miliband that his message sounded a bit like a leadership pitch, he replied: “Absolute baloney.”

Asked whether he would rule out running, Miliband said: “I’m not running for the leadership, no.”

When further asked whether he would rule out running rather than saying he was not currently running, he said: “Yes, yes, I’m not going to run.”

Meanwhile, Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch, writing in the Daily Telegraph, said Starmer should resign as he had “proved incapable of doing the things a prime minister needs to do”.

But with the threat to his position appearing to recede, Starmer is expected to travel to Germany at the end of the week to attend the Munich Security Conference, where concern about the future of the transatlantic alliance is likely to be high on the agenda.