To not really know what a toolmaker is

[Gabbsters]

Well, I know what the words mean but Keir Starmer keeps saying it like it’s a well known job and I’ve never heard of it. What does it mean? Did he work in a hammer factory?

My Dad was a tool maker and my dm was a nurse.
My dad did very specialised/precision work but he was on the factory floor and was very working class.

20 years ago my DH title was toolmaker. Now he is more advanced in precision engineering but still, a toolmaker is a valid job title within engineering now.

Tbh I thought it meant he made screwdrivers at first. But it's just a normal job, not pretentious or harking back to artisan days. It's a skilled processing position, but depending on area of expertise may not be as well paying as it seems.

Toolmakers are generally well paid, it's a precision engineering job.

My Grandad was a toolmaker when they made tools accurate to 1/1000 of an inch by hand.

Rodney Starmer was a toolmaker. He made Keir - so Keir is a tool.
Usha Sunak sold drugs.

I personally know people who “make things by hand” for a living, and people who milk cows every morning. My brother is a toolmaker by trade. They aren’t 17th century artisans.

Yes, Starmer is making himself look a bit daft by repeating it, but you can’t deny he’s made the most of a no-fees, subsidised living expenses university education.

As have I, and I’m pissed off at a system that slammed the door behind me.

Rubbish

You must be a raving Tory to extrapolate all that from a simple statement about his father's job. Milking cows etc...
Calm down!

My brother could also be described as a toolmaker in his first job after leaving school.

He was sticking screwdriver blades into handles and then graduated to putting the blades onto the belt for others to put into handles.

It was his actual job. But also toolmaker is often listed as an occupation on those civil service-type social mobility questionnaires, the ones they ask to try to get the real salt of the earth employeed.

Exactly. Having a highly skilled manual job did not put you into a middle class social bracket, especially during 60s, 70s and 80s (Fred Dibnah for example!). The poster is looking at class from a modern point of view.

And to previous posters asking why does it matter? There is a detachment between the political elite and the working class, those that go to work everyday. Those that haven't experienced real working life will not be great at representing the people, the average voter. Their interests lie elsewhere. It's obvious really.

We definitely do need more working class MPs!!

I agree. Nothing wrong with politicians being a bit boring. Charisma is what Hitler and Oswald Moseley had. God, if Oswald Moseley was around today people would be voting for him in droves.

Hopefully you meant to quote @ll09sm instead of me? I might be raving but don't you dare call me a Tory... 😉

Excuse me but it very much was not like a health care assistant in pre university degree days!!!
Nurses ran wards, managed services, worked with a huge variety of health conditions with great expertise. There was still three years of training and two final exams to pass.
Not on topic I know but as a nurse I could not let this misinformation stand.

What the actual fuck are you on about?

I fail to see how identity politics has played much of a role in who the PM is given we’ve had a string of Oxbridge Etonians.

My exH was a toolmaker which required a three year apprenticeship/college and he gained a degree equivalent qualification, HND. So an engineer. He's always earned well and is now called a 'mechanical design engineer' and a self employed contractor earning £200 a day (probably more now but we've split so I don't know). Semi retired at 53. It's a good trade.

He's obviously from a less privileged background than the last two Labour PMs, especially Tony Blair, but it sounds like he was what's often referred to as lower middle class, rather than working class.

The last real working class background PM was a Tory. John Major grew up in a council house. And definitely wasn't Oxbridge educated. He left school at 16.

However I agree with previous posters that their backgrounds are irrelevant as to whether they'll make a good PM. I'm more interested in their policies.

The £200 per day was over 10yrs ago when I last knew what he earned. I assume much more now as he owns his 4 bed house in London outright and has lots of holidays, a very nice car and helps our adult kids out financially, for which I'm grateful. And, in his words 'I only take the jobs (contracts) that I want to do and the money is good.'

Before degrees, nurses still used to have training. Similar to teachers (who used to have teacher training colleges).

Here's something on nurse training in the 60s

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/jun/26/life-as-an-nhs-nurse-in-the-1960s

I always giggle when he comes out with the reverential “MyFather was a Toolmaker” BS.
It’s an obsolete job that has been taken over by CNC programming then computing in general. He might as well be boasting that “My Father’s still perfecting ways of making Sealing-Wax” (19th Nervous Breakdown - The Rolling Stones)
An odd thing to harp on about, when those skills aren’t generally required any more, so hardly inspirational for the 21st Century…
Maybe he is subliminally referencing the previous line in that song as a warning to what will undoubtedly happen to anyone who earns a penny over the minimum wage if he gets into power?
(You’ll all be in the position of ”Owes a million dollars tax” for those too young to remember!)

Yes of course I did mis-boxed. Sincere apologies!

He's over-milked the toolmaker line, but I do think his background is relevant after years of political power held exclusively by Eton-and-Oxford types who wouldn't know a hard day's work if it hit them between the eyes. I wish when people accuse him of being boring or "a robot" he would have the chutzpah to say, "Look, I'm not here to entertain you. You're not going to see me doing Strictly, or I'm a Celebrity, or Have I got News for You. It's a serious job, and I'm a serious guy, and I'm not going to apologise for that." As for the pp who said he seemed dim, he really is anything but, and it's about time we had someone smart in number 10, because it's been quite some time.

I agree with this. I've seen so much written about KS that accuses him of being a "champagne socialist", of not coming from a WC background so being out of touch. His school became fee paying whilst he was there. He didn't need to pay and the changes were totally out of his control, but he's still been derided for going to "private"'school. His toolmaker line is in response to all the chatter about him not really coming from a WC background when he really did.
And how can he be dim?! He was the director of public prosecutions. You don't achieve that by being dim.

Well said!

I suppose Starmer repeats this biography info because when people hear "Sir Keir" they assume he came from privilege. Most people only vote based on their general impression of the person and they might only pay attention for 3 seconds. I can't blame him for wanting that impression of his background to be accurate.

made the most of a no-fees, subsidised living expenses university education

No more than everyone else in his generation in UK who got the grades to go to Uni ? Also, the big turning point in his career pathway apparently was when KS passed 11+. Therefore, he went to the Grammar school just before that GSschool became a private school (under a Tory govt?) Which is why his younger siblings went to Comprehensives. Among his siblings, the info in the public domain is that one is an HCA & another is a mechanic.

MNers used to rant about how wonderful the grammar school system was & that it should be brought back...

How many other political leaders have siblings now who have moderately or lower paid manual labour jobs? It wouldn't decide my vote, but it would matter to some voters that there is a good chance that KS gets frequent coalface reports of Cost of Living /Public services problems directly from "ordinary" people who he cares about. Which isn't true for most politicians.