Tristram Hunt on why the Labour Party needs 'a bit of a laugh' and the appeal of Justin Trudeau

After laughing at Labour’s leadership during the party conference, MP and historian Tristram Hunt tells Susannah Butter about putting the fun back into politics and the appeal of Justin Trudeau
Blond ambition: Tristram Hunt, Labour MP for Stoke-on-Trent Central
Daniel Hambury

After the Brexit vote and two leadership elections what the Labour Party needs now, says MP Tristram Hunt, is “a bit of a laugh”. “There are quite a few people on the moderate side of the party who are a bit bruised,” he says. “They needed a chance to be rumbustious at conference.”

At Sunday’s Progress rally, the historian-turned-politician injected some exuberance into proceedings with a spirited speech that verged on stand-up comedy. He joked about “Labour Amazonians who once upon a time were held hostage by a far-Left party”. Now he says: “At my first conference 20 years ago the old Lefties told incredibly rude jokes about the leadership. With Jeremy and John McDonnell in charge the Progress rally has become the dissenting space. Everyone gets jumpy about making jokes about the leadership so that was probably the last hurrah.”

Hunt has returned from Liverpool in high spirits, pronouncing it in an unashamedly terrible Merseyside trill and lamenting not having made it to the Labour LGBT disco. He is 42, wears a white shirt with the collar undone and has the sort of lantern jaw, blond thatch and confidence usually reserved for Tories — indeed many have wondered if he is too traditionally handsome to be in the Labour party.

We meet in his Westminster office, a prime spot overlooking Parliament Square: “Sad story: I inherited it from the former leader of Scottish Labour, Jim Murphy. Scottish Labour’s collapse freed up a lot of real estate.” There are books about JMW Turner and the purges in Stalin’s Russia on the table and more history tomes line the shelves, alongside Union Jack flags in a jug by Emma Bridgewater, whose factory is his constituency of six years, Stoke-on-Trent Central.

Hunt voted for Owen Smith to take over as leader and was on a list of 14 Labour MPs who Corbyn’s campaign team said were undermining the party. Today he is obedient but with the air of a child who knows it’s not worth their while to be naughty just now. In quasi-serious tones, a glint in his blue eyes, he says: “Jeremy’s been elected once and twice so if you want a Labour government you have to support the leader.” “Everyone keeps talking about unity, which is good,” he says. “But the unity we need is a slightly more unified relationship with the British public with policies for what we used to call hardworking families. If Theresa May comes and eats our lunch on minimum-wage, apprenticeships, education and social mobility, which are our core terrain, and we’re still talking about elections to the NEC then we’ll be in difficulty.”

MANY of Labour’s problems crystallise around the EU and Hunt says it was “weird and bad that delegates voted not to discuss Brexit at conference. That seems like quite a biggie to thrash out. One of the biggest things about Brexit was the country’s relationship with London, the extraordinary investment in it, which is needed, but also the sense of the rest of the UK not enjoying the same riches. Labour’s powerful in London now so it’s a good vehicle to think about it.” He looks animated at the thought of a challenge.

Can Corbyn win a general election? “We can win it,” he says in a feeble tone. “European politics is in total flux but the mistake in the UK was to think everyone will go Left because they’ve seen the crisis of capitalism. In fact they hold on to what they have. If you want them to go on a radical journey they also need to feel trust and confidence, which is why the only person who has done it is old smiley Trudeau out in Canada because he had that name, tradition and bankability but with it quite a radical anti-austerity programme. It’s sort of brilliant.” On the other side there’s “The Donald”, although Hunt doesn’t rate him.

Over here, “the Left had lost an election and thought, ‘we might as well have some of that old-time religion’”. He calls Momentum’s approach “algorithm politics”, influenced by “tech-savvy idealists”. “It’s like how on Amazon they find what you like and give you more of it — there’s no countervailing voice, so you work yourself up into more righteousness: all Tories are evil, Blairites are wrong.”

It isn’t sustainable, though. “To win a general election you have to get a lot of people who voted Tory to vote Labour and if you’re telling them they’re bastards that’s not a very inviting way to think about pursuing a different future. If we think we can only win by getting non-voters and Green voters to vote Labour then we’re not going to achieve it. You win politics from the centre ground and then move it when you’re in power.”

He continues: “Having been a member of the Labour Party for more than 20 years what gets my back up is people having just joined telling us we’re Tories and should leave and everything is our fault. They think they have ownership of the party when actually Labour has gone through many forms.”

History gives Hunt perspective. “There is a disturbing socialist tradition of ‘if you’re not with us in pure socialism you are against us’ — and even Marx and Engels were more pluralist than some members of Momentum. But what you learn is that these revolutions eat their own children. They think they are the purest at the moment but they won’t find themselves so pure soon.”

Anti-Semitism in the Labour party is “worrying”. “The Shami Chakrabati inquiry was a missed opportunity. It was a lightweight report. There are deep problems — in student unions and at Labour Party conference. You have to be unequivocal about anti-Semitism and understand it is not the same as racism and there is a class element — people assume members of the Jewish community are wealthy so the Labour party can put them to one side, and they also regard Israel as a colonial force so therefore we are against it.” He also sympathises with colleagues who have faced “misogyny and an ugly strand in hard-Left politics”.

Still, Hunt is sticking with it. He’s indignant when I ask if he’d consider founding a new party. “No. It’s deep within the blood. This is my party. Labour goes in waves but you make your case within the party.” He proudly says his father was a Labour councillor and his great-aunt “did great early years work in the GLC”.

Is he the man to save the party? He doesn’t say no to becoming leader one day. “The party’s heading in a slightly different direction to that. Globally, the centre-Left is up against austerity economics, the financial crash and the politics of the European Union. It’s pretty hardcore and going to take some heavy lifting and time.”

Since he was elected Hunt has been held back by his name and background. He went to private school, UCS in north London, then Trinity College Cambridge, where he was in Footlights with Sacha Baron Cohen. This means he’s sympathetic to the far-Left when they are accused of being upper-middle-class and out of touch: “I am vulnerable as Tristram Hunt. I come from a privileged background so I’d never throw stones in glass houses. You’re born into a family but it’s how you live your life.”

He’s been mistaken for Zac Goldsmith and told to “buck my ideas up if I wanted to be mayor”. Still, he wouldn’t change his name. His children, Digby, Margot and Lydia, go to the local state primary in Finsbury Park. “I’ve no intention of sending them to a private school but every parent does the best for their child and it’s a huge struggle in London.”

His wife, Juliet Thornback, works three days a week at her homewares design business so does the majority of childcare but they “box and cox”. He even has “some terrible Tory friends — I’m not as tribal as some”.

When shadowing Michael Gove as Education Secretary he grew to respect him. “It’s a sort of secret,” says Hunt in a low voice. “But there were talks before the election about how myself, David Laws and Michael could agree not to throw up in the air things like the primary school curriculum. But then Michael got purged and Nicky Morgan didn’t want to do that.”

He appears to be chomping at the bit to make practical change on a grand scale. “There’s a great charity called West London Zone which focuses on early years, sport and the bits around education. In Stoke-on-Trent we’ve raised a million quid to hire maths teachers — wouldn’t it be great if we could roll that out across the country? Being in opposition is frustrating because you want to get stuff done.”

Is he tempted to return to a quieter life in academia? “I’m endlessly behind on the books I’m meant to be writing but there are moments I slip into the archives in Stoke and that recharges my batteries.”

Right on cue, the bongs of Big Ben sound. “Politics is fun, and you have that,” he says gesturing at the view. “But you want to be achieving things, not just protesting and holding to account — and that’s where we have to get to. It’s a profound privilege being an MP but you want to have Labour in charge. That’s what we’re here for.”

Follow Susannah on Twitter @susannahbutter

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