Starmer in regular talks with Blair as he prepares Labour for power

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said he talks to Sir Tony Blair “a lot” to draw on his experience of preparing for power in 1997.

Sir Keir said he spoke to both Sir Tony and Gordon Brown about their experiences of moving from opposition into government.

He said it had been “really helpful” to hear from the New Labour figures about how they got ready ahead of the 1997 landslide.

The Labour leader told Channel 5’s Jeremy Vine: “I talk to Tony a lot about the period just before ’97, because obviously I’m very interested in talking to people who have won elections and taken a party from opposition into government.

“In the Labour Party we’ve only done that three times. We did it in 1945 with (Clement) Attlee, we did in 1964 with (Harold) Wilson and we did it in ’97 with Tony Blair. So, talking to Tony and Gordon about that has been really helpful.

“It’s been not so much about specific policies, but about the pace, the preparedness of getting an opposition ready for government if we are privileged enough to be voted in to serve.”

Sir Keir – who was recently told to lose weight by the third major player in New Labour, Lord Mandelson – admitted not all the advice he was being given was helpful.

“I’m getting advice from everyone, all of the time. Obviously, I’m a massive football fan and it’s like being the manager down on the touchline and 60,000 people are giving you their advice on how to do it differently, so there’s a version of that going on.”