George Osborne divided Britain into ‘Shirkers and Strivers’.¹ Keir Starmer is a Super-Striver, who has had two stellar careers. Firstly, as a senior lawyer and latterly as Prime Minister. He’s a Super Striver but what is his cabinet like? The test: what degree did they achieve at university.

Using Osborne’s categorisations we’ll find out.² Ten of Starmer’s cabinet are shy about their achievements at university. ‘Shy’ is code for shifty and evasive.³ This blog ‘awards’ a default degree, which is ‘Mediocre’ to shy politicians. (Classically this applies to Boris Johnson. His Wikipedia entry boasts he was a King’s Scholar at Eton but is silent about his poor Oxford degree.⁴) Meanwhile, Starmer has nine Super-Strivers in his cabinet. These include the astonishing Angela Rayner who is a working-class hero. She and Wes Streeting have an authentic story of triumph over adversity.

Super Striver

Keir Starmer (PM)                               Oxford MA

Angela Rayner (deputy PM)               University of Life Ph.D. (she left school at 16)

Rachel Reeves (Chancellor)                 LSE MA

Yvette Cooper (Home Secretary)       LSE MA

Ed Miliband (Energy)                          LSE MA

David Lammy (Foreign)                      Harvard MA

Peter Kyle (Science)                            Sussex Ph.D.

Ian Murray (Scotland)                         Edinburgh MA

Lisa Nandy (Culture)                           Birkbeck MA

Striver

Liz Kendall (Work)                               Cambridge 1st

Shirker

Shabana Mahmood (Justice)               Oxford 2nd

Bridget Phillipson (Education)             Oxford 2nd 

Mediocre

Pat Mcfadden, Wes Streeting, Jonathan Reynolds, John Healey, Louise Haigh, Hilary Benn, Baroness Smith, Lucy Powell, Jo Stevens and Steve Reed

Discussion

Does it matter what politicians did in their early 20s? A top degree is an intellectual signal and a character reference. Starmer’s cabinet will be under intense pressure from him and their departmental Civil Servants to conform. How they react is a test of character. This was demonstrated during Johnson’s Partygate days with careerists swallowing the daily humiliations by not resigning.

Good government depends on constructive debate and Starmer’s cabinet looks very promising.

Notes

1 David Cameron’s Cabinet May 2015: Shirkers and Strivers | Odeboyz’s Blog (oedeboyz.com)

2 Liz Truss was described as a “quietly desperate shirker’ in a previous blog using these categories. ibid.

3 It’s believed that Boris Johnson didn’t get a First because he was idle unlike David Cameron who flaunts his success in his Wikipedia entry.

4 Boris Johnson – Wikipedia