The minister was incandescent. ‘What are they trying to do to her?’ he raged. ‘Why did they send her to London Fashion Week in the middle of this storm over her dresses? They’ve turned her into a cross between Victoria Beckham and Cruella de Vil.’
I don’t know the Prime Minister’s wife, Lady (Victoria) Starmer. And from what I can ascertain, very few Westminster journalists do either. Dispute her grandiose honorific, she is a women who shuns the limelight. A former lawyer who retrained as an occupational health therapist, since her husband’s elevation to the Labour leadership she has opted to stay in the background, a supportive but unobtrusive presence.
She has conducted no personal interviews, and refused point-blank to allow her family to be used as a political backdrop. She shunned the campaign trail during the election. She has reportedly recoiled at suggestions she could make a short introduction to Sir Keir during his leadership speeches at Labour Party conference.
And her reward has been to be thrown to the wolves. By a Downing Street that only two months into office already appears drunk on hubris, and blind to its own arrogance and hypocrisy.
Lady Victoria Starmer at London Fashion Week on Monday. Her borrowed outfit, created by British Canadian designer Edeline Lee, included a £615 pussy-bow blouse and matching £715 wide-leg trousers in cream, and was decorated with a Dalmatian-like spot motif
The way in which Keir Starmer’s advisors have managed the ‘Wardrobegate Scandal’ – the revelation that Labour donor Lord Alli gifted the Prime Minister and Lady Starmer tens of thousands of pounds of clothing, and was given a pass to No 10, has now moved from the incompetent to the almost criminally negligent.
As the row raged on Tuesday, fuelled by the news that the specific gift to Lady Starmer – dresses and the services of a personal shopper worth about £5,000 – had not been properly declared in the register of members’ interests, the Prime Minister’s most senior aides incomprehensibly allowed his wife to go to the Edeline Lee fashion show at Millbank Tower.
According to Tatler, ‘the new doyenne of Downing Street made her London Fashion Week debut in a full ensemble by British Canadian designer Lee, who has, in the past, dressed the Princess of Wales and Dame Helen Mirren. Her borrowed outfit included a £615 pussy-bow blouse and matching £715 wide-leg trousers in cream, decorated with a navy polka-dot motif, said to be inspired by an artwork from the London based Italian artist Carolina Mazzolari’.
As Lady Starmer sat enjoying ‘the al fresco catwalk show’, the Tories were demanding a full parliamentary investigation into Wardrobegate, and Labour MPs were digesting the statement by Unite General Secretary Sharon Graham condemning their Party’s ‘cruel’ cut to pensioner’s winter-fuel payments.
‘What were they thinking?’ another cabinet minister asked me. ‘I just don’t understand how they can have been this crass. Especially with the winter fuel thing already killing us.’ I can.
In a flattering red ME+EM dress, with her newly elected Prime Minister husband, the couple arrive for the first time at No 10 Downing Street in July
There are too many people around Keir Starmer who woke up on the morning of Friday, July 5, saw the size of their majority and thought ‘job done’. So much of their focus had been on the so-called ‘Ming-Vase’ strategy of sliding surreptitiously into power without scaring the voters, insufficient thought had been given into what would happen when they got there.
As one aide admitted: ‘We spent the past five years hanging on so tightly that the day we won a lot of people went: “Thank God. We’ve made it. Now we can relax a bit”.’
Another problem is the overbearing streak of self-righteousness that runs through the heart of the Starmer project. There is a genuine sense among his inner-circle – primarily perpetuated, in fairness, by the Prime Minister himself – that they are ‘the good guys’. They genuinely believe they occupy a position of such moral superiority in relation to their despised Tory opponents that whatever they do or say is, by definition, pure and true.
When I asked a Minister close to Starmer how the Lord Alli scandal had been allowed to happen, he was honestly perplexed. ‘Lord Alli has been around the leader’s office for years,’ he said. ‘He’s a fixture. It’s not like he’s an outsider buying his access.’
But that’s exactly what he is. There is no distinction between a wealthy donor paying for a Prime Minister’s wardrobe and paying for his wallpaper. But Starmer and his team genuinely cannot see the synergy. And, more importantly, the hypocrisy.
Touching down in Washington, this time Victoria effortlessly carries off a pristine white dress, ready to attend a Nato summit in July
Another factor has been, ironically, Lady Starmer’s reticence to embrace the trappings of power.
Unlike previous Prime Minister’s wives – such as Cheri Blair or Carrie Symonds – she has not appointed a personal press officer or advisor. She has not attempted to assert any personal political influence, or obtain an independent profile. And instead, she has relied on the Prime Minister’s own group of advisors to guide her.
‘She hasn’t got her own team,’ one senior Labour advisor observed. ‘She’s been taking advice from Keir’s guys. And to be honest, they’ve let her down.’
Incomprehensibly and inexcusably. The failure to grasp the toxic optics of the catwalk visit was bad enough. But even more unforgivable was the advice to accept the Alli donation in the first place. Especially given Lady Starmer had been offered complimentary dresses by a number of fashion labels, but declined them.
Given the numerous ceremonial events she has to attend – many of them on the world stage – there would have been no issue had she chosen to promote UK fashion in that way. And the charges of sleeze and cronyism would have been easily avoided.
As it is, Lady Starmer finds herself caught in the very trap her husband constructed for his predecessors. Labour had no qualms about targeting Boris Johnson or Rishi Sunak’s spouses when the opportunity arose. And so as soon as Wardrobegate broke, Mrs Starmer immediately became fair game.
Looking ever more sophisticated in dark sunglasses and a silky dark green suit, Victoria and her husband enjoy a day out at the Betfred St Leger Festival at Doncaster Racecourse on Saturday
Over the past 48 hours some people have over-excitedly claimed the scandal could bring down the Prime Minister, or even his Government.
It won’t. But it still has the potential to do significant damage. When a Prime Minister’s partner starts generating as many headlines as the Prime Minister himself, major political pain invariably follows.
The bizarre scandal involving Cherie Blair, her lifestyle coach Carole Caplin and Caplin’s fraudster boyfriend Peter Foster destabilised Tony Blair’s government for months. The open warfare between Carrie Symonds and Boris Johnson’s most senior advisors went a long way towards perpetuating his downfall.
When I was out on the campaign trail, I lost count of the number of voters who referenced the personal wealth of Sunak’s wife Akshata Murty, and claimed (falsely) she had ‘done something dodgy with her taxes’.
Lady Starmer is not this Government’s Cruella de Vil. Or its Victoria Beckham. She is a private woman, who wishes to support her husband, but remain in the political background. It’s time for his advisors to shelve the hubris and hypocrisy, and make sure she returns there.