From the corridors of Downing Street to the benches of parliament, the new Labour government is brimming with the alumni of a think-tank that has quietly become one of the most powerful policy factories in Westminster.
The Institute of Public Policy Research, which produced heavyweight ministers including David Miliband and Patricia Hewitt last time the party was in power, can boast of providing Sir Keir Starmer with some of his closest advisers and newest MPs.
Carys Roberts, IPPR director, took a job as a special adviser in Number 10, while Rachel Statham, who headed the group’s work on public services, has also joined the Downing Street policy unit.
At the same time, five new MPs — Chris Murray, Luke Myer, Luke Murphy, Miatta Fahnbulleh and Josh Simons — worked at the IPPR, while another four — Sarah Smith, Yuan Yang, Kirsty McNeill and Hamish Falconer — worked alongside it.
The think-tank’s rising influence also means anyone looking for clues on how the new administration will govern may want to scan the library of research papers produced by the group’s staff scattered across London, Manchester, Newcastle and Edinburgh.
The arrival of a Labour government after 14 years in opposition has led to a spike in the influence of progressive think-tanks, while right-wing rivals find themselves suddenly less relevant.
Other leftish think-tanks can claim to have an influence over Starmer’s approach, including the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change and The Resolution Foundation, whose former director Torsten Bell recently became Labour MP for Swansea West.
But the influx of so many IPPR veterans into government point to the close links between the institute and the new regime.
“IPPR is the think-tank doing the most serious and influential policy work around the Labour party,” Lord Peter Mandelson, former deputy prime minister, told the Financial Times.
Lord Victor Adebowale: ‘We should be critical friends of whoever is in power . . . we are the progressive think-tank for people who are interested in progressive public policies’
Lord Victor Adebowale, IPPR chair, said the think-tank had been “hiding its light under a bushel” in recent years.
The crossbench peer said the group is politically neutral but pointed to the number of its ideas that have already been adopted by Labour.
“We should be critical friends of whoever is in power . . . we are the progressive think-tank for people who are interested in progressive public policies, the government should be looking for new ideas, they’re going to need them,” he said.
“We know how difficult it’s going to be, changing the lives of people should be difficult, it should only be easy in a dictatorship,” Adebowale added.
The IPPR was founded in 1988 and was the spawning ground for several successful politicians from the New Labour era, including former foreign secretary David Miliband and one-time health secretary Patricia Hewitt.
“It was set up as a counterbalance to the growing intellectual firepower on the right during the Reagan-Thatcher era and to encourage an intellectual renewal on the left in the 1990s. Talented people from the IPPR went into government, and now they are again,” says Harry Quilter-Pinner, the interim executive director.
Harry Quilter-Pinner: ‘[The IPPR] was set up as a counterbalance to the growing intellectual firepower on the right during the Reagan-Thatcher era’ © Anna Gordon/FT
“What we are trying to do is create the next generation of ideas and progressive leaders. It’s a testament to the fact that IPPR still basically fulfils that same function, which is the intellectual rigour and ideas powerhouse behind progressive politics.”
Perhaps the IPPR’s most influential report in recent years was the “Prosperity and Justice” paper from 2018, which featured a panel including Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, Dame Helena Morrissey of Legal & General and Dominic Barton of McKinsey and Company.
That document claimed Britain’s economic model was “broken” and required a huge overhaul.
The IPPR’s influence can also be seen on Labour’s health policy. “Our policies on delivering 40,000 more appointments every week at evenings and weekends, and our policy for shared waiting lists across hospitals both came direct from IPPR reports,” said one ally of health secretary Wes Streeting. “It feels like it’s returned to the IPPR we had when Labour was last in office.”
Archbishop Justin Welby speaking at the launch of the IPPR’s ‘Prosperity and Justice’ paper in 2018 © IPPR
It is not always straightforward to draw a line between think-tank papers and the final policies adopted by opposition or governing parties.
Most British research institutes are charities and are not party-aligned, even if they occupy niches on the left-right spectrum.
When the Liberal Democrats announced their plan to provide free personal care for anyone who needed it, they cited IPPR research, suggesting the policy could save the NHS more than £2bn a year.
The Lib Dems have also adopted the group’s proposals for raising taxes on dividends and share buybacks.
But with Labour in power the focus will be on IPPR’s policy ideas that may make it into government. For example, Quilter-Pinner wrote a recent paper on “mission councils”, which have been adopted by the government.
Former IPPR director Roberts in 2021 oversaw a report from the cross-party “Environmental Justice Commission” — co-chaired by Ed Miliband, now energy secretary — which argued that increased annual investment of £30bn was needed to achieve the net zero 2050 target fairly and on time.
That was widely seen as the inspiration for chancellor Rachel Reeves’s “Green Prosperity Plan”, which initially outlined £28bn of spending for low-carbon schemes. Since then, the GPP has been sharply scaled back to around £5bn a year.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s ‘Green Prosperity Plan’ is believed to have originally been inspired by IPPR research © Spencer Platt/Getty Images
The GPP remains one of Labour’s most transformative policies, even in its smaller incarnation: “Rachel Reeves talks about investment and the need for a green transition all the time,” said Quilter-Pinner. “She also recognises that the fiscal constraints are challenging.”
Recent papers that could influence future government policy include an IPPR study on universal credit, co-written by Statham, which recommended tackling the current five-week wait for the benefit by introducing two weeks of backdating for new claims.
Another paper recommended an end to one-word judgments by Ofsted school inspectors, which is in line with Labour’s thinking.
IPPR figures to raise their profile in recent months include Zoe Billingham, director of IPPR North, its regional offshoot, and George Dibb, associate director in charge of the group’s economy and environment team.
Some Westminster observers have seen the hiring of Roberts and Statham as proof that Starmer’s instincts may be more left-wing and less “Blairite” than people imagine.
Lord Adebowale said he had no time for that kind of “factional” debate: “I just don’t care, they want serious people who know their onions,” he said. “There are huge challenges ahead for the Labour government on the economy, public policy and public services and IPPR is very well placed to help them with that work.”
