Keir Starmer: Labour leader hoping for keys to Downing Street (2024)

In many ways, Sir Keir Starmer is not your typical politician.

He did not enter Parliament until he was in his 50s, after a successful career as a lawyer, and unlike most MPs he arrived in the House of Commons with a knighthood.

He was knighted in 2014, in recognition for his role as Director of Public Prosecutions, the most senior criminal prosecutor in England and Wales.

The Labour leader's background as a high-flying human rights lawyer might suggest a privileged upbringing. But in fact the 61-year-old - whose dad was a toolmaker and mum was a nurse - comes from a relatively modest background. He rarely misses an opportunity to describe himself as being from a "working class background".

Now, with his party riding high in the opinion polls, he is hoping to return Labour to power after 14 years in opposition.

One of four children, Sir Keir grew up in Oxted, Surrey.

His parents were staunch Labour supporters and named their son after the party's first MP, Keir Hardie.

After passing the 11-plus exam, he got a place at Reigate Grammar School, which became a private school two years later, although existing pupils, like Starmer, had their fees paid by the local council until they were 16.

He was politically active from an early age, joining the East Surrey Young Socialists, the youth branch of the local Labour Party, at the age of 16.

He also excelled at music, playing the flute, piano, violin and recorder and even sharing lessons with Norman Cook, who would become known as chart-topping DJ Fatboy Slim.

However, there were also challenges - his mum suffered from Still's disease, a rare autoimmune condition which eventually left her unable to speak or walk.

In interviews, Sir Keir has recalled how she spent much of his childhood in and out of hospital as her health deteriorated.

He wasn't as close to his father, who he has described as "a difficult man" who could be remote, although he said he was "devoted" to his wife and "incredibly hard-working".

The first in his family to go to university, the young activist had considered studying politics but was encouraged by his parents to go for law.

As a politician, Sir Keir likes to portray himself as a stickler for the rules - indeed he was once dubbed "Mr Rules" by a shadow cabinet colleague.

He has sometimes been accused by opponents of being a bit dull. He unwinds by playing five-a-side football and supporting Arsenal.

But he has not led a blemish-free life, and there is at least one brush with the law in his past.

Trying to raise money during a lads' holiday to the French Riviera as a student in the early 1980s, he was caught by police illegally selling ice creams.

Keir Starmer: At a glance

He graduated with a first from the University of Leeds in 1985, before getting his post-graduate qualification at Oxford the following year and going on to become a barrister, focusing on human rights law.

In his early years in London he recalled living in "a really grotty flat" above a brothel. One of his flatmates at the time, journalist Paul Vickers, described him as a "great party animal", who loved Northern Soul music.

He tends not to give much away about his personality in interviews, but is happy to own up to having a competitive streak.

He recently told The Guardian: "I hate losing. Some say it's the taking part that counts. I am not in that camp."

Sir Keir's commitment to tackling injustice extended to his legal career, which included working to get rid of the death penalty in the Caribbean and Africa.

He was also part of the legal team in the so-called McLibel case, offering his services for free to help defend activists who were pursued by McDonald's for distributing leaflets questioning the fast food giant's environmental claims.

His work on high-profile human rights cases even sparked rumours he was the inspiration behind Mark Darcy, the buttoned-up but dashing lawyer in Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones's Diary novels, although the author later quashed this suggestion.

Sir Keir married his wife, Victoria Alexander, who works for the NHS, in 2007 and the couple have two children.

In 2008 he was named the new head of the Crown Prosecution Service and Director of Public Prosecutions, despite spending most of his career as a defence barrister.

He dealt with a number of major cases including helping to bring two men accused of murdering 18-year-old Stephen Lawrence to justice during his time in the role.

He stood down in 2013 and was knighted the following year.

Sir Keir was elected for MP for Holborn and St Pancras in 2015, a safe seat in Labour's North London stronghold, soon becoming a shadow Home Office minister.

He quit the role in 2016, joining a number of frontbenchers who resigned in protest at Jeremy Corbyn's leadership following the Brexit referendum.

However, unlike many of his colleagues, Sir Keir agreed to rejoin Mr Corbyn's top team just over three months later, as shadow Brexit secretary - and stayed on even when the leadership faced criticism over how it dealt with allegations of antisemitism.

In that job he had the tricky task of navigating Labour's position on the European Union during the withdrawal negotiations with the bloc.

The Remain-supporting MP said publicly that another referendum should remain an option, and that if it happened, he would campaign to stay in the EU.

Some believe he was the driving force behind Labour's change in position ahead of the 2019 election, promising a second vote.

Critics argued this policy was partly responsible for the party's disastrous electoral performance, after which Mr Corbyn announced he would stand down as leader.

Sir Keir was a frontrunner in the race to replace him, promising to unite the party but retain the "radicalism" of the Corbyn years.

Becoming leader in April 2020 - at the start of the first Covid lockdown - Sir Keir pledged to bring "a constructive opposition", working alongside the government to get the country through the pandemic.

However, unable to tour the country and meet voters - he first speech as leader was a video message - and with the news agenda dominated by Covid, he struggled to make an impression.

In May 2021, Labour lost Hartlepool to the Tories in a humiliating by-election defeat.

The result was so bad that - according to a biography of the Labour leader - Sir Keir told his staff he was going to resign.

A former Starmer aide told author Tom Baldwin: "Keir kept saying that he felt he would have to go, that the result showed the party was going backwards and he saw it as a personal rejection.

"I told him it was far too soon for that kind of thing, but it was a rocky few hours."

In the end, Sir Keir didn't quit but the result did prompt a policy rethink and a reshuffle of his top team. The focus was now firmly on winning back Labour voters lost to Boris Johnson's Conservatives in former Labour heartlands - the so-called Red Wall.

Talk of Brexit was discouraged and Sir Keir began dropping left-wing pledges he had made during the leadership campaign, including abolishing university tuition fees and nationalising energy and water companies.

He hit back at claims of betrayal from the left, by arguing that the party couldn't make unfunded spending commitments in the current economic climate and that Labour had to regain the trust of voters on the economy.

Winning back the support of the Jewish community was a key early priority for Sir Keir.

He suspended Jeremy Corbyn from the parliamentary party, in a row over antisemitism, meaning his predecessor and North London constituency neighbour, cannot stand as a Labour candidate at the next general election.

Like Sir Tony, who won three general elections, he has sought to reassure voters that Labour would not go on an unfunded spending spree if the party wins power, which has meant watering down or scrapping some of their more radical proposals.

In February, he ditched one of his biggest spending commitments - a pledge to spend £28bn a year on green policies.

With a general election due on 4 July, he will be hoping that deliberate positioning will help his party win power again, four years after suffering its worst result since the 1930s.