Keir Starmer

0:03Hello and welcome to Table Runners. I'm Jessie Ware and this is the season finale and we shall go out with a big red bang. Yes, I'm very, very, very excited. Why are you so excited, Mum? Well, there have been two people on my list, my target list to have on our podcast. One is Marcus Rashford, obviously. Which is still waiting for me. And this special person. Christmas has come early for me, Mum. Come very early. End of July. You're cooking for Keir Starmer. Sir Keir Starmer tonight. Sir Keir Starmer. The leader of the opposition. Yeah. Potentially our next Prime Minister. Yeah. What are you cooking?

0:41Well, he doesn't eat meat. How do you feel about that, Mum? Not happy. Will it change your vote? No. OK. I would have done a little steak on the barbecue for him, but he's also coming a bit early, so it's kind of a bit high tea-ish. How do you feel about that? Well, it's high tea for me. It's kind of late dinner for you, because it's five o 'clock, darling. You just got my vote, because he likes eating dinner at five, yeah. Yeah, that's it. So we're going for... Look, it's been a breezy few days. But the sun is shining and you've kind of gone for a bit of an alfresco, Provençal kind of Frenchy situation.

1:20Yeah. So I've made a tomato tart a la Alison Robben. Yeah. I've made my pui lentil salad that you love. So good. I've made courgette salad with mint. Well, in fact, you helped do that. Yeah, easy. Shaved courgette, pecorino, mint, olive oil and lemon. And then I've made also an aubergine and tomato and cucumber salad. So I've roasted the aubergine with olive oil. It's got lemon juice, olive oil. So it's a bit like guacamole, but no avocado. It's guacamole. I think nobody calls it guacamole. Oh, guacamole. Which is actually interesting because the only request that we had that we did not do anything with was avocado.

2:06Yeah. he clearly got the memo about Megan being blamed for avocado shortages all over the world didn't want right-wing media no right-wing media going on the avocado front yeah um do you want to know what I've been up to today yes I did sports had a massage no that is very cool that was very very cool okay I did sports day for two hours I heard you darling you sent me little video clips of you yelling at your daughter to go faster that's what i could words of encouragement and i learned from the best mom no helicopter parenting there i believe that sports day should be taken seriously not the taking part that counts all that crap it's the winning yeah so she was the alcaraz of she was not the alcaraz however she gave it a go and she was adamant that i did the parent race bear in mind I was about a litre of water in because we'd been there for one hour and I did the run yeah and I wet myself oh my god Jessie we don't need to hear this because three children in and a litre of water and not going for a wee yeah I wet myself and I did not win bow out did anybody see dramatically that you'd wet yourself no but I told everybody the teacher didn't have to take you aside and say find a new clean pair of knickers in the cupboard me on the ski slopes yeah No.

3:30OK. Anyway, so that's what I was doing. I'm very interested to know whether Sakia Snama has partaken in the parents' race and whether he's competitive. I have very important questions. Also, I went clubbing at the weekend, and I wonder, last time that Sakia stepped inside a club? These are the vital questions I shall be asking. I think everyone wants to know. We shall be asking him food questions, family questions. Because that's what this is all about. Exactly. We're not Laura Kunzberg and Robert Peston here. Mum, take it away. What, darling? Say who we've got. Sir Keir Starmer, coming up on Table Manners.

4:14Sir Keir Starmer, you're in Clapham, you're about to get fed by Lenny Ware, and we've got so many questions to ask, mostly food-related. Very good. Thank you for being here. No, not at all, thanks for having me. You know, we've had some other MPs on. Yeah, some of your front bench. Who have you had on? Jess Phillips. Oh, yeah, I did know that. And Ed Miliband. Ed came on. Yeah. Fantastic. And can I just tell you, very flirty. Was he? Yeah. Surprisingly, asked me if I'd like to go naked swimming at Hampstead Ponds. Oh, he's obsessed with wild swimming. I didn't realise it was that wild. Well, I didn't time that.

4:53He's tried to sell it to me. It's just sort of good for the soul. I do go naked with him too. Mum, you don't feel so special. He's become so into wild swimming. Oh, no. But, well, wait till I have a word with him. And he had Sadiq? Had Sadiq. Yeah, we've had Sadiq. He gave us the scoops. I'm waiting for your scoop for us, please. Thank you. He said that he was announcing that he was running from there again. So I'm just, we'll wait. We'll give you a few glasses, Kira. We'll see what you've got. He broke your glass tooth. Oh, did he? Okay. Oh, that's really nice. But, Kira, let's start at the beginning.

5:26dinner, around the dinner table who was around the dinner table? Are you a Londoner? Yes, Kentish Town Oh right, proper Londoner So who was cooking your meals when you were a child and who was eating them or not eating them? So when I was growing up I lived out in Surrey on the Surrey-Kent border in a semi-detached pebble-dashed house with my mum and dad and four kids three bedrooms so I shared with my brother and my sister shared with each other so I had the bunk bedroom with my brother. Did you like that? It was very cramped. Where did you, are you the eldest? So I've got an older sister. Right.

6:06I'm then next and then I've got a brother and sister who are 18 months younger who are twins. Oh wow. And so that's where we lived and cooking wise it was, this was a, what I would call a sort of classic working class family. So my dad worked in a factory, he was a toolmaker, my mom was a nurse but um she i don't know whether you know that she had stills disease when she was young when she was 11 which is basically a very aggressive juvenile arthritis and it um can destroy your sort of system and um luckily for her they found something that could treat her at least mitigating and so because the diagnosis at prognosis at 11 was that she wouldn't walk after the age of 20 and she wouldn't be able to have kids so even the fact that I'm here is a sort of miracle down to Guy's Hospital and what they're able to do with her but that meant that in the end it was just my dad working and so it was a very traditional setup mum did all the cooking all the cooking good cook yeah really good but my dad I can't I was thinking about this when I was coming down I can't remember my dad ever cooking anything it was just such a traditional working class set up.

7:20He just didn't cook anything. My mum did everything. And what was a memorable dish that your mum made? Well, when I was growing up, it was British food. Yeah. British food, always, always. Really? So my dad was really sort of rigid frameworked about this. So he wasn't going to be eating pasta or anything like that. Are you kidding? So it was British food. There came a point, it must have been when I was a teenager, I think, where my mum sort of branched out and tried a chicken curry. It was one of these sort of chicken and a bit of curry sauce and some sultanas and a bit of rice. Sounds delicious.

7:58This was really exotic for us because otherwise it was, as you'd expect, sort of sausages, mash, meat, veg. It was that chicken and potatoes or vegetables. It was always that sort of menu. And you don't eat meat now. I don't eat meat now, but then it was classic potato, two veg or something like that. So how did the curry go down in the household? I thought it was great. Did your dad like it? Eventually, yeah. But he wouldn't be adventurous on anything else. So, you know, we didn't try anything else at all when I was growing up. So with your mum's illness, did that make it quite hard for, I mean, having four kids in the house?

8:39Were there times when it was quite debilitating for her that it was obvious for you and you were aware of it? Yeah, it was all of the time, really. She was in incredible pain and struggling all the time. What's interesting looking back at it, I don't think I noticed as much then because she contracted this illness before I was born, obviously. So she was always the same. I never knew, you know, this was always how mum was. and there was always you know at meal times along with the food there would always be a sort of mum's tablets that she'd have at every meal because she had to have painkillers and strong tablets and then other tablets to take away the side effects of the first set of tablets and that sort of thing so that was part of the routine if you like at the table which was the food and then you know all of the tablets and medicines that had to go alongside it and were you all talking about politics at dinner time no not particularly was your were your parents political Not actively.

9:34So my dad was a Labour supporter. It was a Labour household. Yeah. And, you know, very strongly believed in the Labour Party and Labour movement. And in terms of activity, so he, I remember distinctly, he would go to work at eight o 'clock in the morning, come home at five o 'clock for his tea, then he'd go back to work at six till ten o 'clock at night. You're kidding. Five days a week. Why? This was his routine. Because we didn't have a lot of money. He had to get the work done. And he had to get the job done. Yeah. And so he would come in, eat and go. And therefore there was no space in his life for, you know, activities, political activities.

10:15So did he play with you? So he was too busy to even get involved. Yeah, I can't remember him being particularly involved with us. It was always mum, particularly when we were younger. So if we sort of came home from school, particularly primary school, It'd be mum that was there to greet us when we came in at whatever time from primary school, half past three, four. And at that stage, I've got this distinct memory of sort of jam sandwiches at about four o 'clock in the afternoon. And my mum always, in my head at least, always playing Jim Reeves. Jim Reeves? Yeah, she loved Jim Reeves. Who's Jim Reeves?

10:54Oh, is it like a country singer? An old country singer from years ago. who's Janice that's so great sorry it's just shows where this is from obviously your mum was incredibly busy bringing up four children and your dad was incredibly busy bringing home the bacon and do you think if your mum had worked what do you think she would have been interested in doing she did she did she would have carried on being a nurse she loved being a nurse so she works whilst being she was exhausted too she worked in her late teens when she first went to work okay And then she stopped. And then did she go back? No, no.

11:31She wasn't strong enough to go back. And also having four children just didn't allow her to go back. But she loved the NHS. She was so proud of being a nurse. It was like, goes through like a sort of a rock. It was incredible. So she'd definitely have carried on being a nurse if she could have done. How old was she when she had her first child? She was 21, I think, maybe just 22. So basically, once you've been told, because of your illness, you may not have children. She kept going. Well, she said, I'm not having that. And obviously took these drugs, which were a sort of form of steroids, which helped mitigate the illness.

12:12And then she got on with it because she got married at 21 and had children straight away. Because I think she must have... I've never discussed this with her. And obviously I can't now because she's passed away. But I assume it's because she felt, at any moment, I might not be well enough to have children, so I'm not going to hang about. I'm going to get on with it. So she was determined and had four children. Was it a happy childhood? Yeah, yeah. It was happy. I did a lot of sports. I was playing football the whole time, out of the house doing that sort of thing. But yeah, it was. There wasn't a lot of discussion.

12:53We didn't sort of discuss politics or current affairs around the kitchen table. It wasn't that kind of household. So when did that happen? Yeah, when did you get interested in politics? I joined the Labour Party when I was 16. So there was something there, obviously, that got me into politics. Was it a particular figure in the Labour Party? No, it was just this burning sense that we needed to change things. And that if you're going to change things, it had to be the Labour Party. So it just made absolute sense to me to join the Labour Party as soon as I could. It was just sort of hardwired in me.

13:22but it didn't come out of discussions around the kitchen table i think it came out of observing what i mean we didn't have a lot of money so i knew you know there were times when things were really tough and we couldn't afford to pay all the bills so we'd have to choose you know what wouldn't we pay and the one we always chose was the telephone because that was a landline it was i think a monthly payment or whatever whatever it was and if you had your phone cut off you didn't have to pay that bill so it was quite tough in that sense I mean not pleading poverty or anything but it was you know we knew what it was like not to have a lot of money and this goes to sort of food as well because my mum and dad almost never had anyone around because my dad felt that people disrespected him because he worked in a factory he felt this really strongly that people looked down on him and when you know when people come around for dinner or whatever it is and you don't know every you know you're meeting people for the first time you inevitably have that discussion well what do you do for a living and he hated that discussion because he felt that as soon as he said he worked in a factory people sort of went quiet and didn't quite know what to say did you feel like that when you were at school if kids asked you what your dad did i didn't feel like that but it's given me something i've held on to all my life which is a real sense that respect and dignity are for me probably the two most valuable and important values in life and I and that that I think was deep in me and I think it's what drove me to say I want to be in the Labour Party and to change things and you know and that then took me on a different course to my dad because my dad did his skills education his technical skills at night school whereas I got the chance to go to university so this was the sort of um the opportunity that I was now getting that others hadn't had and my dad hadn't had to be your dad yeah he was yeah yeah he was did he read a lot he read a lot um he listened to music a lot he listened to classical music but there was no chance of him going to university when he was growing up it was you're going out to get a job and you need the technical skills to do it so that's what he did but he So there was always this, I don't know, this sense that he wasn't valued because of what he did.

15:40And that really burnt away at him. And in the end, stopped them having people around. And then we wouldn't go out to eat. I don't remember ever going to a restaurant as a child, ever. We did go, you know, if we're on holiday. Did you have fish and chips? On holiday, we'd have takeaway fish and chips on the birthday of any of us. Okay. And that would be takeaway, bring it home. And then when we're on holiday, we went to the Lake District every year because my mum loved the Lake District. And so we always went there. And we would then occasionally eat at pubs, sort of pub food in the evening. But beyond that, never.

16:17I mean, I honestly can't remember going to a restaurant with my mom and dad. Do you still like fish and chips? I do still like fish and chips. Vinegar on? Vinegar definitely. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Very important. But then, so I then got the chance to go, you know, on a journey that took me away from that sort of small town working class base to Leeds University, which was an incredible journey. And one of the speeches I gave the other day was about smashing the class ceiling and breaking the link between where children and young people start in life and where they can get to. and too many children young people are still their future is determined by the earnings and income of their parents rather than their own ability.

16:59This is a moral mission like none other but for me I was now starting a different journey which was off to university which was fantastic and so I mean it was eye-opening because you go from a small town to a city. I've never really been to a big city like this before. I've gone as far as Croydon in South London but I hadn't got to, hadn't got to, you know, a city like Leeds. And so suddenly you're, you know, this is a big city, it's diverse, there's lots of things going on. And suddenly my horizon for food just expanded massively. Where, where were the restaurants or the places that you're going out and eating?

17:38Indian restaurants. I'd never been to an Indian restaurant. This was fantastic. Yeah. You know, Chinese restaurants, you know, curry chips, you know, curry chips, Leeds. I remember the first time I ever tasted. Curry sauce on your chips. curry sauce on your chip but that's kind of northern thing isn't it yeah yeah it's not southern but it was such a you know that sort of journey opportunity social mobility call it what you like but it was suddenly my world was opening up and that included food because of the fact that we'd always eaten pretty traditional did you live in the hall of reticence i did yeah to start with and did you um and then you shared a flat then i shared a flat for the second year and third year Yes, I love cooking.

18:17Do you? What was one of your university delights that you would offer up to your friends? I don't think delights would be the word. We had six of us in the house and we had a rota where each of us kicked one night in a week for everybody else. Oh, you had a rota. Was it all blokes? No, no, no. It was very democratic. Yeah. Three blokes, three girls in the house. All studying the same thing? No, different things. so I had one of my very best friends who was studying law with me and then other there was one person I'd been at school with then various others that we sort of connected with as we went on the journey but you know as for the it was the food was cheap as chips food because the most important thing was the ingredients had to be cheap because you're a student you didn't have much money and it was you know chili con carne or coronation chicken oh that sounds quite fat Chili con cot, yeah.

19:11When did you give up meat then? I gave up meat probably about 25 years ago. So after university, I gave up meat. Why? As a matter of principle. Okay. And that's why I struggle with it, because I love meat. Oh, do you? Oh, God. I love it. God, you really are principle. I wouldn't be that principle. And to start with, I gave up fish as well. But then I went back to fish because I found it too much to lose. But then I got together with Vic, my wife. She's been proper vegetarian in the sense she doesn't eat meat or fish. She did that when she was eight or nine years old. So no chicken soup on a Friday night?

19:52No chicken soup. Mock chicken soup. It's very good. Mock chicken soup? Yeah, yeah. Tell me about it. Try it one day. It's nice. It's good. So how do you make it? Well, she does it with just a sort of mixed thing. Vegetables. Massables. Balls? We've got, yeah, yeah. Okay. Then we've got two children. So our boy is 15 and our girl is 12. Do you cook meat for them? So our girl has never in her life tasted meat or fish because... Until she gets to university. Well, this is the thing. She's having that chilli con carne. So as soon as... What we said to the kids was, by the time they're about 10, it's up to you.

20:26Yeah. You know, we don't have meat or fish in the house. We don't cook it. Until they're about 10, obviously they're just eating with us. Oh, I've got veggie friends who've always cooked meat for their children. Yeah, so we never did. And then at the age of 10, I said, you can do what you like. And our boy said, great. So he orders, the moment we go out, there's a delivery for Kentucky Fried Chicken or McDonald's. So he's taken full sort of liberty with the licence to do what you like. But when you go out, he orders it? No, he will order meat. In front of you? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, right. No, we're not bothered by that.

20:58And you just smell it and think, oh, wow. This goes back. So if you give up meat or fish on a matter of principle, you still sort of hanker after it. That's terrible. And so when he brings it in the house, it's like, hmm. Do you do any of the kind of substitute, like we do the this bacon or something like that and you'll do the seitan or, you know, the kind of... Or Linda McCartney's. Linda McCartney's, yeah. Yeah, we do all of that, the corn sausages, the Beyond Meat burgers, which are really good. Yeah. Really good. Yeah. I mean, quite a lot of the time if we're cooking, we don't bother with that because if you're doing pasta or something like that, you don't need to.

21:32What's the veggie food like in the House of Commons? Oh, the food in the House of Commons is pretty, you know, it's nothing special Really? I thought it was quite this Somebody needs to set up a really nice sort of restaurant or takeaway in the House of Commons Seriously, the table man Mum, you're about to go into retirement, maybe you should do that Yes A really nice salad bar, a fresh salad bar or something You don't even have a fresh salad bar? No, no Oh, wow So this is, you've got to come in, okay, you've got to come in as my guest to Parliament and have a look around. Okay. And see what you make of the food and then, you know, to get in there and do something.

22:09Can I ask, when you're having dinner or lunch in the House of Parliament, do you only sit with people from the same party? Or have you got mates in the Tory party or the Liberals? Or is it like quite cliquey? No, there is almost never a slot put in my diary for lunch. And therefore, there isn't such a thing as a lunch break. Therefore, I'll be eating on the move or between meetings, etc. But the second part of your question is really interesting, which is, is it all tribal? Yeah. For some people, it is like that. Not for me, because I think I came into politics later in life. I'd done other jobs.

22:46I'd been a lawyer. So you'd sit next to Nadine and have your dad. Well, I'm not sure about that. But there are, you know, there are Tories and other MPs that I get on perfectly well with. Well, that lovely lady who spoke about Harriet Harman last week. Yeah, she was really good. Wow, wasn't she fabulous? Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, when in the middle of the really fierce Brexit debates, I was leading for our party on it. So in the middle of the debates. And my dad was dying. And it was awful. and so I'd have to sort of be in the middle of this debate and then leave that at the end of the debate and then get a train down to the hospital it was in and it was a really, it was the first time I had that very intense public person, private grief going on and two or three of the Tory MPs reached out to me particularly when he died and that sort of thing you can't ever say there's such tribal politics that we can't get on and do things together or talk or have coffee or eat if we had time.

23:50So, you know, I'm not a great believer in that, you know, divisive politics. Well, we were thinking, Jesse's been thinking about how divided our country is at the minute. Well, it's more about the culture wars and just kind of how it feels so polarising, and particularly for my generation. It just feels like, I mean, yeah, I mean, everyone's got an opinion, and I feel like the right really use marginalised groups, such as immigrants or queer people, trans people, to really use them as pawns to kind of... And how do you feel? Do you feel exhausted by it? I feel... You feel responsible. I feel responsible, particularly for...

24:29I have a huge queer following and I feel incredibly responsible when I'm speaking to you, the leader of opposition, to kind of... How do I phrase one question to you when this is about food and family and there's so many questions that so many people have? You're the first person when we've mentioned you were coming on and everybody had a question for you. Oh, that's great. Every single person. I mean, not all that friendly, Keir. That's absolutely understood. You can imagine, yeah. That's completely understood. And so it should be. There's always going to be that combination of people who support what you're doing, want to challenge what you're doing.

25:05But how do you unite everybody when it feels so polarising? and how do you, you know, you talk about respect and dignity being so important for you. And, like, how do you please everybody? You can't please everybody, right? No, you can't please everybody, but you can... Jo Cox, who was a fantastic, fantastic friend and MP, came into Parliament on the same day as me, and, you know, just a tragic story. But, obviously, she did her maiden speech when she said we've got more in common than that which divides us. That is so powerful and so meaningful. and I think that amongst the reasons the Conservatives have gone into this toxic space of divide, culture wars, is because they haven't got a record that they can stand on.

25:49They haven't got any leadership that they can really believe in and therefore they've gone to this divisive place and that relies on a politics that says let's find the points of difference. So if you and I are going to have a conversation, let's find where we don't agree rather than trying to find what we do agree on. So it becomes an echo chamber and then nothing can go. Yeah, we have to break out of that because it's exhausting. It puts people into camps they don't really want to be in. They entrench in those camps. And it means that there's a sort of collective lack of sort of belief in politics as a force for good because everybody just goes further and further to one side or other in the debate and just shouts at each other or shouts past each other.

26:29So nobody's listening in this. It's very corrosive for the idea that I really believe in, which is that politics ought to be a force for good. So we have to find a way to get through that. And there are, I mean, this is going back to the thing about different MPs. After Joe Cox died, Theresa May joined the sort of campaign around loneliness, which was one of Joe's sort of themes, on a cross-party basis. So there is the ability to do that, and we desperately need to get back to that. I mean, Kit, it's such a task that you have on your hands. and I just don't know where you start. Like, when, if you get into power, where do you start?

27:09Like, what do you start with? Immigration. Like, it feels, does it not feel rather... Yeah, daunting. And why do you want to do it? Because I want to change the country for the better. I absolutely passionately want to. Do you think about the impact on your kids? Yeah. You know, that they're going to be followed by horrible right-wing press trying to bring you down or trip you up Yeah, it's a journey as all these things are. I didn't come into Parliament to be leader of the Labour Party or to become the Prime Minister. I came into Parliament in the hope that Ed Miliband would win the 2015 election and I might just about become the Attorney General or something in his cabinet.

27:50So this wasn't something. And the election, getting Labour into government, is not about me. It's not about me going through the door of number 10. It's not about my shadow cabinet becoming the cabinet. It's not even about the Labour Party. It's about the country. it's about taking the country forward so that that's where i sort of come from on it and that drives me forward and i know there's tough things and we'll have to do tough things and make difficult decisions but you know and i try not to get ahead of myself but what you touched on there one of the things that i'm most worried about is the impact on our children now we've been as protective as i hope we can be so we never name them in public we never have promotional photos has done with them.

28:30And will you continue to not do that if you're primate? It's going to be hard. Yeah, it's going to be hard. I mean, obviously, we're out and about with them and so people know who they are and they see them. But by and large, that's been respected and protected so that they can get on with their lives. I do worry, though, because our boy was 15 the other week. So he will, let's, I'm assuming the election is next year, you know, either May or October. He will be 16. and our daughter is 12 going on 16 or 17 already she will be 13 these are really important ages and it will have an impact on their lives have you spoken i mean who's had if you make it to number 10 who's had similar age groups in there because tony blair's were younger a bit younger younger and then um ed's were a little bit younger as well and boris has got so many that we don't I mean, he's got a few in every decade.

29:25So I don't know, I can't remember now the age of David Cameron's children. They were young. They were quite young. And then he sadly lost a child as well while he was in power. But like today, Jesse's been in the sports day with the mums race. Are you participating in sports days and things like that? Not anymore. Why not? Football injury. No, because how old are your children now? Six, four and two. So what happened to us? and I think this happens to every parent is you lovingly walk the kids to school and pick them up and I used to make a real habit however busy I was to try and make sure that several days a week I was there at the school gates because you know I do not want to be that man and it is usually men who say in years to come I wish I'd spent more time with your kids if you want to spend more time with your kids spend more time with your kids but there does come a point and it's going to come I'm I'm afraid, probably the last year at primary school, where certainly our kids said, oh, can you just drop me at the corner, Dad?

30:25And because they're growing up, and the idea of me pitching up to now secondary school for them would be something that would, you know, that was just a no-go. They'd have a heart attack. They do not want me there on sports day. This is coming, I'm afraid. It's coming. No, Jessie. I want to know, you've got teenagers. They must be politically minded, or are they completely kind of just don't want to know about it? Do you have debates with them around the dinner table? Is it a very different situation than what it was when you were growing up? To join the Conservatives. Could you imagine that? We do talk politics.

30:58We talk, you know, broadly. I try not to impose it on them, obviously. What are they most interested about talking to you about? Oh, work, the job, what goes on. I mean, genuine. So our boy came into Parliament last week. Yeah. and was fascinated, came into some of the debates, sat in the debates. He knew more of our front benches than I thought. I mean, he recognised them. So he would say, I'm not interested in politics. And he says in very strong terms, I'm not going into politics. He's decided, having watched me, that he's not going to become a lawyer. He's not going to become a politician.

31:30But it's quite interesting that deep down, he's beginning to sort of explore those ideas. Our girl, slightly less, she's only 12. so she's just developing those ideas and I wouldn't thrust it on them I mean we've only got two rules for our kids which is happy and confident so I'm not we wouldn't say they've got to go off to university they've got to become this that or the other we genuinely just want them to be happy and confident yeah I mean that's all you want right it's yeah and kind maybe and kind yeah I think I've done alright with you then yeah very good you're quite confident and you're happy yeah doing great things I'm doing okay I'm now terrified about my children and being happy, confident.

32:12No, but congratulations on everything you've achieved. I mean, it's incredible. Thank you. All the music stuff. Thank you. Through the roof. You know, trying. Let's talk about music, actually. I went clubbing over the weekend. I want to know last time you went clubbing here. Oh, gosh, I can't remember. You're into me. I've really enjoyed your Desert Island Discs. Oh, yeah. Well, I'll tell you a very funny story about that. Because, obviously, what I tried to do was pick songs that meant something to me on the journey. So Jim Reeves was the first one because it reminded me of my mum. I went through classical music, you know, Northern Soul I love, Orange Juice, Edwin Collins, that sort of thing.

32:46But I ended with Stormzy with Bridge Over Troubled Water, which I think is a fantastic, a beautiful song. It was actually a Grenfell tribute song as well. And it's beautiful. And our kids are quite into Stormzy, particularly our boy. And so it was something that ended it. No, I haven't. although I went to his record company and they played me his latest album, which is really good, really, really good. And he was sort of texting them at the time saying, what does he think of it? What does he think of it? So I chose that as my final song. And that's fine. And then I was at a pub. It was about six months ago.

33:27And just with Vic and a couple of friends of ours. So just, you know, very social. and some guy comes up to me at the bar and says you're a fraud and I said well you're you know no wonder we don't vote for you you're a fraud I said you know what you know I'm on my I'm with my wife what are you talking about he said desert island discs and I thought of all the challenges I've had on our politics of policy this guy's actually challenging me he said no he said you don't listen to Stormsley you're not being honest and I said did you listen to it because I wasn't I wasn't saying I listened to Stormzy.

34:03I was using records which told a story or reminded me of bits in my life. But it was so interesting to be challenged on. Is that then when you made the call to the label to be like, can I go in and listen to Stormzy's new record, please? No, but I should have been. Was it the press team being like, quick, quick, you must go and listen? So interesting. Are people often rude to you? Do they come up when you're out and say, oh? By and large, people are really positive. Good. And that is great. But, you know, it can go either way, but by and large. And I'm still in the relatively lucky position. I can walk down the high street, I mean, you know, without too much aggression.

34:41How do taxi drivers treat you if you get in a black cab? Because they've always got something to say. They're not big fans of Sadiq, I have to say. No, well, I now have to have a police team with me every time I'm out. So that makes for a different lifestyle. Thank God for that. please report back no but you know what black cab drysers are like should we eat oh god you must just be exhausted it's busy do you think it will be even more full on if you get into number 10 yes it's really hard and again that's just the way it is but then it's a question of trying to ensure that we find time so I'm really really clear I will not do unless it's absolutely urgent or a special reason I won't do a Friday night event so at 6 o 'clock we'll go home and we will be as a family home on a Friday night together Vic's dad comes over sometimes he's 94 and so he comes to us at the weekend quite a lot for people that don't know your wife is Jewish yes she is yes so her family are from Poland originally so Friday nights is Shabbat yeah so we do particularly when our dad's there we do prayers um etc and but we're all in and we want you know and i want that to like you know last for as long as it can because the kids are in and uh that sort of thing i got bat mitzvahed at the end of last year oh did you yeah um and when i remember we do friday nights and there's something incredibly meditative about that feeling of being able to kind of say goodbye to the week and actually pause for a moment and look each other in the eye and have a conversation over the dinner table and say the brockers.

36:30And I don't know, there's something I find incredibly reassuring about it when I'm not working on a Friday night. I think that's probably right. And for me knowing, for the kids knowing, Vic knowing, that we, you know, barring exceptional weeks, we will all be there on a Friday night together is a sort of rock in the week, if you like. Now, a lot of it's spent arguing about if we're going to get a takeaway, what we're going to get, or all the rest of it. But it is really nice and special.

37:04Oh,

37:12look at this. Mum. That is... So that's pill-pull prawns. Okay. Right. So, speak mum. That's a tomato tart. Lovely. That's pill pill prawns, like just garlicky prawns. That's, it's like guacamole but no avocados. You don't like avocados? No, no. What's that about? Just the taste of the taste. It's guacamole and avocados and bananas. Okay, well we're alright. I can't eat or even smell bananas. There's something about bananas. This is from when I was very, very young. Well, this is aubergine. No, that's absolutely lovely. So that's tomato, that's pre-lentils, and that's courgette salad. Fantastic.

37:55House of South for about 100 people. And I love salad. Salad is fantastic. Good. So this is really good. Let's hope this works. So what did you have for lunch today? It doesn't stop for lunch. Today I had... Somebody fed him. Today I had a tuna sandwich. I've had lorry loads of tuna sandwiches since I've been in this job. It's just, you know, this was during the middle of a meeting. Tuna sandwich. Homemade or? No, no, just brought in from Pret today. Gotta love it. Baguette or the sandwich? Baguette, yeah. But it's, you know, the routine for the week is sort of Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday in Parliament or headquarters in London, then out on the road for the rest of the time.

38:40so lunch is just I can't remember the last time I stopped and had lunch as a meal as it were rather than just a sandwich on the road or sandwich whilst we're working this is really fantastic do you like it? yeah yeah yeah the tomato it's really good it's really nice it's really good I like it a chef called Alison Roman who's amazing came on and this is from her new recipe book is it from her new mum? yeah I love cooking I just find it I find it so relaxing. I know this sounds really weird. And I'm not going to pretend I do it every night. Because I don't. And Vic does most of the cooking during the week for the kids.

39:20I mean, quite often I'm not home in time for them anyway. But on a Saturday, I love it. So I've got a sort of routine of... There's Craig Charles to Radio 6. Six music. Just put it six o 'clock. So good. I love it. and it's just this route, so that's the point at which I'll sort of go into the kitchen. So you're not listening to Dad Ringers? No. So six music is your choice? Yeah, and then I've got it on, six o 'clock, and I start chopping away and preparing and just popling around the kitchen, I love it. What was your last meal that you cooked that you can remember? Well, so I cook nearly every week, so the latest one, I love tandoori salmon.

40:05and so um and i've had fantastic um we were up in um glasgow um with the team mr sings in glasgow that's a really fantastic curry restaurant the best tandoori salmon i've ever had okay really really brilliant so i thought right i i've got to cook this so then i've sort of had several goes of it and so that's probably the last thing but i had because um vic and the kids don't eat fish so we've got these corn pieces which I also did you know tandoori like paneer is it almost it's almost like chicken it's intended to be sort of imitation chicken and is it nice yeah it is good and there are other dishes that I love doing on a sassay I mean the problem I run into is I want it to be as different and as elaborate and as experimental as possible because that's part of the enjoyment is seeing what it's like, different ingredients, etc.

41:05But then for the kids, it's like we want pasta and tomato sauce. We don't want to try anything else. So I get into this battle. So I have to do sort of pasta bakes that are as elaborate as I can get away with until it gets to the point where they won't enjoy it or eat it. Okay, well this leads us into last supper.

41:27You're going to... This is the last supper. so you're the last one you don't have to be dying death row thing because it makes me feel horrible so you're going on a desert island for about six months no I'd say let's go a year so one of the things I did when I was a lawyer was work with the death penalty project which is a project based here in London to minimise and get rid of the death penalty across the world particularly in the English speaking former colonies So I did extensive cases in the Caribbean, probably went to the Caribbean about 50 times, to represent people and to fight for people not to be hung.

42:09So I got as close as I wanted to be to that feeling. Wow. Is there still the death penalty there now? Yeah, there is. I mean, because of the work of the Death Penalty Project, it's been much reduced. But it's... And their hunger. It's death by hanging, yeah. So, I mean, and that's very... And, you know, when you're in a... The prisons in, you know, Jamaica, Trinidad, they're not nice places, as you can imagine. Sitting in a dark cell with someone who is destined to be hanged, it's really... It's an incredible moment. And obviously we're fighting to save... Normally his life, there were some women that we represented in Uganda.

42:54but knowing that in this legal case if you get it right this person will live and if you don't and you don't succeed then they will in all likelihood be hung how many did you save save oh i mean i'd say we because we worked as a team the whole time um hundreds we went when we went to uganda um there were over 400 people in one test case that we did at the same time and we met them there in the in Kampala which is obviously the center of Uganda the prison is up high up on a hill and you go in the prison it's high security all of the prisoners are in white shorts and white vest and we sat there with all 400 of them talking through the case we're going to be running on their behalf it's like a film set and some of them had been there 20 years some of them were under 18 when they'd been convicted.

43:48And in the end, in that case, we won on behalf of all 400 of them, which didn't mean they were released from prison, but it meant they weren't going to get hung. And they could have the appropriate sentence for whatever they'd done. It was an incredible thing to do. So, you know, it was really... That was as close to the last supper as I wanted to get. Did you ever see them eating their last supper? Did you ever stay with them for that part? No, we were never there. And most of the time, I'm really happy to say, the people we represented, we managed to get off death row. And so we didn't very often go through that horror of someone you're representing.

44:30OK, so you're not going on death row. OK, we're not going on death row. So this is the last step. I'm going to go, I don't know, I'm going to go to a nice island or something. You're going to go to a nice island, but limited food. Oh, we're limited food. OK, OK. So you've got to choose a starter, a main, a pudding and a drink of choice. Starter, I'm going to go for a salad. Really? Yeah. Jesus, come on. You're going to lose a few votes for that. I love salad. I love salad. And I'm going to go for a seaweed salad with chilli. Oh my goodness, I've never heard of this. This is fantastic. Curveball.

45:01So this goes, this isn't intended to link, but now it does. When we were doing all this case in the Caribbean, we used to have to go via, From the top end of the Caribbean, you go in via Miami and then fly across. And so we would be several out in Miami. And there were two dishes in Miami. There was blackened fish, which was fantastic. And seaweed salad with chilli, a big bowl of it. So is it like sunfire? Yeah, it's a bit sort of thinner and crispier. No, I know, but it's a different kind. It's not as salty. It is fantastic. Is it salty as well? It's salty with chilli in... It is really... Have you ever tried to make it?

45:38No. Okay. I will try one day. I've not even ever really found it anywhere else. I've never... It must be on... It's worth going to Miami for that. But it was really incredible. Okay, I like that. You kind of won me back. Okay, fine. Although I nearly lost you with starting with salad. Hopefully that's... And then I'm going to go for my tandoori salmon because I love it. From Mr. Sings? I'll probably have to go to a takeaway from Mr. Sings. Fine, no problem. I don't know where this last... Can you make it? Have you just put your tandoori paste? yeah so that's that's been trying to perfect it that's the one i've done most recently which is and i've done it now three or four times trying to get it right with all the you know get all the ingredients make the paste marinate it so really you're you're a perfectionist yeah but i also i i tend to follow the recipe rather than just sort of doing it without so i'll give you okay yeah but it's so so that's i mean that that's the sort of most recent thing i've learned to make.

46:36I'm also trying to perfect the perfect arabiata from scratch, which again, just getting the right blend. And that the kids will eat. So they like spicy? Yes. Okay. You like spicy? I like spicy, yeah. Okay, so... So my tandoori salmon is... Any sides? I'm not going to make this meal. Any sides? Yeah, probably some... We always get sort of dals and that sort of thing. Which naan do you go for? Plain naan. Plain naan. Really? Yeah. Why? Which one do you go for? Fish for it? Show off? No, the reason is because the kids wouldn't really eat anything other than a plane, no. So there's a bit of accommodation there.

47:15Okay. And pilau rice. Yeah. They would prefer white rice, so we have a little battle about that. Okay. So I'm going to have this tandoori salmon. And then pud? I think lemon cheesecake. Oh, do you like a cheesecake? A baked cheesecake or a non-baked cheesecake? Baked. Baked. So like Jewish cheesecake? Yeah, very light. Yeah, a proper New York cheesecake. Yeah, yeah. I like that too. So that's where I'd go, I think. And what are you drinking? I drink Pinot Grigio because this is Vic's wine of choice. Oh, really? Yeah. You're very accommodating. She's very easy to taste. Is she allowed to have this meal with me, by the way?

47:54Yeah. We better not have the tandoori salmon then. I might have to think about something else for the middle course. But your team, before you came, said that you drink beer and wine. and I realised that I have no clue about beer. So do you drink an IPA or a lager? Which one? IPA. Usually things like Doomba, but our local pub is called Pineapple. Fantastic local pub. The Pineapple, that's like a rowdy one. No, it's not rowdy. The Pineapple, like the one that's in Camden. Kentris Town. Yeah, it's like a fun, not rowdy, but I've been to parties there. I bet you you've been on a night when there's something going on at the O2 because it's a stop-off point on the way.

48:36No, I've been like, the pineapple's like a fun one. It is. I'm not saying it's not fun, but it's more a sort of local. Like when I was in Man Like Me, they were a Camden-based band. They'd always have like afters at the pineapple. Interesting. Okay, so what do you drink there? They've got an IPA called Pineapple, which is really good. And who makes it? Which brewery? I don't know, actually. Okay. See, I know nothing about beer. The only time I'd drink a beer from IPA is if I play football and it's a hot day, you've kind of got to have a cold lager. Because it's just, I don't know, it's just one of those things that just goes with it.

49:13But wine is, white wine, I drink red as well, but Vic doesn't drink red. How easy is it to switch off from trying to become the leader of this country? Really hard. and sometimes if I've got something going on, I find it almost impossible. And then that's really hard for Vic and the kids because it's obviously I'm distracted and I'm only half listening, I'm not engaged. And it's a really bad thing, but it is very difficult. So if I'm doing media in the morning, for example, I did Laura Kunzberg this week. Was that fun for you? Is it ever fun? Well, you know, the interview was 25 minutes or something, but the amount of time it goes into...

49:55So that means that the Saturday evening before is just completely distracted because I'm thinking about it. And then that is really frustrating for Vic and the kids because it's obvious that I'm sort of half detached from it. And even if I'm in the same room as them, I'm, you know. And the kids joke and say to each other, he can't do two things at once when they're trying to have a conversation with me. And I'm trying to sort of look at something for the morning. We wondered how you manage, because we've got a majority quite right-wing press in this country. I mean, there's only two papers that I think that are supportive of the Labour Party.

50:33How do you manage that? Well, the first thing is I read all the papers every day. We get them delivered. So I go through... How long does that take? Well, I say read. I look at each one to see what's the lead story, what's the editorial, what are the sort of interesting bits and pieces of today, what are they saying about us? what they're saying about me. Do your kids get fed up when they're mean about you? Or do you think they're quite protected to not know about that? They're a mixture, a really good mixture, of being protected, but also, you know, bringing me back down to earth the whole time.

51:05And I'll give you just two examples of that. So last year I won the Spectator Politician of the Year Award. So that's, you know, Spectator. And they gave me a framed certificate, which I then took home about 10 o 'clock at night. And our boy is sitting on the settee with his feet up watching telly. And I came in and I gave it to him and said, what do you think of this? And he looked at it. And then without really taking his eyes off the telly or his feet off the settee, he passed it back to me and said, how'd you blag that then? Oh my goodness. It was just fantastic. And the other one was our daughter.

51:39This was a few years ago now. When she said, what time are you going to be home? And I said, oh, I'm going to be late tonight. I'm afraid. Why? What are you doing? I'm doing a fundraising dinner. She said, what's that? I said, well, it's a dinner where people pay money to hear somebody speak. And she said, who's speaking? And I said, me. And she said, why would anyone pay to hear you speak? And it was like a slow motion sort of car crash. You could almost sense where she was going. Now she'd do it to be cheeky. But then that was just this incredulity. It's a really fantastic leveler. So the moment I walk through the door, I've got to be dad.

52:21I've got to be dad. And I love that. That's great. And that's as it should be. How do they ever go, dad, so-and-so says you're being a dick on this. Or like, so-and-so says that you really are being mean about this. Have they ever brought home politics? Because in the playground, people talk, parents talk. No, they don't. they don't I mean now and this is nice lots of people come up and want a selfie and that sort of thing and they get really fed up about that particularly our boy because if I walk down the high street with him he wants me to be with him not constantly you know being stopped and having to talk to other people and that that's trying to find that space with them is quite hard sometimes and there's no end of people who say I can see you're with your family so I won't I won't interfere and then sit down and have a sort of 20 minute conversation aren't you really yeah But that does, they get a bit fed up with that.

53:15Do you go to parties at Downing Street? Have you been invited? I've never been invited to one of the Downing Street parties, no. Are you kidding me? Thankfully, particularly the ones during Covid. Otherwise, I might not be sitting here.

53:31No. I think all Prime Ministers make a habit of keeping leaders of the opposition well away from Downing Street. It's a bit mean. Yeah, I mean, I've obviously been there, but not... Have you been inside? Yeah, yeah. And what's it like? It's a working... I mean, it's a fantastic building, iconic. What do you think of the recent decor? I haven't seen that decor. You haven't been close, yeah. Rishi might have changed it. Oh, Rishi probably has. Maybe he likes their style. Yeah, I thought there was some story about it. It had been changed, but I don't know. What a waste. But anyway, I haven't been there.

54:05I would like to know where... You've talked about the pineapple. You've talked about Mr Sings. Are there any go-to spots that Sir Keir Starmer couldn't live without? Any local restaurants that you absolutely adore? Yeah, there's an Italian called Rosella up the road, which is run by a friend of ours, and it's fantastic. And if we're not eating at home, we'll sometimes go there on a Friday. And again, that's where Vic and her dad can get together and where her sister will come with her daughter. so that's that's just a really locally based straightforward italian restaurant that is probably our go-to if we're going to go out there's also a really good curry house up in highgate where do you get the fish and chips the nearest place now is just um in highgate but fish and chips if i'm getting fish and chips i wouldn't normally get as a takeaway because um vic's not going to eat it um our daughter's not going to eat it so that would be more when i'm on the road with the team oh yeah um if we're staying over in a hotel or something like that but good good fish and chips hard to beat would you like a bit i will do yeah please that looks fantastic i hope so really fantastic just a small bit for me please okay like that yeah i mean i almost never eat desserts it's just why i don't know i'm not particularly sweet toothed so i just don't It's pavlova made with nectarines.

55:32I'll have that one and then you have a more beautiful one. No, I don't mind. I'm fine. So I very rarely make dessert. I mean, because it's not really my thing. At some stage, I do want to try and get into baking. Everyone says baking is a really good thing to get into. I guess if you like cooking and you can switch off when you're doing it. Yeah. I just find baking quite tedious. I'm really bad at it. Right. But why not? You're a perfectionist, so you could master, you know, like... I feel like it requires attention to detail. I'll give it a go at some stage. It's better that one, though. Oh, I honestly don't mind.

56:07I do. Before we let you go, is there one smell or scent that can take you back somewhere, happy or sad, or taste? I think the smell of cut grass takes me back to beginning to play grass football. And, you know, going on to a pitch that's been cut. So when I was probably... The first time I went on a decent pitch was probably when I was about 10, playing in an under-11 league, where they cut the grass. And it's that smell of fresh grass that's just been cut. You do still get it at football grounds. Not so much because now the grass is sort of integrated a bit with other stuff. You don't get the same cut smell.

56:49But that takes me back to sort of cycling around Surrey and Kent. I played for the Kent Boys League. for a team there and just walking on the pitch. And I can't tell you how joyful walking onto a pitch is for me. It's just stepping onto the grass with a football. You could be the Arsenal mascot. I'm not sure about that. We want to wish them luck. I'm walking on the floor. Are the conversations, you know, you have that person talking to you in the pub about your Stormsea selection. In the stands, are people asking you very different? Do you feel like in different spaces you are asked repeatedly a similar question?

57:32No, there's different things people ask. Can you enjoy the game or you just get hounded with questions? No, I can enjoy the game because round us, the people we were with there, I've known for two or three rows in front. One of the guys in front that we've got to know through sitting there, his wife sends pachoras on the last game. There's just things. So that is a bit like the people I play football with. They wouldn't bombard me with things about work because they know I've been in those seats for I don't know how many years now. So they knew me before I was even a politician. And so they wouldn't do that.

58:08But you do. I mean, you do get it at football. You know, people come up to you. People have ideas. People have challenges. People tell you what they're passionate about. So you do. And people do notice what you've been doing. So occasionally they'll say, I saw you did this that week or that. you know so it does cut through but um i mean in the in the crowd in the stand-up football it's all about the football it's just you get well you know what this is like you just get totally drawn in you're all there sort of enduring and enjoying you know to shout obscenities out not anymore not anymore since you've been not anymore because somebody will take a picture of that and record me But there's, I mean, the moment if you're in the crowd, a goal is scored.

58:53And there's just this, all these people, you know, tens of thousands of people have been doing something else all week, live in different places, don't all know each other. And at that moment, they come together and everybody gets up. It's like this, the choreography that is natural in that is absolutely incredible. And it's an amazing moment. Okay, Keir, when's the general election going to be? I don't know. Do you think it'll be November? Next year. This year? I don't know. I mean, from my point of view, the sooner the better. And I say that because people are really suffering now. They can't pay their bills, their mortgage is going through the roof.

59:33Every day this government's here, it just gets worse. So for the country's sake, we need it soon. My hunch is that it'll go at least into the early part of next year could go all the way through to the end of next year. Yeah, yeah. It's up to the government when they go. They'll go at whatever point they think is best for them, and there's nothing we can do about that. That's just one of the prices of... If you lose an election, you lose the right to say when the next election is. So we'll be ready whenever it is. Sakir Starmer, thank you for joining us on Table Manners. It's been lovely to get to know you a little bit better.

1:00:09Thank you for having me. Thank you for the food. It was delicious, but the company's been great. Thank you and best of luck with all those tuna sandwiches that you're about to enjoy.

1:00:31Well, I thought he was absolutely charming, but such a strong sense of public service. And responsibility. is it? A responsibility. I mean, I felt when he's talking about the Stormzy song, he should be heavy as the head that wears the crown. I'm telling you, but he might have. Do you feel like you learnt anything new about Sir Peter Starmer? Yeah, I do. He didn't come from a political background. It was fascinating listening to him talking about his family. Yeah. And his admiration for his mother and father. Yeah. And they weren't a wealthy family. They were striving to make the best of their lives.

1:01:09Thank you, Sir Keir Starmer, for coming over and doing the podcast. Thank you so much to everyone that has listened to this series of Table Manners. We will be back after, well, a little hiatus. Lenny's going on holiday for a month. And then I'm going to be joining her for some of it. Whilst we may not be having any new guests around over the summer, we've decided to do, because, you know... To remind people of some of the fabulous people we've had. Yeah, so whilst you may not hear some new episodes, Some of you may have joined us three years in and we have plenty of wonderful material that came before.

1:01:43So we will be offering up on the table some wonderful episodes from previous years. But yeah, we'll see you soon. Lenny will have a fabulous tan. She'll have some new Greek recipes. She'll be talking about how beautiful Skopulos is. I shall be talking about touring again. And we'll be getting some brilliant, brilliant guests. Thank you so much for listening to us. We love doing it. Supporting us, yeah. We absolutely love doing it. we love hearing from you please email us at hello at table manners podcast.com and take care of yourselves and we'll speak to you soon have a good summer have a lovely summer

1:02:37Thank you.