Politics professor Tim Bale says he's "absolutely sure" that the debilitating disease suffered by Keir Starmer's mother had an effect on the political outlook of Britain's Labour Party leader. In a wide-ranging interview about the man tipped as the UK's next prime minister, Bale says "I think he learned that anyone could be struck down by misfortune in life and that they needed the help of the state in order to help them... And if that requires some redistribution, then so be it." Starmer grew up in the Conservative voting Surrey town of Oxted, in what he describes as a working-class home. As he often mentions on the campaign trail, his father was a tool-maker and his mother was a nurse, but she suffered from the rare inflammatory condition Stills Disease which often left her bed-bound. IMAGES AND SOUNDBITES IMAGES of Tim Bale and of Keir Starmer's childhood home and hometown AND SOUNDBITES of Tim Bale