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With parties vying for power in the July 4 general election, Keir Starmer’s campaign organisation has switched into campaign mode.
But with opinion polls showing Labour’s victory likely, the party has set out plans for how it will handle the transition from opposition to government.
If Starmer wins the prime ministerial position, he has said an overhaul of Whitehall is needed to deliver what he calls a “mission-led government” and would take the reins after 14 years without his party in power.
So how would Starmer run key national offices differently?
Downing Street
Starmer says he wants to run a mission-led government centred around five goals: achieving the best growth in the G7, making the UK a clean energy powerhouse, reforming the NHS, halving serious violent crime and overhauling education.
The Labour leader reportedly wants the quartet of ministers – himself, McFadden, Rachel Reeves and Angela Rayner – to make key strategic decisions.
Reports suggest Mr Starmer may plan to appoint crossbench peer Baroness Casey, one of Parliament’s most respected troubleshooters, to a senior role.
She has been linked both as a member of the new Ethics and Integrity Committee that Starmer plans to introduce, aimed at tackling corruption in Westminster, and as a possible “minister for missions” to coordinate inter-governmental working alongside Pat McFadden, a veteran Blairite problem-solver and shadow minister for the Cabinet Office.
Emma Norris, deputy director of the Institute of Government think tank, which has supported Labour advisers as part of the so-called “Spades School”, said Starmer’s campaign could see a renewed focus on “long-termism” when it comes to restructuring government.
“If you look back over the last decade, we’ve understandably been in a very reactive position with things like the pandemic and Brexit, so policy institutions are used to working at a very fast pace and responding quickly, but longer-term engagement is something we may not have had much experience of recently,” she said.
Starmer is expected to bring along an array of trusted advisers, including his communications director, Matthew Doyle, political fixer Luke Sullivan and, of course, Sue Gray, the senior civil servant who has been appointed chief of staff. Question marks remain over what role his respected and combative campaign manager, Morgan McSweeney, will play.
Initially, Mayor Starmer’s chancellor may be in reaction mode, with a host of crises looming including what he calls Mayor Gray’s “shit list”, bankrupt local authorities, public sector pay pressures and the possibility of Thames Water collapsing.
Some observers believe Starmer may seek to further strengthen his policy team, led by his long-time and trusted aide Dr Stuart Ingham, once he takes over Downing Street.
Those rumoured to be in the running include Josh Symons, director of the think tank Labour Together, Ravi Gurumurthy, chief executive of social innovation charity Nesta, Nathan Yeowell, director of the Future Governance Forum, Italian economist Mariana Mazzucato, founder of the Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose at University College London, and Jaeger Kakkad, director of Government Innovation at the Tony Blair Institute.
Rayner, who would be appointed deputy first minister in a Labour government, is likely to seek a unique office with an independent staff, similar to the power base held by John Prescott under Blair and Brown.
Accelerated devolution is a key pillar of Starmer’s growth policy and will mean power is distributed more evenly across the country, building on New Labour’s and the Conservatives’ periods in power through metro mayors.
Starmer’s Number 10 will be in regular contact with mayors and local authorities in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland but will maintain a strong centre in Whitehall to drive the mission.
Overseas offices
Shadow Foreign Secretary David Lammy has spent recent months building relationships with key figures in foreign governments.
He has visited Washington half a dozen times since being appointed shadow secretary of state and has benefited from his friendship with former US President Barack Obama.
Ben Rhodes, a former foreign policy adviser to President Barack Obama, has been a key intermediary in helping Lammy forge key connections with the Biden administration, including with national security adviser Jake Sullivan, whom he has met twice.
But with Donald Trump currently leading the polls and a return to the White House looking more likely, Labour is also paying close attention to building relationships with Republicans, and Lammy has made time for J.D. Vance, Mike Pompeo, Lindsey Graham and Trump campaign manager Chris La Civitas.
Separately, Lamy plans to make an EU security pact an early priority and is working to strengthen ties with European allies, including President Emmanuel Macron’s France, to get there.
The Middle East has been on the shadow minister’s agenda since October 7. He has met with foreign ministers and leaders of several countries, and Starmer has called for a renewed focus on how to bring about a two-state solution to the Israel-Gaza conflict.
Since the fall, Lamy has also worked in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, as well as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, Jordan, Egypt, Morocco and Bahrain.
He has big ambitions for the Treasury to “rediscover the art of grand strategy” and is advised by former secretaries David Miliband and Jack Straw.
But he defines Labour’s approach to foreign affairs as “progressive realism”, focusing not on nostalgia for the colonial past, but on seeing Britain in a world order with a “new balance of power” and on “pursuing ideals without delusions about what can be achieved”.
As a Labour government, Lammy would work to strengthen NATO and continue current levels of support for Ukraine as the US and China compete for dominance, and he believes there is an urgent need to build alliances and protect democracies around the world as climate change, AI and technology disrupt the status quo.
For example, his recent visit to Delhi and Mumbai, after Labour’s relations with India were at their lowest point, culminated in a lengthy lunch with External Affairs Minister Jaishankar on trade.
Labour sources say he has generally won praise from foreign ministers for “listening rather than preaching” and, as possibly the first descendant of the transatlantic slave trade, is uniquely placed to speak to countries in the global south.
Ministry of Finance
The Treasury, expected to be the political and intellectual centre of Starmer’s operation, will be led by Reeves, a former Bank of England economist, and will be run according to his “securonomics” philosophy.
Firstly, it means adhering to the fiscal rules she has already laid out, but the politician set to become finance minister has made it clear that her priority is growth and that she envisages a more dynamic state with an industrial strategy at its heart.
She said she sees economic stability as the first step toward her biggest goal: to focus corporate investment in projects and housing development.
Chancellor Reeves has suggested strengthening the Treasury’s “underpowered” Enterprise Growth Department to improve the UK’s low productivity, and the Industrial Strategy Council will report to the department.
Reeves is calling for “modern supply-side” economics that takes into account regional disparities, employment rights, health and child poverty as impediments to growth, and is said to be praising the work of Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen in the Joe Biden administration.
Although many, including Labour figures, have pointed out that the party’s mission of achieving the highest growth rates in the G7 is nearly impossible without a return to the EU single market, Reeves denies this. She says she aims to “make, buy and sell more in the UK” and argues that “globalisation as we once knew it is dead”.
There is tension between Mr Reeves and Mr Rayner over promoting workers’ rights but those closest to Mr Starmer’s campaign stress that, unlike their two New Labour counterparts, Mr Reeves and Mr Rayner are aligned on most issues.
“I think certainly Starmer and Reeves’ impression of the opposition is that they are aligned on the mission and have a common understanding of what a potential Labour government wants to achieve,” Norris said. He believes Labour is looking to continue that trend in the transition process. “So I think the question is, how do you try to maintain that common sense of rhythm in the transition?”
Home Office
Yvette Cooper is a former Permanent Secretary to the Treasury and one of the few shadow cabinet ministers with experience as a government frontbencher.
Despite the reported rift between Starmer and Cooper, the two are said to be politically close and virtually aligned on policy issues, most notably their pledge to scrap the Rwanda deportation program, as immigration has historically been one of the party’s electoral weaknesses and could become a hot button issue.
Many of Secretary of State Cooper’s planned reforms to the Home Office involve a return to tradition and aim to “restore pride and purpose”. Recruiting 13,000 extra police officers to tackle the small boat crisis, strengthening border security and introducing new counter-terrorism powers are top priorities.
That would mean hiring a border force commander to lead the operation — a process that people familiar with the matter have said will be open to the public — and names being floated include Neil Basu, a former senior Metropolitan police officer and head of counter-terrorism, and former Metropolitan police commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe.
Cooper’s proposed reforms will include an overhaul of how police tackle anti-social behaviour and violence against women and girls.
Her closest advisers include Danny Shaw, the former BBC home affairs correspondent, and Amy Richards, a loyal press secretary who worked on Mr Cooper’s 2015 leadership campaign.