Keir Starmer pays tribute to late brother’s ‘resilience and personal courage’

Sir Keir Starmer has spoken about his late brother’s difficulties at school, lauding his sibling’s "resilience" and "personal courage".

The Labour leader said his younger brother’s experiences had "shaped" his life, as he welcomed Sir Lewis Hamilton to Downing Street for a discussion on supporting young people in education.

Nick Starmer, who had learning difficulties due to complications at birth, died last year at the age of 60, after being diagnosed with cancer.

The Prime Minister previously said his younger brother was “wonderful” and recalled how he met “all the challenges life threw at him with courage and good humour”.

Sir Keir said he knew from his brother how much "resilience and personal courage" was required to deal with struggles at school.

“(My brother) really struggled at school — and had difficulties learning, not because of a learning difficulty, but because then in his time he was pushed to one side and treated as someone who would never learn,” he said.

“He struggled a lot as a result of that. You might think someone who sits here as Prime Minister has no idea what it’s like to struggle at school, but I know from my own brother what it was like, and how much resilience and personal courage he had to have.

“That shaped his life, and shaped my life as well”.

In discussion with a group of young people and the Formula One racing driver, whose Mission 44 charity aims to make the education system more inclusive, Sir Keir said he would keep them in “our mind’s eye” when formulating policy.

“As I said to some of you earlier, sometimes politics is about big decisions, policies, data analysis, and speeches,” he said.

“But, most of the time, it’s about who do you have in your mind’s eye when you make a decision?”

The Prime Minister added: “I will take away the work that Lewis is doing. The importance of your discussions — whether in this advisory or elsewhere — so that we have got you in our mind’s eye when we make decisions about what to do, so let’s get on with it.”

As part of the talks, Sir Keir said the Government would develop a “best practice framework” to “help schools increase pupil engagement”, Downing Street said.

The meeting came as the Department for Education expanded its free school meals programme to ensure all pupils in England whose families claim Universal Credit will be eligible for the scheme.

Campaigners and education leaders had argued the move was necessary to ease pressures on young people living in poverty.

Labour has also been facing pressure, including from within party ranks, to abolish the two-child benefit cap amid record highs in child poverty.

Sir Keir has indicated he is considering scrapping the limit amid the prospect of a backbench rebellion, but declined to give further details ahead of the publication of the Government’s flagship child poverty strategy in the autumn.