In the day job, I’ve tried to get the measure of most party leaders and prime ministers since the Eighties. There was one so dull that I nodded off in an upright position over lunch. Mostly I’ve had an idea of what makes them tick: Tony Blair and Margaret Thatcher wanted to remake the UK in their own contrasting images; David Cameron and Boris Johnson were convinced of their entitlement to lead; Rishi Sunak saw government as a technocratic challenge; John Major and Theresa May were decent and proper; Gordon Brown had moral purpose.
Sir Keir Starmer, whom I ought to know the best — fellow north London Gooner, friend of friends — eludes me. I’ve spoken to him on and off the record many times since he became an MP in 2015. And although I can describe some of his important characteristics — he’s ruthless, tough, prone to being ponderous in decision-making, methodical — I can’t tell you why he was so determined to be Prime Minister.
