‘Starmer’s speech gets aspiration but redefines it – it’s election-winning stuff’

There was a lot to be said about Keir Starmer’s Opportunity Mission speech yesterday. It was powerfully delivered (in a way that some would have said was impossible a few years ago) and it hit many of the right notes when it came to education policy.

The decision to focus on “oracy” was excellent, as was doubling down on Labour’s commitment to quality (not just volume) in the early years. I was also pleased to see a determination to retain more teachers in the teaching profession and drive up standards of vocational education.

But – and this might sound odd coming from a Labour member – I was most heartened for Labour’s electoral prospects when on the train to Gillingham I read the comment article that had been placed in the Sun that morning in Keir’s name.

Understanding aspiration

I spend a lot of my professional life in focus groups talking to middle class, lower middle class and working class voters in key constituencies, and in this red top piece I found much of the language and framing we need to see from the Labour leadership if the likes of Blyth, Bury and Doncaster are to come back to the fold.

Forgive me quoting quite a lengthy passage from the article:

“My parents — Mum a nurse, Dad a toolmaker — instilled in me the belief that hard work and imagination would be rewarded in Britain. That, even in tough times, things would get better.

“As a country, we badly need to restore the sense that a better future lies ahead of us. That starts with another crucial commodity: Respect.

“For too long, people have seen their towns ignored. Their views condemned.

“Too few opportunities in too few places. Too little reward for hard work. Too much talent going wasted.

“The pride and ambition that people have in their families, their communities and their country has simply not been matched by those in power. This matters.”

Much of this framing was also present in the speech in Kent, but here it was, distilled down to its purest tabloid form.

As I say, there’s a lot to like if you want to see a Labour government returned.

Optimism that a better future is possible

There’s a Blairite reference to optimism in that a better future is possible, of course. No bad thing. But mainly this is passage that recognises that for very many communities, hope has long since evaporated. In the language of Boris and Brexit, they have been left behind.

There is a version of the Labour movement that always felt uncomfortable with the individualism of the idea of “social mobility” – and I am sure this discomfort is present here.

Starmer – I hope – is beginning to articulate an interesting political idea, one that was close to dead under Thatcher and (to some extent) under Blair: that aspiration should not just be about individuals, but also about the streets, suburbs and town in which they grow up too.

Pleasingly, this framing was to be found in the ‘opportunity’ speech too. Take this passage:

“It’s about community as well. For a long time now, too many people have had to leave theirs to find success, had to get out, to get on.

“When talented young people start to leave a town, it becomes hard to break free from that dynamic. It’s a vicious cycle, it leads to communities – far too many in this country – where the only jobs on offer are low paid and insecure.”

Families and communities building their own pathways to success

Later, Starmer talked about ensuring the provision of “gold-standard apprenticeships”. Believe me when I say if there is one education policy that key voters want from Labour at the next election it is this, not free university places. “Gold-standard apprenticeships” represent families and communities building their own pathways to success, not heading off to London or Bristol or Newcastle, never to return.

This is absolutely and profoundly clear.

Yesterday was a good day. Yesterday, Keir Starmer told a story about communities with aspiration for their own futures, with their own agency. This is what voters want to hear.

More please. And repeat. This is election-winning stuff.