19 October 2023 , 09:45
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A billionaire banker has thrown his weight behind Keir Starmer in the latest coup for the Labour leader.
BlackRock chief Larry Fink, boss of the world’s largest asset manager, praised Mr Starmer’s “real strength” in bringing the party back to the centre ground of politics after Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. “Keir Starmer has shown real strength as a moderate Labour Party,” he told the Wall Street Journal’s Free Expression podcast.
“If you think about the UK, the UK was the one that started the high level of populism through the Brexit, and then the populism here led to Donald Trump being President. Well, we’ll see what happens, if Starmer gets elected in, let’s say a year from now. But I believe that’s a measurement of hope.”
Life-long Democrat Mr Fink, who backed Hilary Clinton’s failed 2016 White House tilt, added: “I’m very pleased to see how the Labour Party in the UK went from an extremist party with a Marxist leader to Keir Starmer who has shown real strength as a moderate Labour Party.”
Larry Fink, seen on the right, in 2017 (REX/Shutterstock)He said the “pendulum went so far there”, when Mr Corbyn seized the party leadership in 2015 following the party’s shock general election defeat. Mr Starmer and Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves have spent months wooing business chiefs in an echo of Tony Blair’s charm offensive in the run-up to the 1997 general election, where Labour toppled the Tories. This month’s party conference in Liverpool saw thousands of Labour activists and delegates mingle with businessmen and women who flocked to Merseyside to hear from frontbenchers.
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Mr Fink’s endorsement will be welcomed by the party hierarchy as another sign of how far back to the centre Labour has moved since Mr Starmer was elected leader in April 2020. He claimed the reins after Mr Corbyn was forced to quit having led the party to its worst general election defeat since 1935. Mr Starmer set about ridding the grassroots of anti-Semitism which took hold under his predecessor, before positioning the party back to the centre ground.
However, the backing from the BlackRock boss could be exploited by hard left activists who claim the party has shifted too far to the right by adopting a string of business-friendly policies. The firm is best known in the UK for employing Conservative austerity Chancellor George Osborne. He became an adviser to the Wall Street giant in January 2017, six months after quitting the Treasury in the wake of the Brexit referendum where he campaigned to Remain.
Taking up his role, Mr Osborne said at the time: "BlackRock wants better outcomes for pensioners and savers and I want to help them deliver that." He joined his former chief of staff, Rupert Harrison, who was a senior strategist for the US investment firm. Hailing Mr Osborne’s arrival, Mr Fink said then: "George has a unique and invaluable perspective on the issues that are shaping our world today.” However, millionaire aristocrat Mr Osborne left BlackRock in February 2021 to take a job at investment bank Robey Warshaw.
A BlackRock spokeswoman said: “Larry was offering his observations on the transformation of the Labour Party and his view that political parties moving back toward the centre was a measurement of hope. He was not offering an endorsement of any political party.”