Bluestocking Special: What Does Keir Starmer Believe?
My favourite political nerds answer the biggest question in British politics.
Happy Friday!
Programming note: this is a special edition about British leftwing politics. You’re welcome! Or: I’m sorry.
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Helen
Here are three strong data points in favour of Keir Starmer being the next British prime minister. One: the polls, duh. Two: the number of Tory MPs who are stepping down at the next election (43 and counting). Three: the ever-more obvious disrespect with which the Conservatives are being treated, such as ITV’s decision to broadcast Gillian Keegan’s hot mic moment.
With that in mind, now is a very good time to take stock of Labour. The party is utterly transformed since Keir Starmer became leader in Spring 2020. Then, he ran on 10 pledges, which included higher tax rates on the top 5% of earners; ending the benefit sanctions regime; promoting “peace and human rights”; public ownership of utilities; and defending migrant rights. I went to one of his campaign events and the impression that you got was that with Starmer, you were voting for Corbynism plus competence and minus anti-semitism. He also made a big deal of his time as shadow Brexit secretary, opposing Theresa May’s deal.
Very little of that early agenda remains. Jeremy Corbyn is suspended from the party, as is his closest parliamentary ally Diane Abbott. The hard left has been blocked from selection as MPs or mayoral candidates. Successive shadow cabinet reshuffles have tilted towards the “Blairite” (for once, this word is being used literally: Pat McFadden, now the national campaign co-ordinator, was Blair’s political secretary). The man who ran Liz Kendall’s campaign in 2015, Morgan McSweeney, is one of Starmer’s most powerful advisers. On welfare, Starmer is now in favour of the two-child benefit cap—a policy where, in a phrase coined by my colleague Adam Serwer, the cruelty is the point. On migration, Starmer has ruled out a return to free movement. On the economy, he claims that everything that needs to be fixed in Britain can be done through growth, and even told the Telegraph in June that he didn’t want to increase the top rate of tax: “In principle, I want lower taxation. We’re not looking to the lever of taxation, we’re looking to the lever of growth.” He just abolished the pointless but symbolic Corbyn-era role of Shadow Minister for Peace and Disarmament.
I’ve written before about how Starmer’s defining quality is his unshowy ruthlessness; something which was again on display with his demotion of former leadership rival Lisa Nandy in the reshuffle. Clearly, he has “got the barnacles off the boat”—ditched any policy he thinks could cost him the next election. But what is Starmerism? And which policies does he genuinely believe will help Britain—the ones that he advocated in 2020, or the ones he is advocating now?
In other words: would the real Keir Starmer please stand up?
Starmer’s wholesale overhaul of Corbyn-era policies, and Corbyn-era dysfunction, is one of the most interesting—and, if you agree with it, impressive—feats of British political management in my lifetime. Do others think the same? I decided to open the debate to a dozen commentators who are in no way a representative sample of anything other than “people I find interesting who will answer my emails.” (For a full-throttle Corbynite take on the iniquities of Starmer, Owen Jones is your man.) My four questions were:
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election? (Confidently predict this one will split 50/50 between “build more houses” and smartarse jokes).
Their answers are below. Enjoy!
Alex Massie: The Labour party is like France
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
Starmer believes in winning and all else is, for the time being, secondary to that essential consideration. What is the point of a Labour party that never gets to govern? A serious Labour party meets the electorate on the latter's terms, not its own.
I doubt that Starmer is an especially original thinker but, in 2023, that is not really a problem. He is unusual, these days, for having had a lengthy and successful and serious career before entering parliament. If you look at his legal career, you see a campaigning lawyer happy to take on unpopular or unfashionable causes AND a prosecutor whose decisions must be made on the basis of the best evidence available at the time in pursuit of what is possible, not necessarily what is ideal. That feels like a useful guide to Starmerism: tempered idealism. (There is a ruthlessness too, of course, as evidenced by his treatment of Jeremy Corbyn and there is ego too, as demonstrated by his better-to-be-inside-the-tent willingness to serve Corbyn during Labour's most recent wilderness years.)
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
Wes Streeting and Angela Rayner are the most interesting and, in their respective ways, perhaps also the most impressive people around Starmer. [Streeting is at health and Rayner is deputy leader and shadow secretary for levelling up.] Each has the magic quality of authenticity which in turn licences reasonable and good faith disagreement which consequently helps foster a kind of credibility upon which governments depend for much of their legitimacy.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
The Labour party is like France. It knows only two forms of being: anarchy or absolutism. In such circumstances, running the party like an autocrat is a feature not a bug and, indeed, a necessary condition for getting to Downing Street. Left to itself, Labour would cheerfully sabotage its own prospects, this being eternally and psychologically satisfying.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
Don’t just do something, sit there. A policy of masterly inactivity has much to commend it. Labour will disappoint in government because that's what all governments do. There is no need to advertise the terms of that disappointment right now.
Alex Massie is a Times columnist and author of the Substack, The Debatable Land.
Ayesha Hazarika: His relationships with former leaders are fascinating
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
Cue X Factor montage… but he’s been on a journey. I think he started off as pretty left-wing—he has a history of campaigning in that tradition—but his time in the Crown Prosecution Service cooled his political passions as he was a public servant. This means that he hasn’t spent decades in one particular faction steeped in a specific strain of Labour ideology. Coming into politics later in life as an ambitious “name” means he is now a ruthless pragmatist. He was determined to do whatever he had to to rise within the party which he did and he is now determined to do the same to win power.
I think he it’s a mistake to say that he is not political—the polls suggest he’s very good at politics, but he’s clearly not a creature of any one faction. His guiding light is not philosophical, it’s an ambition to make history and get Labour into power. It will be fascinating to see how his politics really play out in office if he wins.
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
I find his relationships with former Labour leaders fascinating. He uses them very effectively. He served Corbyn when he needed to establish himself in the party, before then wisely distancing himself from him over anti-semitism. He has kept Ed Miliband close (despite grumbling) and has allowed him to do a lot of useful heavy lifting on climate policy which has kept him reasonably happy. He tasked Gordon Brown with pulling together chunky proposals for constitutional reform and devolution. And of course he’s had a blossoming bromance with Tony Blair, who recently anointed him when they appeared for the first time together in public.
This is smart, as former leaders can be incredibly difficult to manage. But he has found them roles, showing he’s a good people manager. Clearly [former chief of staff, now campaign co-ordinator] Morgan McSweeney is a crucial figure within his team of advisers.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
A competent leader. The party had become such a basket-case that it needed to be sorted out and for some organisation, professionalism and discipline to be restored. Labour is at a unique point in recent history where it has a serious shot at power—he can’t afford to take any chances and that means selecting strong candidates who are not going to turn out to be a national embarrassment down the track or blow things up in the media. He also has to have the confidence to mould the party in the way he sees fit in order to win. He has to prioritise persuading and winning over the public more than the feelings of internal Labour activists no matter how tough that feels.
That is necessary to win, but it does mean that internal goodwill could be in short supply down the track.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
He has to do more than offer philosophical diagnosis about the condition of Britain (f***ed) and offer some actual prescription about he would fix things, but with some honesty. The public don’t expect or believe that a Labour government could wave a magic wand and fix everything overnight, but they want to see some practical, achievable offers which pass the smell test. People are desperate for change but they want to have a sense of what that will look like other than, “trust us—we’re just nicer, fundamentally better people than the other lot.”
He needs some more tangible material, like his announcements on planning reform which were praised for being radical and achievable.
Ayesha Hazarika is an Evening Standard columnist and a former Labour adviser.
Patrick Maguire: He is the politician New Labour built
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
Nowhere. And that’s what makes him so fascinating, frustrating and confounding to cover. Another way to ask this question is to ask which faction Starmer belongs— none of them. He arrived as a political clean skin, fully formed and ready for junior ministry in a Miliband government only to then serve under Corbyn for a bit, resign, and then serve for longer. So chalk him up as the mushy middle of the PLP: Labourist by disposition and disinclined to think too deeply about questions of internal politics.
That’s one answer. The other is that he is the politician New Labour built, his understanding of power shaped by the long legal and legislative struggle to codify human rights in the British constitution and to reform institutions in Northern Ireland to progressive ends. Sorry to quote myself but here's how I put it in The Times in March: ‘It is a politics of windowless conference rooms and ringbinders full of exacting recommendations on things like bespoke training courses for public sector employees. It is a politics of bureaucratic fixes and committees and annual reports.’ Only possible under New Labour, really.
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
It has to be Morgan McSweeney. What possesses a Corkman to reshape Britain’s Labour Party in his own image? Nothing about it makes sense and yet this is his project to a greater extent than Starmer’s. That’s the story.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
During coalition negotiations in 2010, William Hague told the Liberal Democrats that the Conservative Party was “an absolute monarchy tempered by regicide”. I tend to think of Keir Starmer’s Labour Party like that. Only he is the regicide and he has an office full of kings of varying abilities.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
Learn how to talk about football as if he hasn't had the concept explained to him in a one-pager written by ChatGPT.
Patrick Maguire is a Times columnist and presents a show on Times Radio. Follow him on Twitter.
Laura McInerney: A management agenda, not a grand narrative
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
Starmer seems to have a deep-seated belief in justice, hence his career, and that sense of justice is about protecting the little guys from the big guys, and trying to make the world fairer by evening up power imbalances.
If you believe this, Labour is a fairly natural home. Unions are an organisational form of this sort of justice. So are many famous Labour policies: the minimum wage, equal pay, expanding university access.
This should all add up to a personal politics that’s quite rousing, but I also think he’s got a technocrat sense of the world. He’s run big organisations. He’s quietly nudged cases forward over decades. Hence he seems happier thinking about politics as a quarterly management agenda rather than a grand narrative, which consequently dulls what is, I think, his fairly emotional link to the party and what it stands for.
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
Peter Hyman is a Senior Advisor to Starmer (according to his Twitter). A former Blair advisor, Hyman trained to become a teacher and eventually went on to build and lead a fairly radical school in East London focused on oracy and hands-on projects. This might explain why the word ‘oracy’ was mentioned five times in Labour’s recent education policy document.
Unfortunately, Hyman’s old school isn’t doing that well—its recent school inspection labelled it as requiring improvement—which calls into question whether its sensible for Labour to stake much of its education manifesto on emulating it.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
Given the situation Starmer inherited, he seems to have managed to get things on track quite well, if with a somewhat heavy-handed set of moves at times. Can you be an autocratic competent leader? I think that’s maybe what he’s been.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
Top thing would be committing more money for schools, but on the basis they’re not going to do that my close second is…
Get a slicker media operation going. I know Labour has fewer resources, and the social media agenda moves quickly and blah…
But New Labour’s strategy of swift rebuttals, clear lines to take, and planning how to take space in the media was legendary for a reason. There seems to be a reluctance to write down “lines to take” these days in case they get leaked. Good! More people will see them!
Likewise, hit back sometimes at PMQs when called Captain Hindsight, or the PM makes stupid comments about New Labour. Don’t just hide behind tweets throwing shade on Rishi, be man enough to say it to his face!
Essentially: more conviction, please.
Laura McInerney is a former editor of Schools Week and co-founder of TeacherTapp, a daily survey app for teachers.
Rafael Behr: A casing of cold steel around soft-left romanticism
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
The first thing to say is that Starmer isn’t a Blairite, at least not in the sense of that word most commonly and pejoratively used by his Labour critics. There is a perception on the Corbynite left that the 2020 leadership contest was an elaborate fraud; that Starmer pretended to be a continuity candidate but was, in fact, a sleeper agent for the New Labour revanche. The reality is more complicated. It’s important to remember how little machine politics Starmer had done before he reached the shadow cabinet under Corbyn, which meant that he wasn’t the product of any particular faction. His politics in 2020 were, I think, fairly typical of a middle-aged London professional; a former radical left teenager who has grown out of militancy— nebulously romantic soft left. But he also has a fierce, ruthless ambition, and that casing of cold steel condensed the misty pinkish nebula into a hard rain of pragmatism. He intends to be prime minister and if it becomes clear that certain policies and certain people are obstructions that mission, he closes them down.
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
Among the advisors, Morgan McSweeney, Starmer’s campaign director, is key, precisely because he brings the experience and intuitive judgement of a seasoned political-machine operator that Starmer lacks. He has helped reshape the party around the leader with a relative minimum of drama. It may not feel that way for the people who have been excluded and it hasn’t been painless, but it is worth considering how messy and self-destructive the thorough re-capture of Labour’s apparatus could have been. It has been decried as a “purge”, but the remarkable thing is actually how bloodless it has been.
In the recent shadow cabinet reshuffle, the key appointment is Pat McFadden—promoted to shadow the cabinet office brief alongside a role as national campaign coordinator. Unlike Starmer, he literally is a Blairite of Nineties vintage; a disciple of the school of What Works with a strategic intelligence that, coupled with a veteran’s experience, doesn’t get distracted by daily Westminster guff.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
Competent leader. When rebuilding from an election drubbing, if people aren’t reeling from the ruthlessness of your operation, you’re doing it wrong. (Although that doesn’t mean he isn’t storing up a world of future pain by snuffing out dissent now. He is, but that might be the necessary price of victory.)
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
I wish he would lean into at least one of the hard issues that the Tories think are Labour weaknesses. I understand the merit in making yourself a small target, but it’s hard to inspire people from a defensive crouch. He needs to win an argument and demonstrate that the terms of debate are shifting under the Tories’ feet. It hardly even matters which topic he chooses. It could be the the two-child benefits cap, air pollution, Europe, wealth taxes … something that demonstrates a capacity to upend the conventional view that politics is a Tory stadium and Labour must always, always be playing as the away team. (To his credit, he is kind of doing this with housebuilding but it’s still got too much of a flinch about it.)
Starmer’s biggest flaw is probably a lack of spontaneous fluency that feeds a conspicuous distaste for the performance side of campaigning (which seems odd, given his background as a barrister). That breeds caution, which limits agility and means he never seems to make the weather, which is one of the most indefinable political skills—impossible to explain how it works but you know it when you see it.
Rafael Behr is a Guardian political columnist and leader writer; host of the Politics on the Couch podcast; and author of Politics: A Survivor's Guide.
Sam Freedman: The macho anonymous briefing is unwise
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
I have no idea.
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
I’m fascinated by how the Sue Gray appointment [as chief of staff, formerly a civil servant who conducted the Partygate inquiry] is going to play out. We’ve never had a chief of staff who had held such a senior role in the civil service for such a long time. She has quite poor relationships with a lot of officials, and also a lot of dirt on a lot of people. I think there’s going to be a lot of intrigue around her once they’re in government.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
Autocrats can be competent! He’s certainly got control of the party at the moment (e.g. barely a peep out of anyone who got demoted in the reshuffle and no angry op-eds about the two child limit despite plenty of MPs being privately dismayed by that.) The bigger test will be once things start going sour in government and opportunities for revenge and agitation offer themselves. Welfare and Europe will be obvious areas for rebellion over the first few years of the Parliament. They’ll need to keep as many people onside for as long as possible which makes some of the more macho anonymous briefing against people like Yvette Cooper and Lisa Nandy seem unwise (as well as obnoxious).
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
There’s lots of things I’d like him to say that he won’t say (“we’ll stop obsessing about fiscal rules”; “we’ll reform the benefits system so it’s about need not arbitrary caps invented by George Osborne for a Sun headline” etc…)
Something he might actually say? How about set out a plan for major infrastructure investment in health and education under the banner of their “green new deal”.
Sam Freedman is a former special adviser to Michael Gove and one half of Comment Is Freed.
Henry Oliver: He is running the party like a Tory
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
Harold Wilson. Essentially he believes in energy and optimism against the Tories who are a bunch of exhausted volcanoes. Rather than being doctrinaire, he wants to get the economy growing. Hence the confusion that he is a Blairite. He lacks the empty glamour and the interventionist foreign policy for that. Wilson was more left-wing but in temperament, dour showmanship, and an emphasis on material progress, combined with good political manoeuvrability, he seems more like Wilson to me. If you want a Tory comparison it's Macmillan: “Quiet calm deliberation disentangles every knot.” (I wrote about this last year.)
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
Ed Miliband. Former leaders don't tend to go back into cabinet roles any more, other than William Hague. This is a sign of Starmer's steel and his ability to promote talent.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
What's the difference? This is Westminster, not a Fabian debating society. The last time the Labour party bent over backwards to make sure all strands of opinion were included they got Corbyn as leader. Starmer got the message and now he’s running the party like a Tory.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
Houses, yes, with a real plan, and other supply side issues like a commitment to science funding, infrastructure approvals, being able to hook up new wind farms to the National Grid in less than seven years... Essentially I want him to come out full-throttle as a supply-side progressive.
Henry Oliver writes The Common Reader and worked for Liz Truss (before she was famous).
James O’Malley: He’s basically the Midjourney output for the prompt “Guardian reader”
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
I think much of the commentary attempting to divine his true essence, based on Labour’s stated policies or his Shadow Cabinet appointments are basically misguided, because both of those things are mediated through a bunch of other concerns, like internal party politics and a desire to appeal to the median voter.
So I think it’s better to take a more ‘fundamentals’ approach, and look at his background and what he has done. That’s why his provocative comments on, for example, Freedom of Movement, seem so wildly inauthentic. Because we know he’s a Remain-voting, former human-rights barrister who lives in Kentish Town. By demographics and background, he’s basically the Midjourney output for the prompt “Guardian reader”.
So though I’d struggle to precisely place him among Labour’s various factions, I think it is true to say that if we could scan his brain, we’d discover that he is significantly further to the left than most British voters. The only reason people on the left thinks that he isn’t is because he actually wants to win the next election and he is optimising his approach for winning seats, not ideological purity.
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
I can’t claim deep knowledge of his inner-circle as I’m not enough of a Westminster insider, but one group I think are really interesting in terms of Starmer politics is the YIMBYs, who are increasingly organised, and it feels like are experiencing a bit of a cultural moment (at least in the commentariat), like how Britpop suddenly became a thing in the 90s. Across the spectrum, everyone agrees we need more housing – and Starmer has already committed to planning reform, making it one of his signature dividing lines. So I’m curious to see whether YIMBY-thinking will further permeate his government, and what ‘rules’ about How Politics Works, like that you can’t touch the green belt, that it might upend.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
Mostly a competent leader. Like everyone, I initially lapsed into lazy pattern recognition and assumed he was a Kinnock rather than a Blair, but he’s surprised me in how ruthless he has been in terms of turning the party around. I think the reason he has upset so many people with his leadership style is that, at least on the left, we have a tendency to want to throw everything to a committee, to find a consensus on an issue, to keep endlessly talking and never actually doing anything. But Starmer is, well, leading.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
If you mean 2024, the one thing is “please don’t fuck it up”. If you mean before 2028, then like everyone else I’m a “build more houses” bore too. But what I’d really like him to do is to lean into the ‘abundance agenda’ in a broader sense. Don’t just build more houses, deliver on the “green growth” pledge and then some – if we can generate a vast green energy surplus, we can use to make energy bills dramatically cheaper, extract carbon from the atmosphere, and grow the economy – without making anyone poorer in the process.
Oh, and of course, he should liberate the Postcode Address File, and untangle what is currently a massive tax on innovation.
James O’Malley writes Odds and Ends of History.
Robert Colvile: His natural space is the Miliband Zone
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
It's tempting to say he doesn't believe in anything, judging by the way he’s thrown out every single pledge he made to win the leadership, apart from the one about making Labour electable. In reality, I think his natural ideological space is the Miliband zone—to the left of Blair and Brown, but far to the right of Corbyn and co. But actually I think there's a more significant parallel with David Cameron—Starmer strikes me as someone who thinks he'd be pretty good at being Prime Minister, and the country would be better off for it, and he'll make his party into whatever it needs to be to deliver that.
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
No surprises here but it’s obviously Rachel Reeves, who is dictating a level of fiscal constraint that I frankly didn’t think the party would be able to put up with. The absolutely huge question for Labour is how she and they resolve the tension between their promises on tax and the many, many demands they'll face for higher spending.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
I'm not sure there's much of a difference! All successful leaders have an element of the autocrat to them - I'm sure he's storing up resentment for the future, but all he has to do is point at Labour's poll ratings to shut people up, at least for now.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
I'd say 'build more houses', because it's my answer to everything, but that's one of the few policy areas where Labour are showing genuine boldness—although they did just sack their housing lead. Maybe learn to tweet about football like he's actually ever seen a game...
Robert Colvile is director of the Centre for Policy Studies and a Sunday Times columnist.
Sonia Sodha: He should come clean about the tough trade-offs ahead
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
I think he believes that Labour needs to be in government, and that means putting pragmatism over idealism and not taking uncalculated risks in the run-up to an election that Labour looks likely to win. In that sense, he’s a worthy heir to Blair, although what that actually means in 2023 looks different to how it looked in 1996. The aspect of his approach that is most symptomatic of this is not his recent shadow cabinet reshuffle, but the tough fiscal rules he and Rachel Reeves have pledged to adopt for the party's first term in government.
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
Rachel Reeves is the most important figure in his orbit, in the same way Gordon Brown was so pivotal to Tony Blair’s leadership when Labour were in opposition (and indeed, in government). As shadow chancellor, Reeves has shaped Labour's economic policy and will have a huge say over what policies do and don’t get signed off in the run up to the election. As chancellor, she will effectively control departmental spending and will therefore act as a gatekeeper for large swathes of government policy.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
Like a competent leader—which inevitably means he is perceived as autocratic by those who don't agree with his approach. The most striking thing about his first couple of years as leader was the way he tackled Jeremy Corbyn's legacy of antisemitism head-on. He's shifted party rules away from grassroots democracy towards giving the leader's office more control. But I don’t think you can necessarily argue this is “anti-democratic” given the party membership is not representative of the country at large, and Labour's first duty as a party is to British voters, not its members.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
I would like him to level more with the public about some of the tough trade-offs we face as a country. For example on health and social care—we have an ageing population and are right to expect better care, but it will cost more: where will the money come from? On housing, improving housing affordability will mean pursuing policies that lead to falling real house prices, which will create losers. It's not 1997— the policy challenges are far more difficult, it is less clear where economic growth is going to come from, and so a Labour government will have to make tougher choices. I think voters know this, and would respect politicians who are a bit more honest about those trade-offs. It’s the opposite of the populism that has defined eurosceptic Conservatism for the last 15 or so years, and I think voters would find it a refreshing change.
Sonia Sodha is a former adviser to Ed Miliband, and now an Observer columnist and chief leader writer.
Ian Leslie: He has a couple of superpowers
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
I think his driving belief is that working class/lower class people deserve respect and a decent life, and they need a competent and effective Labour Party fighting for them. Simple as that. I don't think he is deeply embedded in the Labour tradition, in an institutional or intellectual way, and I don't think he is very preoccupied by ideas. People say he's copying Blair and to some extent that's right but that's because Blair did the basic stuff that any Labour leader needs to do to win power, so in that sense any viable Labour leader will resemble Blair. But Blair was much more interested and invested in the intellectual debate within the left and beyond, and in his idiosyncratic way, more of an ideologue, or at least more of a passionate 'ideas' politician. Starmer resembles the kind of pragmatic, patriotic soft left type which you can trace back to Attlee. Let's show we're ready for office, let's beat the Tories, let's govern competently, let's not mess about.
Although he's not a flamboyantly talented politician, he has a couple of superpowers. First, his ability to focus, absolutely and relentlessly, on winning. He's just the most incredibly competitive guy, there is nothing he won't do to meet that overriding goal. He'll change his opinions, jettison policies, throw people over, work on his image, and even change his personality. That level of focus, the intensity of it, is unusual. The second one is endurance. He has an exceptional ability to soak up setbacks, drudgery, pain, failure, and just keep going, and going, and going.
I don't really agree with the 'needs a vision' thing when it comes to winning the election. I don't think the country is in the mood for visions, they want good government. I think he's going to win big and that's not just down to Tory weakness. But I do worry slightly that his lack of passion for ideas and policies is going to hurt his ability to govern. To succeed in government, you have to be focused on getting a few big things done, you have to really, really want to do them, and you have to send very clear signals to the whole government about where you want to go. He's got to be as relentless about policy and delivery as he is about winning the next election (because that's how you win the election after).
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit—Or the one you find most interesting?
The most important figure in his orbit is now Rachel Reeves, without question. As far as I can tell they have a very strong relationship—he listens to her, and they share that relentless focus on getting into power, doing whatever it takes. They are almost co-equals. But unlike Gordon and Tony there isn't a fundamental political or personal tension. RR's dream job has always been running the Treasury. I wouldn't say she'd never run for leader but she's never given any sign of wanting it. So they absolutely trust each other. The question is, do you need some creative tension to be a successful partnership? Did you know I'm writing a book about Lennon and McCartney? In terms of non-politician figures in his orbit I'm interested to see how Sue Gray works out. She hasn't worked in politics, and although she knows the inner workings of the Westminster machine intimately, she's never run a department—she's never actually been responsible for delivery. So in practice she may struggle to define a role for herself.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
Well, both. Are there any examples of a leader failing because they had too much control over their party? I tend to think a Labour leader isn't electorally viable until Neal Lawson starts moaning about how they're autocratic.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
I'm satisfied he's done enough to be in position to win and win big. I'm more worried about governing, and it's hard to tell how ready he is/they are from the outside. The first three months, before the parliamentary arteries clog up, will be crucial; speed and dynamism are of the essence. So if he wants to get any of the politically difficult stuff done on supply-side reform (houses, energy, childcare) he's got to have a very detailed plan of executive and legislative action in place by election time. I don't know if that counts as one thing.
Ian Leslie writes The Ruffian, and is the author of CURIOUS and CONFLICTED.
Harry Lambert: He’s the opposite of Dominic Cummings
1. What does Keir Starmer believe? Where would you situate his personal politics in the Labour tradition?
He believes in winning and he sees only one playbook for doing so: Blair’s. That’s reasonable given the last Labour leader to win an election before Blair won 49 years ago. Keir was 12. I think his personal politics are defined by orderliness: he is an official masquerading as a politician and I think any government he leads will be in thrall to officialdom (he has picked pliant ministers). Whatever [Dominic] Cummings was, he’s the opposite.
2. Who is the most important figure in his orbit---Or the one you find most interesting?
Sue Gray, his Jonathan Powell, will become the most important figure in government. For now Morgan McSweeney—a more powerful Philip Gould (do I have to think by analogy?)—remains the central character. He’s defining the party’s strategy and caution. That caution is, I fear, going to leave Labour governing in chains, but I don’t think McSweeney or Gray will mind that: the range of things they want to do is narrow.
3. Is Starmer running the party like an autocrat, or a competent leader?
He is running it like an autocrat, which is quite a competent way of running a party if you can get away with it. He is unusually powerful. Attlee and Wilson both governed a team of rivals, harnessing the talents of others arguably more impressive than them. Blair was counter-balanced by Brown. But Keir is preeminent. There is no tension yet with Reeves. Cutting off rivals does come at a cost—Nandy is better on air than most.
4. What one thing would you like to see him do before the next election?
Lay the ground for tax rises on wealth by making the argument for them in general terms, namely: you can’t level up the country unless you reform council tax; we should not give tax breaks to the buy-to-let landlord or stock market trader; by equalising the tax burden we could cut the basic rate of income tax. Reeves has done the opposite - somebody shoot me.
Harry Lambert is special correspondent at the New Statesman
Sam Bowman: He needs a “big bang” on housing
I don't think I can answer the first three—I'm not even very good at answering things like this about Tories or Lib Dems, let alone Labour.
On point 4, if you mean before the election when he presumably becomes PM, ideally I'd like him to prepare, before reaching office, a planning reform bill that is ready to be brought to Parliament on the first day that it resumes normal business after the election. This should focus on (a) making it easier to build houses on greenfield, especially around existing infrastructure (eg, the areas around Metropolitan Line and Elizabeth Line tube stations), (b) intensify development on existing build-on areas; and (c) making it easier to build infrastructure, reducing the amount of consultations and environmental assessments etc around things like reservoirs, energy supply infrastructure, roads and railways.
This is a "big bang" approach, and will spend political capital. I don’t have a good sense of whether he intends to do something like this: he’s certainly said a lot of good things on housing and planning, but I don't know whether he's doing it because he believes this makes him popular, or if he believes it is politically costly, but worth doing to build up political capital to do radical stuff when he gets into power. He will likely end up with a lot of backbenchers who are resistant to doing much planning reform because they represent suburban, NIMBY-ish constituencies, and it would be easier to tie their hands by getting them elected on a platform of reform. Getting all this done early is doubly valuable, because the extra economic activity that would result (eg, more houses being built) would increase growth and tax revenues during the rest of his government.
In any case, I'd advise him / his team to familiarise themselves with past attempts to reform the planning system in the UK, and not put too much stock in ideas like New Towns or mega-quangos that can supposedly impose lots of housing on places that don't want it. If he's not prepared to spend a lot of political capital on major reform, then I'd probably aim to use opt-ins or opt-outs to enable upzoning in built-on areas (following, for example, Houston's model of city-wide upzoning that smaller blocks can opt out of, retaining their old lower density rules, if they vote to do so).
Sam Bowman is editor of Works in Progress, and former executive director of the Adam Smith Institute.
So there you have it. Perhaps the next edition can ask “What does Morgan McSweeney believe” since he appears to be Starmerism’s Philip Gould. And just to note, I asked for these responses before Rishi Sunak’s “net zero? I never even met her” speech.
Thoughts? Comments? Want to write a poem about Keir Starmer like people used to do about Corbyn? Just hit ‘reply’. Normal service resumes next week.
I’m a huge fan of Sonia but boy is she wrong about what Keir should do
There is no need for him to talk about the tough decisions until he’s in power, I lived through the 2019 Australian election once already, I don’t need to do it again
This is fascinating and really worth doing. Thank you Helen. Interesting how much agreement there is among them, especially on housing as number one.