Warm water was a luxury in the house where Britain's deputy prime minister Angela Rayner ⁇ grew up. Health minister Wes Streeting was born to a single mother who pawned her jewellery for a living. Racist skinheads profaned black British teenager David Lammy ⁇ ye, now foreign minister, near his home in a poor area north of London.
Britain's current cabinet is made up of 22 high-ranking deputies, including prime minister Keir Starmer ⁇ , and is one of the most working class in the country's history. Only one went to private school, and many spent their first lives in poverty. Mr Starmer, whose father worked in a factory, said his phones were cut off because his parents couldn't pay the bills.
The cabinet resembles many of the people it governs, but the British don't seem to have noticed.
According to a recent public opinion survey, less than one in four people think that the Labour government, which came to power in July, ⁇ cares about people like them, while almost two-thirds of voters think that the government's interests are not bothered by normal people.
This impression was shaped in part by recent revelations that the Labour Party's top figures were accepting free gifts for party donors, including clothes and glasses for Mr. Starmer and dresses for his wife.
But analysts say the apparent inequality between the modest social origins of senior ministers and the way they are perceived underscores the frustration many Britons feel about the system and the political class in general.
