SIR KEIR STARMER is facing a possible Labour rebuke over his deeply unpopular plans to cut winter fuel benefits for pensioners.

The party’s largest affiliate, Unite, will try to force a vote on the issue at Labour’s conference, which opens in Liverpool on Sunday.

Unite’s motion also calls for the scrapping of the Treasury’s fiscal rules, which have placed the new government’s spending plans in a strait-jacket.

It urges Labour to borrow more to invest in public services and infrastructure and says that “workers and communities voted for change — a better future, not just better management and not cuts to the winter fuel allowance.”

Calling for a U-turn on the winter fuel cut, the motion added: “We need a vision where pensioners are not the first to face a new wave of cuts and those that profited from decades of deregulation finally help to rebuild Britain.”

The attitude of other affiliated unions will be critical to the success of the motion, which will have to leap procedural hurdles to be debated, something submissions from large unions usually accomplish.

Labour officialdom have, however, ruled out a conference motion demanding a “humane immigration policy” on procedural grounds.

The Rushcliffe local party wanted to commit Labour to safe and legal routes for asylum-seekers, as well as a range of rights from day one. 

However, the conference arrangements committee advised that since the motion covered more than one subject it could not be considered by conference but would be referred to the party’s National Policy Forum instead. The decision is being appealed.

Meanwhile Starmer received a modest boost in yesterday’s national executive committee (NEC) elections, with Labour’s right securing an additional seat.

Long-standing left member Mish Rahman lost his seat in the constituency section, which now has four right-wingers, three from the left and two non-aligned.

This is the first time in two decades that the right has had more constituency NEC representatives than the left, though this is of limited significance given Starmer’s large overall majority on the body.

Left candidates Jess Barnard, Gemma Bolton and Yasmine Dar were re-elected. 

“They will have a key role to play defending real socialist values throughout the party,” Momentum said. 

“However, abysmal turnout in these elections shows the consequences of rolling back members’ rights amid an increasingly reactionary leadership.”

It is believed that only around 12 per cent of Labour’s depleted membership voted.