United Kingdom Labour leader sets battle lines against 'incompetent' PM Boris Johnson

UK Labour leader Keir Starmer sought to move past years of infighting and electoral defeat in a keynote speech Tuesday that included a stinging personal attack on Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

Starmer used his address to the main opposition party's virtual annual conference to distance himself from his left-wing predecessor Jeremy Corbyn, who oversaw December's historic electoral rout.

Labour recorded its worst showing since the 1930s as Johnson's Conservatives won an 80-seat majority in the House of Commons, which they used to take Britain out of the European Union in January this year.

In a live-streamed address from Doncaster, northern England, Starmer said the party must take the blame.

"Never again will Labour go into an election not being trusted on national security, with your job, with your community and with your money," he said.

"That's what being under new leadership means."

Corbyn's left-wing views attracted hundreds of thousands of new members to Labour, which has been out of office since 2010, but he presided over two election defeats.

"It's time to get serious about winning," Starmer said to camera, deprived of a real-life audience because of coronavirus restrictions.

The next election is not due until 2024 and Starmer, a former human rights lawyer and public prosecutor who was elected leader in April, set out no concrete policies.

But he said he would lead according to his values of "decency, fairness, opportunity, compassion and security" -- including national security, an area in which the life-long anti-war campaigner Corbyn lost support.

And he launched a blistering attack on Johnson's own character and elastic approach to the truth in both his political career and his former job as a journalist.

"While Boris Johnson was writing flippant columns about bendy bananas, I was defending victims and prosecuting terrorists," Starmer said, referring to the premier's stories about EU regulations.

"While he was being sacked by a newspaper for making up quotes, I was fighting for justice and the rule of law."

Starmer repeated his accusation that the government was guilty of "serial incompetence" in response to the coronavirus pandemic, which has seen almost 42,000 deaths in Britain -- the worst toll in Europe.

Of Johnson, he said: "He's just not serious. He's just not up to the job."

Opinion polls suggest such attacks are winning public support, with one recent YouGov poll putting Labour and the Tories level for the first time since Johnson took over in July 2019.

Starmer has also halted the exodus of Jewish members sparked by allegations -- strongly denied -- that the fervently pro-Palestinian Corbyn ignored widespread anti-Semitism in the party.

On Tuesday he paid tribute to Jewish former MP Ruth Smeeth, who spoke out about the abuse she received, after she introduced his speech.

Her seat in the central English city of Stoke-on-Trent was one of a string of former Labour strongholds that fell to the Tories in December, and which Starmer must win back to take power.

Many voters were wooed by Johnson's promise to end years of political arguments over how to implement the 2016 referendum vote to Brexit -- and put off by Labour's own muddled policy on the issue.

Starmer urged them to "take another look" at his party and despite his own opposition to Brexit, declared the debate "over".

But he demanded Johnson deliver on his promise to get a post-Brexit trade deal with the EU, amid fears that the current deadlock in talks will lead to huge economic disruption.

"If that happens, he'll have nobody to blame but himself," Starmer said, adding: "We want to get this deal done."

In the absence of any clear policies, many Corbyn supporters are still wary of Starmer's leadership.

But the Tories rejected his attempt at a re-brand, saying the years Starmer spent in Corbyn's top team showed he was "just more of the same old Labour".