Happy New Year to all our readers. We hope 2026 has begun with warmth, hope and renewed determination, even if the political weather remains cold.
There’s no point pretending otherwise: starting another year under this Labour government is dispiriting. Good news is thin on the ground, excuses are plentiful, and the embarrassment on the world stage seems to deepen by the week. And yet, we refuse to give up.
Here at the Conservative Post, we believe deeply in bringing you good news, and when the headlines themselves fall short, we look instead to what lies ahead.
This week, we are doing something a little different. Rather than a traditional round-up, we are offering our predictions for the year to come.
We do so not out of blind optimism, but hard-earned realism. Britain does not stop being Britain simply because it is poorly governed. While Labour dithers, drifts and delays, real achievements will continue to happen across this country. The British people will go on innovating, inspiring and succeeding against the odds. That is the quiet truth the government cannot erase.
Stay strong. This awful period will not last forever.
Politically, 2026 is unlikely to bring Labour stability. If anything, it will expose more fragility. Leadership uncertainty will hang over government like a permanent fog. Ministers will shuffle, policies will be announced and quietly abandoned, and the civil service will increasingly slow-walk ideas it suspects will never survive public scrutiny. A government low in the polls does not govern boldly… it governs nervously.
We do not believe Keir Starmer will see out the first half of the year.
By June, the pressure from collapsing confidence, internal discontent and a restless parliamentary party will become impossible to ignore. When that moment arrives, the succession battle will begin almost immediately. Angela Rayner and Andy Burnham are the two most likely claimants, each representing a different and incompatible wing of Labour’s fractured coalition. Burnham, in particular, is expected to manoeuvre early, positioning himself as the “electable” alternative at the first available flashpoint. Labour may speak the language of unity, but 2026 looks set to expose its fault lines beyond repair.
Starmer, we predict, will sacrifice Rachel Reeves before he himself is forced out, a last attempt to steady a ship already taking on water.
Economically, little will improve in the short term. Investment will remain cautious, not because Britain lacks potential, but because Labour has fostered uncertainty. Growth will be anaemic, retail fragile, and wages stagnant in the private sector. Interest rates may fall, not as a sign of strength, but because the economy is flatlining. This is not only collapse through catastrophe, but decline through drift, and drift is often the most dangerous form of all.
Yet even as government stumbles, British excellence will continue to surface elsewhere. Science, engineering, defence and innovation will push on regardless. Breakthroughs will still emerge from our universities and laboratories. Our Armed Forces will continue to train and deploy with professionalism admired across the world. British industry will keep building, exporting and competing, often in spite of policy rather than because of it. These successes may not always dominate the headlines, but they will underpin the nation’s resilience.
On the right, the political landscape will become more fluid… and more interesting. Reform will continue to make gains, particularly in Wales, Scotland and outer London, drawing support from voters who feel ignored by Labour and betrayed by the establishment. Meanwhile, the Conservatives will begin the slow process of regaining their footing.
A poor showing in the local elections could place renewed pressure on Kemi Badenoch’s leadership. Should that happen, attention would inevitably turn to Robert Jenrick as a potential challenger. Jenrick would represent a serious, credible option, and one more open to pragmatic cooperation with Reform, laying the foundations for a broader realignment of the right rather than endless fratricide.
It would also be a mistake to overlook Ben Habib’s new party, Advance UK. We expect Advance UK to make meaningful gains in 2026, with Habib rapidly becoming a household name. Should Reform drift leftwards, Habib could find himself snapping at Nigel Farage’s heels, offering a clearer, more uncompromising home for small-c conservatives. Crucially, Habib and Jenrick are likely to work constructively together, shaping the contours of a wider conservative revival.
And politics, as ever, has a habit of circling back on itself. Do not rule out a certain blond bombshell returning to the ring. Towards the end of the year, Boris Johnson may yet re-emerge, and if he does, we suspect it will follow a call from across the Atlantic. Trump has never hidden his admiration for BoJo, and in turbulent times, familiar figures are often summoned back to the front line. Elon Musk, too, will take his place back in Trump’s orbit, and the renewed confidence of America’s right will inevitably ripple across the Atlantic.
What is clear is this: the patriotic right in Britain will grow stronger as the year progresses. But Reform and the Conservatives must recognise that neither can win alone. Cooperation is no longer optional. The alternative… a future stitched together by Labour, the Greens and nationalist parties, would mean more drift, more ideology and less Britain.
So yes, the year ahead may feel cold, weary and faintly dreary. But beneath the gloom lies opportunity. Labour’s incompetence is not the end of the story; it is the beginning of a conservative revival rooted in confidence, competence and belief in this country.
2026 may not be the year of transformation, but it will be the year the ground shifts. The year the tide begins to turn. The year the foundations are laid for putting the great back into Great Britain.
So stay strong. Keep the faith. Celebrate the wins, however small they may seem. Britain is still here, still capable, still exceptional.
And better days are coming.
By Claire Bullivant
For last week’s top Great British news stories (22 – 28 December 2025) click here.
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