Multi-millionaire Tory donor Lord Harris switches support to Labour

A multi-millionaire Tory donor and backer of dozens of academies has switched his support to Labour because he says the Conservatives have run out of ideas.

Lord Harris of Peckham, the founder of The Harris Federation, a charity that runs more than 50 primary and secondary schools across deprived London boroughs, said the Conservatives were no longer the party of high and rising education standards.

Knighted by Baroness Thatcher and elevated to the House of Lords by Sir John Major, he has donated more than £1.1 million to the Conservatives over the past 20 years and has been giving money to the party since the 1980s.

Lord Harris founded Carpetright, the country’s largest carpet chain, after starting work in his family market stall and two shops at the age of 15, but is best known for his contributions to education. He was a close ally of Michael Gove in championing academy schools.

In a letter to The Times, he wrote: “Fourteen years ago, radical change spearheaded by an ambitious and determined Michael Gove brought new ways of teaching and running schools to our education system.

“Academies – including those in the Harris Federation – have been a central part of bringing a renewed focus on high standards, on evidence-led practice in teaching, and on the outcomes a school delivers rather than who runs it or how they like to teach it. The results speak for themselves.

“At this election, it is no longer the Conservatives who are the party of high and rising standards, no longer the Conservatives putting our children and their schools front and centre. Despite a merry-go-round of ministers in recent years, they are out of ideas.”

Mr Gove, who is standing down after Thursday’s election, oversaw an expansion of the academies programme and also allowed groups to set up free schools, outside local authority control.

One of the most expensive free schools established was Harris Westminster, a sixth form that cost £45 million and was supported by the fee-charging Westminster School. It takes pupils from across London, and sends dozens to leading universities each year.

Despite supporting Mr Gove’s education reforms, Lord Harris said: “I have watched with slowly growing admiration as Sir Keir Starmer and Bridget Phillipson, Labour’s impressive education spokeswoman, have set out Labour’s stall.

“She gets teaching, knows that expanding and improving the teacher workforce and tackling the epidemic of mental ill-health among our young people are both vital, and will focus on making schools better, not fiddling with how well run schools are operating.

“At this election, the party for people who care about education is, as it was a quarter of a century back, Labour. The torch of change has passed.”

Last August, Lord Harris gave £5,000 to Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, who was a former pupil at a Harris Academy school.

He told the Telegraph at the time: “The whole situation in politics at the moment is very damaging to the UK.

“Does a party like the Conservatives, with what they have done in the last three years, deserve to get back [in power]? I don’t think so.

“You can’t think of many good things that the Conservatives have done and stuck to. At the last election, they said they were going to open 40 new hospitals in the next five years. Where are they?”

The 81-year-old has become the latest high-profile businessman to donate to Labour ahead of the next election.

Former supermarket chairman Baron David Sainsbury and Gary Lubner, the former Autoglass chief, have both given multi-million-pound donations following a charm offensive by Sir Keir and Ms Reeves.