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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Sam Jones in Madrid

Spain’s socialist leader has defied expectations. Are there lessons for Starmer?

Sánchez and Starmer shake hands. The pair are flanked by Spain and UK flags
Pedro Sánchez and Keir Starmer at a summit in Oxford in July. Sánchez is known as the great survivor of Spanish politics. Photograph: Chris Ratcliffe/EPA

As Labour’s electoral honeymoon slips into distant-memory territory and Keir Starmer attempts to reboot his premiership, the party and its leader might find a southward glance instructive.

For the past six years, the Spanish Socialist Workers’ party (PSOE), led by the prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has defied expectations by remaining in power during some of the most turbulent times in recent Spanish and European history, making it a rare bulwark of social democracy in an increasingly right-leaning continent.

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