Keir Starmer has removed a £100,000 portrait of Margaret Thatcher from a study at Number 10 after finding it ‘unsettling.
The portrait was commissioned by former Labour prime minister Gordon Brown while he was in office in 2009 and depicts the late Iron Lady just after the Falklands War in 1982.
Claims Sir Keir has had it removed were made by his biographer Tom Baldwin, who was also an advisor to David Miliband when he was Labour leader
The painting hung in a study unofficially called the ‘Thatcher Room’, which the Labour leader doesn’t use as his own study.
Some politicians – mostly Conservative – have criticised the move calling it ‘petty’ and ‘vindictive’.
Mr Baldwin was speaking at Glasgow book festival Aye Write when he recalled Sir Keir telling him the study was a ‘place where we can go and have a quiet talk’, the Glasgow Herald reports.
The author told his audience: ‘We sat there, and I go: “It’s a bit unsettling with her staring down at you like that, isn’t it?”‘
He said the prime minister replied: ‘Yeah.’
Mr Baldwin said he then asked if Sir Keir would ‘get rid of’ the portrait, to which Sir Starmer nodded. He then added: ‘And he has.’
The news comes just eight weeks after Sir Keir took office, and months after he praised Baroness Thatcher – who was PM between 1979 and 1990 – in a news article.
In December he wrote in the Sunday Telegraph that she brought ‘meaningful change’ in British politics.
‘Margaret Thatcher sought to drag Britain out of its stupor by setting loose our natural entrepreneurialism,’ he said.
His comments sparked backlash from trade union leaders and left-wing MPs.
Former Conservative leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith believes Lady Thatcher’sportrait was removed to appease the ‘hard left’, reports the MailOnline.
‘It’s a very simple gesture that says to the hard Left, “don’t worry, I share your view of Thatcher as well”‘, he said.
He added: ‘It seems peculiarly petty to remove her picture from the office that she used, which nobody else has used, and which bears her name.’
Meanwhile, former Northern Ireland first minister and Ulster Unionist Baroness Arlene Foster wrote on X: ‘I think it is ‘unsettling’ that the PM should remove the first female PM from No 10.
‘He cannot deny her role in our nation – the most significant PM after Churchill. Not a good start from Labour, looks and feels vindictive and petty.’
In Scotland, the three candidates for the leadership of the Scottish Conservative Party all spoke of their anger at the painting’s removal.
‘Gordon Brown commissioned this portrait after calling the first female prime minister ‘a conviction politician who saw the need for change,’ Russel Findlay said, according to Sky News.
‘I agree with Gordon Brown’s reasonable position to treat his political opponents with decency and respect… Keir Starmer seems to have a much more petty approach.’
Today, Labour Minister Jacqui Smith came to the prime minister’s defence.
Asked on GB News about the portrait and the furore surrounding it, Ms Smith said: ‘Look, Keir Starmer can’t win, can he?
‘A few months ago he was being criticised for talking about Margaret Thatcher’s legacy and the elements of her leadership that he respected, and now he’s being criticised for asking for a few pictures to be moved around.’
She explained that there are still other portraits of Baroness Thatcher on the wall ‘as there are of all previous Prime Ministers in Number Ten’, adding: ‘And that, of course, is absolutely right.’
Among those to speak out against Sir Keir’s praise of Lady Thatcher in December was Fire Brigades Union general secretary Matt Wrack.
He said at the time: ‘Her government deliberately inflicted mass unemployment and poverty on communities through a vindictive pit closures programme and the decimation of the manufacturing industry.’
Baroness Thatcher’s portrait was painted by Richard Stone and paid for by an anonymous private donor.
The Metro has contacted Downing Street for comment.
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