Keir Starmer is carrying his precious ‘victory vase’ across a very slippery floor

If there is anyone who knows the danger of hubris, it is Jack Straw, who reflects on a difficult week for Labour after the party leader’s good campaign start. Here, he explains why anything can happen from here, and that history tells us early leads in polls can often turn out to be a false dawn

Tony Blair went three for three and Neil Kinnock (inset) lost out in 1997, both faced challenges along the way as Starmer will too, no matter how inevitable things may seem (AFP/Getty/PA)

You never ever felt like that,” was my wife’s response when I told her that I had been asked to write about how it feels to fight an election when you think you are going to win. The 1997 general election was the sixth I’d fought as a candidate. Yes, Labour has beaten the Tories occasionally. In 1964, only just. For months we’d been ahead in the polls; but they narrowed and narrowed. On the day we had just a one-seat margin over all other parties.

In February 1974 (when I was Labour candidate for that socialist redoubt of Tonbridge and Malling) Tory PM Ted Heath had had a seven-point lead when he called the election. It ended in a dead heat. The Tories polled more votes than us, but were four seats down. Harold Wilson formed a minority administration, to scrape a majority in October. That time we had 42 more seats than the Tories, but only two seats ahead of all other parties. In the five years to 1979 we gradually lost our majority, stumbling to defeat against Margaret Thatcher. That was when I was first elected as MP for Blackburn.

Starmer’s strong poll lead has been overshadowed by the row about Diane Abbott and whether she would be allowed to stand as a candidate in the forthcoming election (Getty)