Sir Keir Starmer was 'a bit of a lad’: ex-classmate shares memories of time at school with Labour leader

21 October 2022, 12:36 | Updated: 21 October 2022, 12:42

Keir Starmer was a 'bit of a lad', claims Lord Cooper

Lord Andrew Cooper, who went to Reigate Grammar School with Sir Keir Starmer, tells Nick Ferrari the Labour leader was a “live wire”.

A former classmate of Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer shared memories of his time at Reigate Grammar School.

Nick Ferrari asked: “What do you remember of young Starmer?”

Lord Andrew Cooper said: “I was at school with him, yeah, we were quite good friends at school.

“He was quite different to the personality that people see and criticise today. I see people criticise him for being kind of boring and wooden. He was very lively, very sporty, very musical, a bit of a lad at school.”

Nick chuckled: “You know what’s coming Andrew - what do you mean by ‘a bit of a lad’?”

“He was a live wire, he was a very charismatic individual in social situations”, came Lord Cooper’s reply.

“If there was a bunch of boys in the playground larking around, he would be in the middle of it.”

Nick asked: “Did he regularly get detentions or lines or run round the quad, or whatever it was at Reigate Grammar?”

Lord Cooper said: “I don’t remember that, he may well have done, I certainly got my fair share of detentions and maybe he did too!”

Sir Keir Starmer will be joining Nick Ferrari at Breakfast on LBC to answer questions from listeners. Listen live on global player.

This comes after a tumultuous six weeks in politics which culminated in Liz Truss resigning as Prime Minister.

On Thursday the Leader of the Opposition told Andrew Marr: “We either carry on with this utter chaos...or we have the stability of a Labour government coming in, stabilising the economy with a credible plan for the future.”