What is a working person? This question dominated the lead-up to Labour’s first Budget in over 14 years. After Rachel Reeves stood at the despatch box and announced tax rises for farmers, business owners and entrepreneurs, it’s at least become clearer who Keir Starmer doesn’t mean when he talks about working people. Since then, the Prime Minister has had to deny that he is mounting a class war by targeting private schools and landowners. Yet class is an important part of Starmer’s political project – with the work beginning long before he entered Downing Street.
‘I thought people were looked down on for how they voted. I thought there was no empathy with why somebody might have voted to leave the European Union’
In Starmer’s team, one group of voters – disengaged Leave voters who might have taken a punt on Boris Johnson in 2019 – are viewed as integral to Starmer’s election victory and keeping him in No.
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