Senior Reporter
derek.achong@guardian.co.tt
Newly elected United Kingdom Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, KC, has a long-standing connection with T&T stretching back almost three decades from his work as a leading human rights advocate.
In the late 1990s, Starmer was among a group of UK attorneys who lent their expertise to local legal luminaries and their junior attorneys pursuing cases challenging the death penalty and human rights issues in the criminal justice system.
When Starmer applied to be a Queen’s Counsel in 2002, he sought a recommendation from now-deceased Senior Counsel Desmond Allum, with whom he worked on several cases.
Former Law Association vice president Rajiv Persad, SC, who now heads Allum Chambers, recounted his experiences with Starmer, a founding member and consultant at the law firm he now heads.
“Keir Starmer was part of a team of English lawyers who were advocating fair trial rights for prisoners in the Caribbean and were basically working on challenging the constitutionality of the death penalty in the region,” he said.
“It was a vehicle by which Caribbean lawyers would come, meet and work with the English lawyers to ensure that persons who were being prosecuted for murder were going to get the best levels of representation in keeping with fundamental fairness and European human rights standards.”
Describing Starmer as measured, proportionate and strategic, Persad added: “He would take an argument and just break it down limb by limb.”
Persad noted that before his life in UK politics, Starmer helped author Blackstone’s Human Rights Digest, which became the leading legal textbook on human rights in the Commonwealth.
“He had not only the ability to be strategic and articulate but he had a large knowledge base which made him a formidable advocate,” he said.
Persad recounted how Starmer appeared alongside him and Allum in Allum’s first case before the UK-based Privy Council where they challenged the legal representation afforded to Ann-Marie Boodram, who was convicted of murdering her husband by poisoning in 1994.
“That was a landmark case. The trial counsel had failed to represent the woman properly and the case talked about the competence of counsel,” he said.
Persad noted that while serving as the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) of England and Wales, Starmer was invited to give a lecture entitled: “Must the prosecution of crime be at the expense of human rights?”
“We were trying to get across to people that you can prosecute people successfully, yet strike a balance with human rights. It was an important topic and it (the lecture) was really oversubscribed,” he explained.
Persad noted that Starmer’s work on local cases was not limited to advocacy before the Privy Council as he also led cases before the High Court, including extradition proceedings against businessman Ish Galbaransingh (now deceased) for corruption charges arising out of the construction of the Piarco International Airport.
“I remember in the stages of the extradition, Keir led me on behalf of Ish Galbaransingh. He would have come and been involved locally and would have appeared in the High Court,” Persad said.
Persad also pointed out that Starmer did cases with King’s Counsel Edward Fitzgerald, with whom he jointly headed Doughty Street Chambers and who continues to frequently appear in local cases.
“Edward and Keir were like a tag team. Together they were formidable. What made them so great was Edward had his style and Keir was the opposite,” he said.
He revealed that Allum provided a recommendation when Starmer applied for “silk”.
“Mr Allum was predominantly a local lawyer but had a practice in London. He was highly regarded. If it wasn’t for Mr Allum I would not have been introduced to Keir,” he said.
Persad noted that Starmer’s name is still listed on a sign at the front of his chambers at Shine Street in Port-of-Spain, which is named after his legal mentor.
Attorney General Reginald Armour, SC, also recounted his experiences with Starmer.
“I have had the distinct privilege and pleasure of working in T&T and on Privy Council work on human rights and death penalty cases with recently elected Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, SC, when he and I were both junior barristers,” Armour said.
“He is bright and hard-working, a complete professional and of the utmost integrity,” he added.
Armour said he planned to send Starmer a congratulatory message.
“I will be sending to him my warm personal congratulations and that of the Government of T&T through the UK High Commission Office in Port-of-Spain, wishing him well and assuring him of my every assistance in my capacity as Attorney General,” he said.
“The people of the United Kingdom are in very good hands under his leadership.”
Starmer, the son of a nurse and a toolmaker, was born in 1962.
In 1987, Starmer was called to the bar. In 1990, Starmer was among the founding members of Doughty Street Chambers and specialised in human rights, international law, judicial review, extradition, criminal law, police law and media law.
Before being appointed Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and head of the Crown Prosecution Service in 2008, Starmer appeared in numerous human rights and death penalty cases in the Commonwealth including T&T.
After his term ended, Starmer successfully contested the 2015 UK general election securing the Holborn and St Pancras constituency in London.
He served as an MP and held shadow ministerial roles before being elected head of the Labour Party after its resounding defeat in the 2019 general election.
He spent almost four and a half years as Leader of the Opposition before leading the party to a landslide victory over the Conservative party in Thursday’s election.
Starmer met his wife Victoria Alexander, a solicitor, in the early 2000s while they were working on the same case. They have two children together.