Labour's Power Players

If Keir Starmer rides a wave of support from business to No 10 next year, he will have one person in particular to thank. Step forward Vidhya Alakeson, who heads the Labour Leader’s outreach to corporates as his external relations supremo.

Unlike her Conservative counterpart, the former banker Franck Petitgas, Alakeson came to her post through a much more varied set of roles. She founded and led the community business charity Power to Change, was as senior policy researcher at the Resolution Foundation thank tank, and had stints in Whitehall including as a Treasury official.

Alakeson’s breadth of experience has impressed both Labour insiders and business leaders and made her the person Starmer turns to for the final view on who he should be meeting. Her ability to shape strategy and reputed skill at avoiding the factionalism that has often hobbled the Leader’s office means she will be the crucial conduit for industry well into the first term of any Labour administration.

With Alakeson focused on broader stakeholder outreach, she is increasingly relying on an experienced number 2 to get companies on board ahead the election. At her right hand sits Head of Business Relations Ellie Robinson, a veteran of Labour operations who is no stranger to the political frontline.

One of the few remaining faces from Starmer’s 2020 leadership bid, Robinson joined Team Starmer from City Hall, where she was in the thick of London politics as Sadiq Khan’s outreach lead. But her experience in bringing stakeholders on board stretches back much further. Elected a councillor in the London borough of Newham at the age of just 24 in 2010, she rose to become the local Cabinet member for community affairs before moving on to work for Khan when he won his first term.

Robinson has spent her initial few months helping build Labour’s understanding of different business sectors and is taking the lead in running this conference’s Business Forum. But with the election beckoning, her brief is changing. She’ll be looking for businesses willing to be more proactive in their engagement with Labour, including going on the record in support of party policies. With several election wins under her belt – including her own council races, Ed Miliband’s campaign for Leader and Khan’s mayoral campaigns – she’ll be a formidable force in Labour’s election machine.

Rounding out the refreshed business relations team and joining Alakeson and Robinson as the third member of the trio, is Celebrities and Endorsements Manager, Paul Hilliar.

As a communications specialist, Hilliar brings a different pedigree to the team from his more political colleagues, having first cut his teeth in the entertainment industry. His resume includes working for an impressive list of PR agencies and global brands, founding his own arts charity and even a stint as a West-End actor, where he starred as Detective Sergeant Trotter in Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap.

Hilliar will now be on the case to find as many celebrities as he can to publicly back Starmer’s bid for PM, using his industry links and business contacts to build out the Labour bandwagon with some famous faces. Though he regularly meets industry representatives, his focus is to add a touch of stardust to those willing to endorse the party in the run up to the next election and try and add some serious star power to Labour’s national campaign.

After two years of steadying the ship, Starmer brought in an experienced adviser who could help shape and articulate Labour’s vision and tighten up their communications strategy. Who did he turn to? Tony Blair’s former Head of Strategic Communications, Peter Hyman.

Having spent nearly a decade working as a speechwriter for the last Labour Government, Hyman brings comms and policy chops to Starmer’s operation, further adding to the ranks of Blairites surrounding the Labour leader. Credited with coming up with Labour’s 5 National Missions, Hyman has brought a sense of direction to the party’s communications output as the party starts to develop its manifesto - which he is intricately involved in.

His experience also extends to education policy: he set up two schools and a charity as a headteacher following his time in government, which makes him a trusted source of advice on both schools and now tech policy, and is one of the few people in LOTO thinking about what Labour’s digital policy offer will look like. Hyman is firmly embedded across everything the party is doing and will be at the heart of Labour’s final offer to the country in the months to come.

As the manager of Starmer’s diary, Jill Cuthbertson is the gatekeeper through which all who wish to see Starmer must go through – and she guards and manages his time fiercely.

A stalwart of the Labour movement, she previously worked on the EU Remain campaign, was Head of Scheduling for Ed Miliband during his time as leader and has worked with both Gordon Brown and Cherie Blair. Cuthbertson now brings all this experience to bear as Starmer’s Private Secretary, and she has managed to navigate the wider party deftly and is impressively well-liked across the movement - no easy feat in recent years.

Ultimately, it’s Cuthbertson who decides who gets in front of Starmer and when, giving her a degree of access, influence and power that means she is now one of the best-connected people in LOTO. Given Starmer’s lack of factionalism or true political allies, her value has never been higher as the Labour leader navigates the wider Labour movement on the treacherous path to power.