What lessons from history can Keir Starmer draw on when choosing his chief of staff?

As Tony Blair entered Downing Street for the first time as prime minister in May 1997, a few steps ahead of him walked a new, powerful political constitutional creature: his No 10 chief of staff.

With the precedent established, every prime minister since has followed the Blair innovation in one form or another. Now Keir Starmer is searching for a candidate that could fulfil that role, leading preparations for power and then easing the transition to government if Labour wins.

Since Jonathan Powell, the chief of staff is the most important piece in the advisory jigsaw that potential prime ministers need to assemble. For Blair, the aim was a powerful group of political advisers able to provide the high-quality central direction and leadership from within Downing Street that was believed to be absent from John Major’s government. In addition, they were to address the perception that the government machine had absorbed the values and instincts of the Conservative government that had been in power for 18 years.

Of these advisers, Powell would never compete with Alastair Campbell as the best known of Blair’s inner circle. Indeed, Powell rarely gave interviews, and curious journalists initially even found it difficult to find photographs of him. Neither would he compete with Anji Hunter as the voice of Blair’s middle England political project. Nor could he hope to rival Sally Morgan’s grasp of the machinations of Labour Party politics.

Yet Powell brought something else: a knowledge and experience of government while Blair was in opposition, and a capacity to engage with the machinery of government and get things done for the prime minister throughout his period in office. This contribution meant he stayed the distance, outlasting all of Blair’s other senior advisers and having a central role