When a young Keir Starmer turned up to the interview for his first job as a barrister wearing a cardigan, senior counsel had to be persuaded to take him on.
“Keir interviewed badly. He lacked confidence and dress sense and looked about 14,” said Geoffrey Robertson KC, the founder of Doughty Street Chambers, who recruited Starmer. “But he turned out, as could be predicted from his written work, to be brilliant — my new secret weapon.”
The prospective UK prime minister has since had to constantly remould himself to match his ambitions. Dubbed a “lefty lawyer” by rivals, Starmer, 61, made his name as a top human rights barrister in the 1990s at Doughty Street, taking on high profile cases from the “McLibel” lawsuit — acting for environmental activists against McDonald’s — to human rights abuses in Northern Ireland, and a colourful druid called King Arthur Pendragon.