[quote Onetoomuch]@CirclesWithinCircles god you sound condescending. Keir Starmers parents were a tool maker and nurse, he went to a state school. He was a human rights lawyer for years.
Keir Starmer bought the land for his mother years back when he was a lawyer so she could carry on running a donkey sanctuary with her husband. She was unable to walk due to a life limiting illness and the land was bought so she could still be involved. The land is now worth reportedly 10 million. I remember the daily mail using it as ammunition trying to trash him but they ended up looking foolish..
To think that an eton education doesn't bestow advantage is clearly naive, the guy was in the Bullingdon club fgs with other well connected men that he knew from Eton. Maybe read the tatler rather than Agameen Dagblag, you'll get a better handle on class in the UK 
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To come back to this, why do you think I need "a better handle on class in the UK"?
And what gives you the right to write such a condescending comment while simultaneously accusing me of being condescending? Its like me making an assumption that you're racist because you've confused my being raised partly in another country and tendency to read Algemeen Dagblad with actually being gulp not British. So you would actually speak differently to someone you assume not to be British and boss them around and insult them? OMG...
Not to forget, you want to dictate my reading material too! So heres an article about Keir in Tatler for you:
www.tatler.com/article/sir-keir-starmer-owns-land-in-surrey-worth-10-million
Now the reason that Keir bought those 7 acres in the first place is because they are behind his parent's former home, which he sold recently for around £500,000. Its a very ordinary property, but as we all know, thats what properties in that area go for.
I do realise that Labour are all excited to have a Leader who has actually had a proper career for once. But you really are not on a winner with the working class man of the people shtick.
Do you have any idea how difficult it was for anyone other than white men to even contemplate qualifying as a barrister in 1987, when Keir was first admitted? To become a barrister, you need an incredible amount of financial help, because you earn nothing at all for quite a while and have to live within commuting distance of central London, where your chambers will be located. Things have changed a lot in the law since then, but at that time, women were in a tiny minority and mixed race or black people were extremely rare, along with most chambers being in central London. So yes, that is privilege right there. Most people could never afford it, never mind have the confidence to try.
As for the luxury of possessing land worth £10 million and not to have to sell it, again this is champagne socialism at its finest. Now Keir cannot really win here, but I would surmise that his altruism is at least partly explained by the likliehood of selling the land amounting political suicide. But he still has it, as a nice little nest egg when he retires, and use it as security for loans or a mortgage. Even to afford 7 acres of land adjoining Oxted in Surrey when he bought it is beyond the dreams of nearly everyone. It was an incredible investment decision.
I have nothing against Keir Starmer, he is excellent, clever and articulate, although I would like to see him actually offer some opposition and some genuine principles. I do question whether theres much point in anyone with genuine ambitions to be pm bothering to even join Labour at the moment, and for that reason I question whether he really wants the job. Opposition is much easier, you get to blame the real government for any failings and you have no real responsibility. I think its a shame he didn't join another party to use his obvious talents, but then again, which other party does the UK actually have which could provide a proper Opposition?