BORIS JOHNSON: The inspirational teacher who transformed the lives of so many disadvantaged children – and whose life's work puts Starmer and the vindictive hatred of left-wing aspirations to shame

This week I went to a packed church in North London to say goodbye to a very great man. This was Ray Lewis, 61, my former deputy mayor of London, former prison guard, former priest and one of the most inspiring teachers I have ever seen in action.

There were hundreds of us in that congregation, singing, clapping, shouting our praises of Ray's life and work, and of course there were many of his former students.

One by one, they came to the front and explained what Ray had done for them, how he had changed their lives. They cried tears of gratitude.

They came from quite difficult areas of London, and some of them, young black boys and girls, had grown up without a father figure. If things had gone differently, they could have been drawn into London's gangs. They could have been victims of knife crime, bleeding on the sidewalks during the resurgence of the plague just described, in these pages, by Harriet Sergeant.

They could have been another statistic in Mayor Khan's miserable record.

Each of them, however, had been blessed by Providence and in one way or another referenced the East Side Young Leaders Academy, a sort of boot camp that Ray had founded more than 20 years in a seemingly modest room in the Newham district.

There, under the tutelage of the Guyanese with the resounding but tiny voice, these children discovered discipline.

Ray gave them such self-confidence and ambition that they won places and scholarships at some of the best schools in the country: Rugby, Lancing, Eton, Sherborne School for Girls, City of London and others. They went from these schools to some of the best universities in the world.

From its humble beginnings, the East Side Young Leaders Academy has nurtured cohort after cohort of children, so that there are already 1,300 alumni, and with three additional academies and growing partnerships with private schools, there has more and more young people who have I climbed a ladder of opportunities invented by Ray Lewis.

I sat there, listening to these tributes, and wondered if there ever was such a noble and beautiful educational mission. Surely no one could be blind enough or grumpy enough to want to bring down that ladder.

Surely no politician would ever be stupid enough to make it harder for these young people to realize their potential.

Would they do it? Oh but they would. Never underestimate the wickedness of the left, its incessant desire to seek out tall poppies and cut off their heads.

The truth is that for 20 years, left-wingers in London have been angry with Ray. They deplored his methods. They complained about his discipline on the parade ground. They complained about his jokes and his complete refusal to be politically correct.

Through various ruses, they repeatedly attempted to thwart his ambitions and close his school, regardless of the needs of his charges. They resented Ray because he was the living, breathing reject of their wretched socialist ideology.

Their message to these children was that their destiny was sealed at birth and that their life chances depended entirely on their social class, their race and the entire inescapable socio-economic matrix of their origin.

Ray's message to these children was entirely different.

Ray replied: No. He said, to hell with all this left-wing fatalism.

Ray told them they could achieve great things.

He believed as I did that you will find talent and potential fairly evenly distributed in our country; and he believed it was his job, with his unique formula, to unlock that potential.

These young leaders could feel the sincerity of his confidence in them and of course it made them believe in themselves; and that is at least part of why they have succeeded academically and continue to succeed in so many areas of life.

For two decades the formula worked and the program expanded, because the fee-paying schools were willing and increasingly enthusiastic partners, subsidizing East Side students and many others, in a process that has expanded to the point where 20 percent of Eton children receive some sort of financial aid in the form of scholarships.

Surely any sane person would want this type of support to continue. I want more and more young people to get their foot on that ladder of opportunity, because that's what I mean by moving to the next level and that's one of the reasons why I'm really dreading it now. perspective of Starmer and Labor.

If they get in, they will do something that Tony Blair never did, because he was far too sensible. They will hit fee-paying schools with 20 percent VAT.

This is pure revenge. This will paralyze some schools. Of course we want to improve all schools in this country. Of course, this is by far the most important thing we can do in politics, which is why the government I led invested so much money, increased starting salaries for teachers, funded teachers to go to schools and regions that really needed them, expanded the academy. program and much more.

But how does this help all these schools crucify the relatively small fee-paying sector? This will do nothing to raise academic standards or achievement, not in a single class. This will do nothing to improve our national productivity or add a cent to GDP. Quite the contrary.

This will mean that fee-paying schools will be forced to sell more and more places to rich children from abroad, so that young people from this country will find it increasingly difficult to get into them.

By imposing a 20 per cent tax on these schools, Starmer will make it much harder for them to receive the scholarships that have helped children like Ray Lewis's pupils.

You have to wonder why Starmer is doing this, why he is so destructive, anti-Blair and hostile to aspirations.

Is it for tax revenue? Of course not. The sums collected would be fiscally insignificant, and subject to the law of diminishing returns, since the tax would tend to put schools out of business.

Some believe this is just a gesture to his left-wing MPs, and that Starmer – who attended a fee-paying school – will find an excuse, once in power, not to move forward. I fear it's worse than that.

The terrible truth about Starmer is that he is far to the left of Blair and by attacking these schools he is revealing his true colors and the true instincts of today's Labor Party.

They want to punish excellence. The Conservatives want to promote excellence everywhere.

Labor wants to level down. The Conservatives want to take it to the next level.

It is clear that Starmers’ Labor Party wants to take away opportunities from those who need them most.

When I think about what a Labor government would mean for the life chances of those kids at Rays academies, it makes me boil with rage.

Many Starmers simply want to punish their aspirations and they must not be allowed to succeed.

As for Starmer himself – who benefited from a scholarship to his private school – it is utterly monstrous that he is making it even harder for schools to offer exactly the same type of financial aid that gave him a such a crucial boost in life.