Before the election, Keir Starmer was optimistically sold to the public as “Blair without the flair.” A moniker he likely welcomed, given Blair’s historic landslide and decade-long premiership. Though while Starmer certainly lacks the flair, he’s also proving he’s no Blair either…
Guido happened upon an intriguing nugget from Charles Moore in The Telegraph, recounting a moment when David Blunkett, then shadow education secretary, briefed a paper about Labour’s plan to slap VAT on private school fees. According to Alastair Campbell’s diaries at the turn of 1994-5, Blair went “berserk”:
“Are you telling me,” said Tony, “that one of our own people has done an interview and… we are going into the New Year with a story about Labour taxing people to educate their children?…Do we care about what a few activists think, or do we care about what millions of people think? Will we ever get serious?”
Fast forward to today, and Blair’s words might as well be aimed directly at his successor. Moore gathers Blair has “strong views on the matter,” while Blair says he speaks to Starmer “frequently”. Meanwhile, a source close to Blair recently offered a scathing summary of Starmer’s government: “a bunch of librarians and academics in charge of a government.” Blair could remind Keir this isn’t the “modernisation” people voted for…
Paula Barker, Liverpool Wavertree MP backing Andy Burnham, told Times Radio there wouldn’t be trouble from the markets under Burnham:
“The markets will have to fall in line.”