Keir Starmer pays tribute to his late toolmaker dad on Father's Day - after he was mocked for talking about him during Sky election grilling

Sir Keir Starmer has today paid a touching tribute to his late toolmaker dad on Father's Day.

The Labour leader, 61, shared a photo on social media of himself graduating from the University of Leeds as he stands next to his proud parents while his father Rodney holds a camera.

Alongside the snap who posted a heartfelt message that read: 'Today, on Father's Day, I'm thinking about my dad, the things I learned about him after he was gone, and the father I am to my children, because of him. Happy Father's Day.'

He has previously spoken about his regret about his distant' relationship with his father who 'gave up everything' to look after Sir Keir's ill mother.

Rodney - known as Rod - spent a great deal of time tending to Sir Keir's mother, Josephine, who passed away in 2015.

Rod died in 2018 - two years before his son took up his current role.

Sir Keir Starmer has today paid a touching tribute to his late toolmaker dad, Rod, (left) on Father's Day. The Labour leader, 61, shared a photo on social media of him graduating from Leeds university as he stands next to his proud parents as his father Rodney holds a camera

A heartfelt message read: 'Today, on Father's Day, I'm thinking about my dad, the things I learned about him after he was gone, and the father I am to my children, because of him'

Sir Keir has been widely mocked for reminding people about his father's job - most recently this week during the Sky News election debate which drew groans and laughter from the audience.

Discussing his own financial situation, Sir Keir said: 'I accept I earn a lot of money in the job I am now in. But when I grew up my dad was a toolmaker, he worked in a factory.'

As the audience broke into laughter, the Labour leader hit back, responding: 'It's true - my mum was a nurse - and we couldn't make ends meet, which is not a laughing matter.'

Discussing his own financial situation, Sir Keir drew laughter as he told the audience: 'I accept I earn a lot of money in the job I am now in. But when I grew up my dad was a toolmaker, he worked in a factory.

As the audience broke into laughter, the Labour leader hit back, responding: 'It's true - my mum was a nurse - and we couldn't make ends meet, which is not a laughing matter.'

His Father's Day message was cruelly taunted by X/ Twitter users as people teased Sir Keir by asking what his father did for a living.

Another posted the same image but photoshopped to show his father dressed in denim dungarees and holding a toolmaker's kit.

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The tribute posted by the Labour leader today as he remembered his late father. Some X/Twitter users cruelly taunted Sir Keir

The leader of the opposition said his father, Rod (right), never revealed how proud he was of him. Pictured: Sir Keir pictured on his wedding day in 2007 to wife Victoria, with his mother Jo and father Rod in 2007

Sir Keir told Sky News in March that because he 'invested it all' in his ill mother Josephine, the 'emotional space was more squeezed' when it came to him and his father - which he said he wishes he had rectified before it was too late.

 He said: 'I probably should have addressed that before he passed.

'And I wish I had - but I didn't.'

Sir Keir previously opened up about the strained relationship he had with his late father in an emotional new biography.

The leader of the opposition said his father, Rod, never revealed how proud he was of him. Starmer only found out about how he really felt after he passed away.

When he was clearing out his family home, the 61-year-old found a scrapbook hidden in the back of a cupboard that was full of newspaper cuttings.

He added that he's taken the lessons he learned from that relationship into account with his own children - aged 13 and 15.

He continued: 'I do not want to be that bloke - and it usually is a bloke - who in 10 years says I wish I'd spent more time with my children.'

These were all different points of the Labour leader's career, from his time as Director of Public Prosecutions to when he became an MP. Rod had written dates underneath each article.

'I didn't really know what to think about it, why he had taken all that trouble, then hidden it,' he said.

'Dad was proud of me and loved me, even if he couldn't tell me to my face.

'And it's now too late for me to tell him to his face that I was proud of him, that I loved him too.'