Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s new cabinet has, by far, the highest proportion of MPs who were educated at comprehensive schools compared to previous cabinets.

Data released by the Sutton Trust and compiled by the Londoners shows that Starmer’s cabinet is 92% state-school-educated, compared to just just 21% of those who regularly attended cabinet meetings in the final days of Rishi Sunak’s time as Prime Minister.

Starmer’s cabinet met for the first time on Saturday 6 July, after Labour’s landslide general election win.

Dr Kevin Latham, research and policy manager for schools and colleges at the Sutton Trust, said: “Everybody should have a voice at the cabinet table. 

“There has been a huge imbalance in the past but now the cabinet is more representative of the British public, a vast majority of whom go to comprehensive schools.

“Whether this becomes the norm or whether there is some backsliding in the future, a precedent has been set and future eyes will look at the composition of future cabinets and compare them to this cabinet.”

The new cabinet has 23 MPs who attended comprehensive schools, one who attended a private school, Louise Haigh MP, and one who attended a selective school, the Prime Minister himself.

In comparison, of those who regularly attended cabinet meetings in the final stages of Rishi Sunak’s government, only seven MPs attended comprehensive schools, five attended selective schools, and 21 attended private schools, including Sunak himself, who attended Winchester College.

In a poll conducted by the Sutton Trust in February, 63% of people across the UK said that they thought politicians come from similar backgrounds that don’t reflect the wider public. 

Only 28% said politicians come from all walks of life, reflecting the wider public.

Angela Rayner, the new Deputy Prime Minister is evidence that politicians can come from all walks of life, Latham told us.

He added: “When it comes to social mobility, I think that her appointment can only be positive.

“It sends a positive message to people all over the country who may not be going through the easiest of times.”

Rayner left school aged 16 pregnant with her first son and with no formal qualifications.

She told the Financial Times that there were no books in her house growing up as her mother could neither read nor write.

Latham added: “Young people can now see that anyone from any background can end up in the cabinet making decisions about the running of the country as long as they’re competent and capable, have the right motivation, and work very hard to get there.”

Sir Keir Starmer campaigned on the pledge to remove the exemption on VAT for private schools, promising to use that money to fund state-funded education.

In Sky’s ‘Battle for Number 10’, he said: “For those children in a state secondary-school who don’t have the teachers they need, that’s not a one-year problem or a two-year budgeting problem, it’s a lifelong problem.

“If they don’t get the qualifications that they need at 15 and 16 then they can’t go and do what they want.

“So we need to recruit 6,500 teachers for our state secondary schools to make sure every child, wherever they come from, whatever their background, whatever school they go to, has the same opportunity.”

Kevin thought investment in schools would be an effective way to improve social mobility across the UK.

“It’s a matter of trying to make sure that everybody has equal access to high-quality education,” he said.

Such investment may be the best way to ensure that future cabinets maintain the level of representation that Starmer’s cabinet has set and that previous cabinets have failed to achieve.

Photo credit for featured image to Mercy Haggerty

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Keir Starmer’s Labour Party won a landslide victory in the country’s general election last week, while the Conservatives suffered their worst ever result.

No surprises there, except perhaps among the party’s own strategists – who reportedly feared that voters’ sense of a foregone conclusion would depress turnout and wind up boosting the Tories’ seat count. Yet Labour secured its win on the lowest vote share of any single majority government in history and appeared to lose among young progressives to parties that campaigned on more explicitly social justice-oriented platforms, like the Greens.

Alex Parnham-Cope weighed up voting Green before polling day. He believes that, as a trans man, the Labour Party didn’t actually want his vote.

He thinks that while Starmer has been backed into a corner by the Tories’ persistent waging of a culture war on trans rights, and left afraid of putting forward a more progressive message for fear of being “torn apart” in the right-wing media, the party went a step beyond what could be excused as careful campaigning.

“I couldn’t trust a Labour government [to deliver on trans rights], considering the party’s willingness to not simply engage culture war talking points, but actually advance them,” Alex, 24, explains.

Miles, a 22 year-old trans man who did not want to give his last name, feels similarly.

“I don’t see any hope in the Labour Party, especially seeing the ways they’ve treated transphobic MPs versus, say, MPs of colour,” he says.

Alex, meanwhile, says he’s trying to get the balance between catastrophising and gutter optimism.

“There is the sense that much of what [political parties] could do to make our lives tangibly harder has already been done, if not through explicit legislation then as an outcome of austerity,” Alex explains.

The new Health Secretary Wes Streeting, for example, recently committed to implementing the recommendations of the Cass Review on gender-affirming care for minors.

The report was criticised by organisations including the World Professional Association for Transgender Health and Amnesty International.

But as disappointing and anxiety-inducing as such a policy of further delaying healthcare may be for younger trans people and their families, the reality is that gender-affirming care has already been “effectively privatised” in the UK due to years-long waiting lists, he says.

“The other kernel of optimism, which is a very depressing kind of optimism, is the fact that because Labour has so matched the energy of the Conservatives in of their willingness to punch down on trans people as the minority of choice this electoral cycle, there’s been a race to the bottom in the culture wars,” Alex adds, which has “fast-tracked the transphobic culture wars to their logical conclusion”.

Steph Richards, the CEO of non-partisan trans advocacy organisation Translucent and a Labour campaigner, echoes Alex in saying she thinks the party is stuck “between a rock and a hard place” – but feels disappointed by some of the trans community’s response to Labour.

She acknowledges that there’s still work to do inside the Labour Party, particularly on the issue of gender self-identification and single-sex hospital wards. In her view, however, a Labour government offers something the Tories never did: the opportunity to engage in good faith.

“[Labour is] not going to be perfect. [But] groups like Sex Matters will lose a lot of their venom, for a time. They’ll still have influence, but less than they had with the Tories,” she says.

“Where we are today, compared to three months ago, is in a hell of a better position. We were all screaming for a general election, seeing our rights risk disappearing in front of our very eyes, and that’s all disappeared. The Equality Act isn’t going to be changed. The Gender Recognition Act is going to be reformed – perhaps not to the extent we wanted, but it is going to be reformed. We’re going to see the end of culture wars. We’re going to see conversion therapy banned. That’s all got to be a good thing, ultimately.

“Perfect? No. Better? Yes.”

For Alex, though, “better” means little considering just how far the UK has regressed in recent years when it comes to trans rights.

He points out that Theresa May planned to reform the Gender Recognition Act to allow an element of self-identification back when she was Prime Minister in 2017.

“She was by no means being progressive on that, or being a flag-waving ally – simply reflecting the broad, largely bureaucratic international consensus on trans rights, before the contemporary campaign to roll them back in the UK and US began,” he says.

Miles shares Alex’s frustration.

“Trans rights are no longer seen as representative of cultural progress.

“It seems mad to me that one can see the rights of a group being stripped back and not think that it will eventually – or rather, as it already is doing – seep into class politics, gender-based discrimination, systemic and interpersonal racial violence, and perpetual undercurrents of ableism”, he says.

It remains to be seen what Labour in power will mean for Britain’s embattled trans community. No announcements have been made about the specificities of the new Minister for Women and Equalities’ brief, a role now shared by Anneliese Dodds and Bridget Phillipson. But many are not holding their breath.

The Labour Party did not respond to requests for comment.

Photo credit: Alisdare Hickson via Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 2.0

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The Green Party candidate for Streatham and Croydon North suggested that both locally and nationally, the Labour party avoids honest dialogue with the public on matters such as Gaza.

The safe Labour seats in Lambeth of Streatham and Croydon North, Clapham and Brixton Hill, Dulwich and West Norwood, and Vauxhall and Camberwell Green, all re-elected their Labour MPs with a large majority.

However, in comparison to previous elections all four have severely fewer votes – something interesting in an election where Labour had a landslide victory in order to get the Tories out of office.

Steve Reed, MP for Streatham and Croydon North has gone from the most popular out of the four with 74.2% of votes in 2017 to the least popular with 52.1% in 2024.

Helen Hayes, MP for Dulwich and West Norwood has been able to maintain this a bit more, from 69.6% in 2017 to 60.3% in 2024, signifying that it wasn’t just following the EU Brexit referendum in 2016 as Lambeth was the second highest remain voter at 78.6%, just behind Gibraltar.

In his victory speech, Reed said: “We will clean up our polluted rivers and we will clean up our polluted politics.”

Scott Ainslie, Green Party candidate for Reed’s constituency of Streatham and Croydon North, said: “We’ve got U-turn Starmer. All the policies that he was in favour of like proportional representation – U-turns – investing in a green new deal – U-turns.

“I think I would’ve felt more hopeful if we had more green MPs that would push Labour to be better.

“I think we’re quite sheepish about Labour’s offer to the public. There’s a lot of people on the doorstep saying how refreshing the Green manifesto was.”

Ainslie claimed that residents viewed the Green manifesto as one that covered the topics that were kept away from the debate between Sunak and Starmer such as a focus on the climate, on Gaza and cost-of-living.

He came in second place with a huge increase in votes for Greens from 2.9% in 2019 to 17.1% in 2024.

Ainslie said: “There was a lot of two-party politics, which I think everyone’s fed up with.

“We need electoral reform in this country because so many millions of voices are not being heard.

“And where there’s a Green in the room we can push Labour to be better, holding their feet to the fire, encouraging them to be braver.”

Reed had been criticised in late 2023 for his response to the situation in Gaza as well as his response to a local awareness group, Crystal Palace Friends of Palestine, protesting at his house with signs that read ‘Steve Reed kills babies’ and ‘shame on you Steve Reed’.

Ainslie said: “I’ve been holding Labour to in Lambeth as a councillor for the last 10 years, they don’t like being told when they’re wrong, they’ve got no humility sometimes. It would be good if they were able to just say, ‘you know what? We did do wrong there’, or ‘I understand where they’re coming from’.

“They just double down on their defensiveness and get litigious – I don’t think that’s a good way to be as a human being.”

The Green vote has increased all throughout Lambeth – a borough renowned for its background in activism.

Pete Elliott received the highest vote out of the Green candidates in the four constituencies, receiving 18.9% of votes in Dulwich and West Norwood.

Elliott’s Green party was the only one to have also been in second place for the general election in 2019.

The Green Party here is a firm er of Palestine, with Elliott stating on his portfolio: “Both Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak have let Palestinians down, by failing to call out war crimes when they have clearly been happening before our eyes.”

In the seat that he campaigned for, Dulwich and West Norwood, the re-elected MP Helen Hayes caught flack in November 2023 for following Starmer’s request to abstain from voting for the SNP’s amendment for an ‘immediate ceasefire’ in the Israel-Hamas war.

Elliott said: “I’m hopeful that the results will do us justice, certainly in Dulwich and West Norwood, as we’ve had a great response from people on the doorstep and where we’ve spoken to people, they’re really wanting a green voice out there to represent them.

“We just need more people to get involved with us, help us out and I think we can certainly turn this area Green.”

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The UK woke today to a Labour government for the first time in 14 years, following a historic landslide defeat for the Conservative Party.

And that national picture was reflected across the capital, as Labour took 59 of the 75 available seats, with the Tories winning just nine.

It was also a good night for the Liberal Democrats, who doubled their seat tally in London to jump to six seats, as part of a wider national rise.

For more on all the big stories from the general election, both in London and beyond, read our e-edition below.

Featured image courtesy of Keir Starmer via Flickr

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The political landscape of London’s south western boroughs has been reshaped with the Liberal Democrats and Labour making significant inroads into what was once considered Conservative territory.

One of the most notable trends of the night was the collapse of the Conservative vote share across south west London.

As Labour swept to power with an overwhelming landslide, ending 14 years of Conservative rule, they strengthened their hold on the capital while the Lib Dems quietly but effectively painted a large part of south west London in their signature yellow gold.

Across south west London, the Lib Dems doubled their number of seats from three to six, while Labour secured some significant scalps of their own.

The Lib Dems bulldozed in Wimbledon in a remarkable result which saw them gain the constituency which had been held by the Conservatives since 2005 whilst gaining more votes than Labour and the Tories combined.

They picked up two more gains in Sutton borough marginals Sutton and Cheam and Carshalton and Wallington, a sweet victory in a borough that voted for Brexit in 2016.

Lib Dem leader Sir Ed Davey, who was re-elected as the Kingston and Surbiton MP with a large 25,870 votes, increasing his majority from 11,000 to 17,000, hailed the “exceptional” and “historic” results which saw his party record their best electoral performance in a century.

Elsewhere, Labour made huge inroads in more central and traditionally wealthy seats.

They seized marginals Kensington and Bayswater and Cities of London and Westminster and unseated Government minister Greg Hands in Chelsea and Fulham.

Even in seats where the Tories managed to hold on such as Croydon South, a significant hold by them, their majority was significantly reduced.

The results in Croydon reflected a broader trend across London, with Labour making gains in outer boroughs that had previously leaned blue.

Labour also secured big wins in constituencies across the boroughs of Hounslow, Lambeth and Wandsworth.

The Green Party, while not winning any seats in south west London, saw its vote share increase across the board.

In Richmond Park, the Greens secured over 5% of the vote, their best performance in the constituency to date.

The Lib Dem and Labour successes in south west London marks significant political realignment in the region which has traditionally been a key battleground between the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative Party.

With this result, south west London which was once a fairly predictable area, is now a rainbow of yellow, red and diminishing blue.

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Keir Starmer has made his first speech as Prime Minister outside of 10 Downing Street.

Under the rain and met by cheers and handshakes, he and his wife Victoria weaved their way through the crowd and up to the podium.

His speech emphasised the importance of public service and stark deviation from the failures of the 14-year Conservative government.

Starmer said: “For too long now we’ve turned a blind eye as millions slid into greater insecurity. 

“As soon as the cameras stop rolling their lives are ignored. 

“I want to say very clearly to those people: not this time.

“Changing a country is not like flicking a switch, the world is now a more volatile place, this will take a while, but the work begins immediately.”

Starmer paid homage to his predecessor Rishi Sunak who made his speech just an hour beforehand.

Starmer said: “His achievement as the first British Asian Prime Minister of our country – the extra effort that that will have required should not be underestimated by anyone.

“But now this wound, this lack of trust, can only be healed by actions not words. I know that.

“We can make a start today with the simple acknowledgement that public service is a privilege, and that your government should treat every signal person in this country with respect.”

Labour celebrated their greatest win since Tony Blair’s leadership, with a total of 412 seats, just six seats less than in 1997.

But Starmer addressed those who voted for other parties and said: “Whether you voted Labour or not, in fact, especially if you did not, I say to you directly: my government will serve you.

“Politics can be a force for good. 

“We will show that we’ve changed the Labour party, returned it to service, and that is how we will govern: country first, party second.”

The Prime Minister outlined the party’s priorities, among them securing borders, making streets safer, and rejuvenating the NHS.

In an effort to appeal to “working class families like mine”, Starmer stressed the importance of affordable homes and educational opportunities.

He said: “We will rebuild Britain.

“Brick by brick we will rebuild the infrastructure of opportunity.”

In the final lines of his speech, he read: “You have given us a clear mandate and we will use it to deliver change, to restore service and respect to politics, to end the era of noisy performance, and unite our country.

“Our work is urgent and we begin it today.”

Featured image of Sir Keir Starmer via Sky News on YouTube

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The crowds are queuing up outside Downing Street to celebrate Labour’s landslide election win and our reporter David Olaseinde is right in the thick of it.

Hundreds of people are making up a lively, optimistic crowd that seems high-spirited despite the pouring rain.

As former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak left, the crowd booed and cheered his departure. 

Of the people who have spoken to SWLondonder, most are anti-Conservative as opposed to pro-Labour, and voted tactically to get the Tories out of office.

Hackney Wick constituent Andrea Garland said: “ We are delighted, and so relieved. Get rid of them! 

“The Tories have wrecked the country, the mess they have created is disgusting – everything they’ve touched, they’ve destroyed.

“I believe Labour will govern for everybody, not just for themselves. I believe in Labour’s policies and Keir Starmer.”

After 14 years, there is a vehement public desire for change and, although there is scepticism towards Labour, for many it represents, at least, the lesser of two evils. 

Nevertheless, the vibrant atmosphere outside Downing Street suggests that Starmer is not exactly unliked.

Many say that Sunak hasn’t been given a fair trial, having only been in office for 20 months amidst Covid and the energy crisis in Europe. 

But the public are faced with the excessive strain on the NHS, increase in homelessness, inflation, a devastating cost-of-living crisis, and involvement in foreign conflicts under Tory rule.

Twickenham constituent Amy Foster said: “I feel hopeful and positive, it’s time for change from the lies, the corruption, the immorality, the trashing of the NHS, and cuts to vital funding services.

“We need to fund, respect, and honour the amazing institution that is the NHS.”

Hackney Wick constituent Andrew Bolton agreed, saying: “Labour will bring a bit of stability and a bit of common sense to government.

“These people [the Conservatives] are the dregs of the Brexit party.

“We want proper government, proper auditing, and lack of corruption.”

The first-past-the-post voting system has led hoards of constituents to vote tactically, calling into question how the results might have differed under proportional representation.

Voters have today said they would have voted for smaller parties, but on this occasion, in an attempt to oust the Conservatives, they opted with Labour instead.

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Labour dominated the general election in London, winning 59 out of 75 constituencies, yet their former leader Jeremy Corbyn claimed victory in Islington North.

Corbyn polled 24,120 votes in holding his seat since 1983, beating Labour’s Praful Nargund who garnered 16,873 votes.

Corbyn called the result: “A resonating message from the people of Islington North. 

“I have dedicated my life, my learning and my abilities to the people of Islington North – this victory is a victory for them.” 

Whilst Islington North slipped through Labour’s hands, the party picked up nine seats from the Conservatives in London including Cities of London and Westminster, all three constituencies in Barnet, and Boris Johnson’s former constituency Uxbridge and Ruislip South.

The Conservatives fell from 21 seats in 2019 in the capital to just nine in 2024, en route to their worst nationwide defeat in 190 years.

They lost nine seats to Labour, as well as three to the Lib Dems, who doubled their seat tally in the capital alongside a surge in seats nationally.

Among the Conservatives they defeated were Minister for London Greg Hands in Chelsea and Fulham and Thresea Villiers in Chipping Barnet. 

Hands did not give a concession speech but his victorious opponent Ben Coleman who ousted him by just 152 votes said: “The whole country needs change, we need to get the NHS back on its feet, our schools need more teachers, we need to get police back on the street. 

“In Chelsea and Fulham we got Wes Streeting to come down here just a few weeks ago and guarantee rebuilding and the modernisation of Charing Cross Hospital and I’m looking forward to making that happen.” 

It wasn’t all rosy for Labour as incoming Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer saw his majority in Holborn and St Pancras reduced to just over 11,500 votes against former ANC Parliamentarian Andrew Feinstein.

Starmer called it a huge privilege to be re-elected in his constituency, saying it was where his wife and his children had grown up in and it was their love that had kept him grounded. 

He said to his constituents: “I’ll serve every person in this constituency. 

“I will speak out for you, have your back, fight your corner every single day.”

Moreover, Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting survived a scare, holding off independent candidate Leanne Mohamad who ran on a platform challenging the party’s position on the Israel/Gaza conflict.

Nevertheless, the 59 capital victories are two more than the 1997 Labour Landslide of Tony Blair which remains Labour’s largest electoral success. 

For the Conservatives, the result was a complete disaster and it could have been worse as Iain Duncan Smith in Chingford and Woodford Green and Chris Philp in Croydon South barely clung on to their seats. 

Duncan Smith was helped by the splitting of the Labour vote between its candidate Shama Tatler and her predecessor Faiza Shaheen, with Tatler only narrowly finishing ahead of Shaheen in the poll. 

Shaheen attacked Labour saying: “They’ve let my community down. I’m so angry with them right now. That shouldn’t have happened.” 

Philp was predicted to have a 1% of holding his seat in the exit poll but survived by 2,313 votes. 

The Liberal Democrats won six seats in the capital but took key targets such as Wimbledon, Carshalton and Wallington and Sutton and Cheam from the Conservatives as part of its best ever performance. 

Its Leader Sir Ed Davey said after winning in Kingston and Surbiton: “I am humbled by the millions of people who backed the Liberal Democrats to both kick the Conservatives out of power and deliver the change our country needs.” 

Neither the Greens and Reform were able to win any seats in London though they did both win four seats nationwide.

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The wealthiest borough in London has swung back to Labour in an unusual break from its Conservative tradition.

Labour MP Joe Powell won 40.5% of the Kensington and Bayswater vote with 17,025 votes, gaining the seat from incumbent Conservative MP Felicity Buchan by a margin of 2,903.

Powell said: “We’ve run a really positive, professional, dedicated campaign focused on the things that people told us on their doorstep.

“They really wanted to see change in our community and change nationally, so we’re obviously delighted that residents of Kensington and Bayswater have decided to put their trust in us.

“I’m very aware that trust in politics is low in this country at the moment, and that’s because we’ve had too many people who have over-promised and under-delivered.”

Powell is not only the newly-elected MP for Kensington and Bayswater but five weeks ago became a father to twins.

He said: “There’s been a lot of juggling and a lot of from family and friends.

“I’m quite relieved now to at least have the campaign out of the way.”

It was a hard-fought battle previously with Buchan winning the then Kensington constituency by just 150 votes in 2019.

Labour’s Emma Dent Coad, who ran as an independent in this election, won by even less, 20 votes, in 2017, becoming the first Labour MP in the constituency.

After boundary changes last year, Kensington now includes Bayswater and Lancaster Gate to form the new constituency of Kensington and Bayswater.

If the new boundaries had been in place in 2019, then Labour would have won the seat.

Home to Kensington Palace, the Royal Albert Hall and the Victoria and Albert Museum, Kensington and Chelsea ranked as the richest borough in London in 2022 according to ONS average yearly wage data.

The turnout for the constituency was 54.5%, a notable drop from its 67.7% turnout at the 2019 General Election.

Liberal Democrat candidate William Houngbo, who received 2,910 votes, said: “What didn’t go well for me tonight was that the public wanted Labour to get rid of the Conservatives, so their priority was to vote tactically.

“I would tell Powell that communities are our core values and you cannot have a top-down approach.

“You need to be embedded in the community and you need to listen.

“Bring them around the table and make them part of the decision making process so that you can find solutions together.”

Powell said: “I want to be ing a Labour government that delivers on the very specific pledges that we’ve made – the things that will make a real difference in Kensington and Bayswater.

“I think people want to see a government that’s on their side and delivering on the things that they really care about.”

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Nigel Farage has warned the Labour Party that he and Reform UK are coming for them.

The 60-year-old was elected in a landslide victory as the parliamentary member for Clacton following seven previous attempts to become an MP.

Since announcing he was taking over as leader of Reform, Farage has overseen a considerable rise in for the party over the last month culminating in them winning five seats.

As well as Clacton, they were elected in Great Yarmouth, Boston & Skegness and Ashfield.

Farage immediately hit out at the Labour Party, saying they will now target Labour Votes.

He said: “There’s no enthusiasm for Labour, there’s no enthusiasm for Starmer whatsoever.

“In fact, about half of the vote is simply an anti-Conservative vote.

“This Labour government will be in trouble very very quickly – we’re coming for Labour, be in no doubt about that.”

On the Conservatives, he said: “This is the beginning of the end of the Conservative Party.

“To have done this in such a short space of time says something very fundamental is happening.”

In Clacton, Farage gained a majority of 8,405 votes, over the Conservative Party candidate Giles Watling, who in the 2019 election had a majority of 24,692 votes.

The outspoken former Conservative Party deputy chairman Lee Anderson secured Reform its first seat of the night in Ashfield, having defected to Reform in January.

In his speech he thanked the people of Ashfield for re-electing him under a different party, and surmised that the win can be seen as part of an election night reckoning.

Reform UK also won seats in Great Yarmouth and in Boston and Skegness, with Rupert Lowe and Richard Tice winning seats.

Tice said: “This really is quite extraordinary what we have achieved.

“Just three years ago as Reform UK nobody had heard of us, we were 0% in the polls.”

The rise and appeal of Reform UK will no doubt be felt keenly by the Conservative Party who suffered significant losses across the country due to Reform UK splitting the right-wing vote.

Feature image: Nigel Farage speaking with ers at “Liberty for Trump” event in Arizona
Credit: Gage Skidmore, Wikimedia Commons

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