Dan Wootton: Starmer has made Labour the new nasty party

Keir Starmer decided to make tools the theme of his first major – and I guess by major I mean long, very long – address to a Labour party conference as leader.

But in the end the only tool ended up being the Leader of No Opposition himself.

And not just for droning on for 90-minutes, with various cliches, a hell of a lot of bluster and ample doses of faux emotion.

But the real reason I think Keir was a tool today was because of his personal attacks on the Prime Minister and his family.

A Prime Minister whose sister revealed had buried his recently deceased mother just two days ago.

But that didn’t stop Keir – no surprise given Labour is now unashamedly the country’s nasty party.

It’s interesting he invoked his father throughout the speech given that in June this year in an ITV interview with Piers Morgan he spoke of his very strained relationship with the man who he criticised for having “real difficulty expressing his emotions”.

But he has the cheek to criticise Boris’ dad Stanley – a regular member of my superstar panel – despite the fact the PM has retained a good relationship with him.

After calling him a tool, Keir Starmer’s personal attack on Boris continued.

Irony is not lost on Starmer either it seems. First, he roasted the Tories for exploiting the culture war.

Former Labour MP Laura Pidcock gave a scathing analysis where she "thought it was quite uninspiring.”

And as a heckler at Brighton pointed out today, folk like me will not forget Starmer’s policy on Brexit, a policy designed to overturn the biggest democratic vote in our history.

But you know I’m fair – and there was a moment that brought me real delight.

Starmer committed Labour to being the party of the Union. That’s significant given the only hope of achieving power again in the medium-term will likely require some form of coalition with the SNP.

But this wasn’t a good week for Labour overall – and they are no closer to delivering on their promise of becoming an effective opposition.