Is Labour turning on Keir Starmer?

0:02This is a Global Player original podcast. I'm not willing to sacrifice Scotland's NHS, our schools, our communities, our towns, cities, villages and islands to a third decade of an SNP government. That's why the distraction needs to end and the leadership in Downing Street has to change. That is the leader of Labour in Scotland, Anna Sawa, calling for Keir Starmer to quit. The most senior voice spelling out his belief that things have got too bad for him to stay. And he says his first priorities are to his country, Scotland. Was this the moment that the leadership crisis around Keir Starmer became uncontainable?

0:53Was this the tipping point? Is the Prime Minister, yet another Prime Minister, about to resign? Welcome to The News Agents.

1:07The News Agents. It's Emily. It's Lewis. And we thought when we got up this morning, we'd be talking about the resignation of Morgan McSweeney, Keir Starmer's Chief of Staff, now former Chief of Staff and right-hand man. And we thought at lunchtime that we might be talking about the resignation of Tim Allen, another very close aide to his in Downing Street. But it is now five to three and a question mark is looming really with a greater urgency than I think we have felt at any point over the weekend over what Keir Starmer does next. because this is a pretty senior voice going public and saying he has no confidence in the UK Prime Minister, the leader of his party.

1:58Here's a little bit of Anas Sawa. It is delicately phrased. In fact, in the speech itself, he doesn't directly call on Keir Starmer to go, but it is well briefed and it is very clear by the end what he's intending to say. The situation in Downing Street is not good enough. There have been too many mistakes. They promised they were going to be different, but too much has happened. Have there been good things? Of course there have, many of them. But no one knows them and no one can hear them because they're being drowned out. That's why it cannot continue. I am proud to have played my part in removing a Tory government that was doing so much damage to Scotland.

2:44And having a Labour government matters. I am proud of my Scottish Labour MPs who did the hard work, persuaded our fellow Scots, ran a historic and successful campaign and who have spent every day since fighting for Scotland's interests. Keir Starmer is a decent man. And it is no secret that I have always got on well with him, and he has dedicated his life to public service. I have also dedicated myself to public service, and I need to decide what I'm willing to accept and what I'm willing to tolerate. The people of this great country, Scotland, are crying out for competent government, for transparency, for honesty, and for delivery.

3:32They want to see politics that is open and accountable. They want to see leaders who put the national interest... So this crisis, which has been triggered by the Peter Mandelson affair, by the Epstein files for Keir Starmer, has just reached a new level. And it's reached a new level for a couple of reasons. Morgan McSweeney, as you say, Emily, we thought that we'd be talking about today. And indeed, of course, his departure, the Prime Minister's Chief of Staff, and not just his Chief of Staff, but his principal aide. The reason, frankly, he even is Labour leader and Prime Minister. That's how important Morgan McSweeney has been for him.

4:08Morgan McSweeney, normally prime ministers handpick their advisers in a very real sense. Morgan McSweeney pick Keir Starmer to be the kind of anti-Corbyn person to take through to the Labour leadership and eventually prime minister. He's a very, very big figure. His departure matters. But ultimately, other powerful advisers and aides have left Downing Street's numbers 10 before. And prime ministers have survived. you know whether it's dominic cummings with boris johnson or whether it's nick timothy and fiona hill with theresa may you know the list goes on and on when the crisis starts to be talked about and you have political figures of the stature of anasawa the scottish labor leader not just an mp or cabinet minister but someone that senior in a party come out and say that it's over it is takes things to a new level for three reasons one is is that it is a potential ignition for others cabinet ministers other senior parliamentarians and so on to follow him it matters because we are facing as anasawa was saying there holyrood elections in a few months time what an absurd situation it is to be in to have the labour party going into those elections with their leader in scotland saying that the national leader kirstama the prime minister or not to be in post just makes the party look absurd.

5:27And thirdly, it's a slightly more prosaic reason, but in terms of the numbers, it matters. Labour have got 37 MPs in Scotland now, as were the place in the country that they did best in in the 2024 general election, winning back dozens of seats in the central belt in the old Labour heartland. What are they to do in this situation? Do they listen to their leader in Scotland, Anasawa, who is calling on the prime minister to go and they act accordingly? or do they listen to the leader of the parliamentary Labour Party, their leader in Westminster? And it is just worth saying on that that the Scotland Labour MPs, the Scottish Labour MPs have been especially unhappy for quite a long time now for the reasons that Sarwal was saying, which is they have felt they had long fancied their chances of dislodging the SNP in those Holyrood elections in office since 2007 in Scotland and they feel they have been dragged down by the party's national performance.

6:20So that block of 37 Scottish Labour MPs, if there were to be a contest, potentially an important constituent voting block of the PRP. Yeah, we should say that it is essentially breaking news as we're recording this. We are getting responses. It's not the easiest conditions in which to try and have a relaxed conversation. But as we're watching the screen here, we are seeing various cabinet ministers come out and defend the prime minister. John Healy, the defence secretary, is one. Starmer has my full support. Rachel Reeves, another. Yvette Cooper, another. Bridget Phillipson, Education Secretary, another.

6:55Wes Streeting, we understand, was doorstepped and asked whether he had full support for Keir Starmer. We do not think he answered that doorstep at that moment. We're waiting to hear from Wes Streeting, but obviously question marks there. David Lammy, Deputy PM, another one who has shown Keir Starmer his support. What I would say is that, to your point, there will be some people looking at Anasawa now and saying, would this have come anyway? You know, he's actually said that he wants to get rid of a failing SNP government. And this is too important to miss. We cannot allow the failures to continue here in Scotland.

7:36We have an NHS crisis in Scotland. There are some people, there are some people in the Labour Party in Scotland who are saying, is this Anasawa trying to get ahead of what may be a bad defeat for Labour in Scotland and saying, I need some distance with the Prime Minister. And I think it's also fair to say that a lot of things have been elided at this point. It is ostensibly about Mandelson. It is ostensibly about Epstein. But actually, if you go through some of the responses from various parts of the Labour Party, as we have done all week, all last 10 days, really, there are some people who I would say are using the Mandy Rice Davis sort of defence.

8:21You know, she was ironically a witness in the Profumo affair. They would say that, wouldn't they? You know, so in other words, if you think you're going to be in trouble in the elections, you might say that anyway. If you think that Starmer has fucked up not just over Epstein and Maddelson, but in taking the party to the wrong direction, you would say that anyway. If you think that he made a catastrophic mistake going as far back as the winter fuel crisis, you would say that anyway. So are there people who now feel more able to vocalise stuff that they have frankly been feeling for more or less 18 months?

8:57And I think you have to just in your head differentiate that from whether this is entirely about the Epstein-Mandelson scandal. Because if it is just about Mandelson, if it is just about Epstein, the irony of Keir Starmer being brought down, you know, in this country by a billionaire paedophile he's never met. He was not mentioned in the papers. And we see so little, so little being done in the US. So little being done to, let's call them, rapists and paedophiles all over the world that have not actually been targeted so far by the sort of journalism that we're discussing here. there is something sort of catastrophically wrong with the system, which is what makes me think it cannot just be about a relationship to Epstein.

9:43And in fact, Anasawa himself had to explain why he was photographed on the steps of the embassy with Mandelson saying, my good friend Peter Mandelson, you know, congratulations, just five, six months ago. Westminster is a place that is not unknown to hypocrisy. I think it's been basking in hypocrisy the last week or so. I happened to look yesterday or the weekend for my Sunday show on LBC to put it to different political parties just to check in Hansard whether a single member of Parliament got up when Starmer appointed Manilson. Given that we all now think it was so egregious. And so obvious.

10:17And so obvious. Let's just see if a single MP got up at Prime Minister's questions and said, Prime Minister, how on earth are you appointing this man with these links to Jeffrey Epstein that are well known? Think a single one got up, Emily? Not just at Prime Minister's questions. Never. At no point. At no point. Has a single MP got up during that period and mentioned Jeffrey Epstein? Not even at Prime Minister's questions, but full stop. Yes, there was some commentary from a couple of MPs, I think Alicia Kearns in particular, outside of the chamber. But in terms of the reception to that decision at the time, there was nothing.

10:49Right. Nothing. So on that level, there is profound hypocrisy. Kemi Bainock didn't say a word. She's saying now that everybody knew and everyone... I mean, we can play a clip maybe of Kemi Bainock this morning where she was asked directly if she had said anything, to your point, exactly, at the time in January. And I think her defence was, well, I can't be everywhere. So, in other words, no. Well, do you think if it was that important, she might have said something? But yeah, listen to that clip from the Today programme. You did not say, because he has a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, and that continued even after he had a conviction for paedophilia, he is unsuitable to be ambassador.

11:23So aren't you being wise after the event? No, not at all. And in fact, many Conservatives raised concerns. And Ian Duncan-Smith, Caroline Dainidge, we've put down parliamentary questions. I have a big team. It's not just me doing this work. I'm not a one-man band. But to be clear, the leader of the opposition did not raise that. No, no, I was raising all the problems that he was creating in the economy, his endless U-turns, the National Drooming Gang scandal, the terrible policies. There was a lot I was raising. I can't do it all on my own. I do have a team of people and we were correct to raise those issues.

11:53Many things were in the public domain, but the fact of the matter remains. The Prime Minister chose to make this appointment despite his vetting information telling him otherwise. But it is true to say, as we say often on the show, two things can be true at once. The Mandelson thing, it's clearly bad judgment, but it is the touch paper, really, for a far longer standing set of systemic concerns about the performance of the government, which who knows? I mean, maybe there'll be plenty of time for discussion for this. We could find ourselves doing a post-mortem of the Starmer premiership by the end of the week.

12:23today in the next hour who knows so maybe we can sort of reserve it for that i think it is interesting in terms of what the reaction has has been from downing street to sarwa's call on starmer to resign because up to that point we'd actually heard nothing from downing street pretty much apart from jackie smith the skills minister out on the airwaves this morning defending the government position that was after pat mcfadden the work and pension secretary yesterday saying if the prime minister stays in place a pretty remarkable kind of situation to be in where you've got a cabinet minister openly suggesting well maybe the prime minister might not be in place but since the sarwa speech even in the minutes afterwards it's clear that downing street is attempting to mount some sort of fight back so number 10 putting out a quote saying keir starmer is one of only four labour leaders to have ever won a general election he has a clear five-year mandate from the British people to deliver change, and that is what he will do.

13:21We've seen a succession since the Sarwell speech of cabinet ministers, something that we hadn't seen at the start of the day, slightly unusually and forebodingly. To be fair, we'd be messaging and texting and asking people to come on. Indeed so. Darren Jones, the Chief Secretary of the Prime Minister, the battle for Britain in the years ahead is between a modern, diverse Britain led by Labour, dark, divisive Britain under reform. We must get behind the Prime Minister. We've seen the Chancellor come out. We've seen the Deputy Prime Minister come out. We've seen the Education Secretary, Bridget Philipson, come out showing their support.

13:49Now, you might think, well, yeah, I mean, that's a bare minimum. But it is true to say that it appears for now, as we are recording this, that Downing Street and Number 10 intend to ignore Sarwa and fight on. It is worth noting, of course, goes back to that point. Is this the start of something? Is this the kind of Geoffrey Howe moment for Keir Starmer, as it was for Margaret Thatcher, a famous Geoffrey Howe speech where he almost called on her to go and that sort of set off a sequence that led her to her resignation. But as you say, Emily, nothing from West Streeting. And talking to different Labour people just, you know, since that speech, I'm detecting two camps.

14:25One is a sort of absolute fatalism about the situation, some of whom are proper Starmer loyalists who just think that the authority's gone and is over. And then a selection of others, one of whom described this to me, this entire thing is complete lunacy, saying that the cabinet will back him and that he will fight on. And he will fight because, not least because, there is this continuing concern as to who will replace him. And indeed, there is suspicion around Anasawa precisely on the West Streeting point because who is Anasawa good friends with, known to be a close ally of? One West Streeting.

15:02So you can just see all of the kind of bloodlust of the Labour Party, which is just, the lid is just about being kept on it at the moment by the fact Keir Starmer is still there. But my word, it is ready to explode. Yeah, we should explain, if you're wondering, that Anasawa himself could not be the next Prime Minister, the leader of the Labour Party, because he's not a sitting MP. He gave up his seat in 2015. But let's just step back to where we thought we'd be on Monday morning, before the Anasawa speech. I was told that the Morgan McSweeney decision was made on Friday. I've only been told that by one source.

15:37I haven't had double confirmation. But if that is true, essentially it tells us that it was in Keir Starmer's mind from Friday and they delivered it on Sunday after the morning rounds, after the politicians went out on air, presumably because they wanted it to set the pace for this week rather than end last week. In other words, Keir Starmer figures he's got a good run at this week. It's also worth knowing that in parliamentary terms, today, Monday, is what they call a one-line whip. Most of the MPs will not be back in Westminster until tonight. So there aren't a lot of people sort of chattering, talking.

16:13Keir Starmer will speak to people this evening. But there isn't that sense of a chatter amongst MPs about him going, or there wasn't before Anasova made his intervention. And I don't think we should start believing that just because the loudest voices in the Labour Party, And I would say, to some extent, the voices you always expected have been calling publicly for Starmer to go. That's not true of Sawa, though. No, it's not. Although Sawa, as explained, has got his own reasons. You know, he's fighting Scottish elections in a pretty perilous moment for him and his party up there. And as he said consistently, his priority is Scotland, not the UK.

16:55And so he thinks that he's got to protect Labour MPs in Scotland right now. But I would just say, I think there are a vast majority of sitting Labour MPs who think it would be ridiculous to lose, as you say, the fourth ever elected Labour prime minister over a crime that was nothing to do with him. I mean, was there a failure of, sorry, a crime that was nothing to do with him? I mean, Epstein's crimes, Mandelson's alleged crimes. There's a weird phrase that's often used at sort of political moments like this. gradually then suddenly. In other words, things that seemed inconceivable 10 days ago, two weeks ago, now seem imminent.

17:36And I think there is a danger of momentum. In other words, a lot of people now will be saying, he's got to go, he's toast, it's over, it's done, it's finished. If you look around the Labour Parliamentary Party, you will actually find a lot of MPs who are remaining solidly behind Keir Starmer, who remain solidly behind the idea that chaos should be avoided at all costs. Leadership elections should be avoided at all costs. This idea of sort of dispensable politics, dispensable leaders should be avoided at all costs because he was the one that won an election in 2024. And I do think that it is worth trying to put this back into context of the crime that is being described because Epstein is making us recalibrate what a crime looks like now.

18:30I mean, in those files, there are rapists, there are paedophiles, there are money launderers, there are people who are, as has been alleged, selling state secrets. I don't think Keir Starmer fits into any of those categories. And if he is going to lose his job over this, if the UK is going to lose its leader over an association and an appointment when so many other crimes are yet to be even discussed. We're in a really perilous place. We're in a really dangerous place in terms of, I guess, what the sort of next stages of democracy looks like, because it seems to me too fragile to start saying that this is a reason for him to go.

19:18It's worth saying that Wes Streeting has, even while I've been recording this, saying he said that he thinks that Keir Starmer doesn't need to resign. Not the most ringing endorsement, but he doesn't need to resign. It has not been the best week for the government. Give Keir a chance. I'm getting, even as we sat here, Emily, and it's one of those sort of days where everything is obviously developing minute by minute, I'm sort of texting dozens of people up and down the Labour Party. My sense of what they're saying as of right now is that they feel that this is not the end right now, partly because the Cabinet has clearly agreed to come out fighting for Starmer.

19:51Again, even as we've been sat here now, the list has extended to much of the cabinet. You've got Vett Cooper there, Liz Kendall there, Peter Carr, Pat McFadden, the Chief Whip, Johnny Reynolds, John Healy, the Defence Secretary. So there clearly is a bolt-on-the-work of support for now for Keir Starmer. People I would have an eye on still, his deputy, Lucy Powell. Very interesting position that she is now in. Andy Burnham, ally. I'd be looking at other members of the NEC. I'd be looking at key trade union officials and trade union voices. I'd be looking to the chair of the Parliamentary Labour Party, some of the leaders of the top select committees, the Welsh First Minister, Alenid Morgan as well.

20:27There are other power players and power brokers who have not yet showed their hand and displayed their hand who will be crucial in the hours between probably us finishing recording this podcast and the hours you're listening to it. Of course, even if Starmer gets to the end of the day and he's got that key meeting with the parliamentary Labour Party tonight, and I can imagine the psychology, just knowing the Labour Party, I can imagine psychology being one suddenly of rallying around, wanting to show some support. As you say, Emily, receptive to the fact that I think there are lots of MPs who are deeply pissed off with Starmer, who are deeply frustrated by the performance of his government, deeply frustrated by his lack of vision and ability to communicate whatever vision he has, who also think that this is not the thing over which he should resign or go.

21:13And that they think that the message that that would send and the idea of it just sits uncomfortably comfortably and leaves a bitter taste in the mouth both of those things can be true at once all of that said we have got to remember as we're sat here on monday afternoon that this story will get worse before it gets better why is that because we will get the documents and whatever is in those documents we can guarantee that they will not be embarrassment free for this government for its connections with peter mandelson and the things that they say about the united states and Donald Trump. So we know that this story, there is much still yet to weather for Keir Starmer on this story alone before he can get to what I would say is the finish line for him this week.

21:54He's in one of those positions where he's got to go day by day, which is basically Thursday, which is when Parliament breaks up for the half term recess. If he can get to Thursday, get to the other end of that, MPs can go back to their constituencies and either calm down or get riled up by the responses they get from their constituents, then at least he'll have survive the week but it feels like a long time assuming those documents come out between now and then it's a long time to get there he is being saved as well by there being no obvious successor and whoever you ask cannot see an obvious successor they might have an ally they might have a thought they might have a preference but there is no one who is an obvious successor to starmer at this point and if there's one thing we know about him he's pretty steely now i'll probably wake up tomorrow completely regretting this but i think that you might know there's worse to come but also figure what's the point of going now why would you give all that up now what does he gain from giving it all up now unless it is the case that he as reported the weekend is so dispirited by events that he decides himself upbeat apparently yeah so what they always say, isn't it?

23:05Everyone's always upbeat, right up to the point that you're not. Yeah, exactly. I never would be described as upbeat. We better stop recording before something else happens. We will be talking about some of the contents of the Epstein files and about how it relates to the royal family. And actually, Emily, just before we go, we've been saying that this is a kind of rolling story with lots of different Labour people coming out and responding to it. I think a very significant one, just as you've been speaking, from Angela Rayner, obviously the former deputy leader, deputy prime minister saying the recent scandal around peter mandelson and jeffrey epstein was shocking and demands that both this government and our party learn the lessons but the worst possible response would be to play party politics or factional games where streeting take notice especially saying labor is only getting started on changing things for the better etc etc i urge all my colleagues to come together remember our values and put them into practice as a team the Prime Minister has my full support in leading us to that end.

24:05Very significant intervention alongside Lucy Powell. So saying their deputy leader also coming out in favour. It feels to me that Keir Starmer is likely still in the end game, but that game might be a little bit longer than it might have looked even when we started to speak.

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24:59The News Agents Charles,

25:05how long have you known about Angie and the King? Charles, how long have you known about Angie and the King? Angie and the King! So that is some audio from a walkabout that the King, King Charles was doing in Lancashire this morning as you can hear he is heckled about what he knew about Andrew and Epstein this is the second heckle to take place of this kind in the last six months or so you also heard there that people who had turned up to see the king were heckling back and booing the person who heckled but nonetheless this will be of concern for Buckingham Palace that this keeps happening, not least because today is the day where police have announced that they are assessing allegations that Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor passed on confidential information about overseas trips to Jeffrey Epstein.

26:03So in a sort of weird inverse mirror image of the political story with Peter Mandelson, Andrew is suspected of forwarding official reports of trips to Singapore, Hong Kong and Vietnam in 2010 and 11 when he was a government trade envoy. he has been accused of, quote, ruthlessly exploiting his role to further his relationship with Epstein. Yeah, to put this in context, Andrew was made a trade envoy for the UK government. And I guess it was a role that was seen at the time to be sort of finding him work, finding him a job. It was where he earned the air miles Andy. But the connection had already started to be made in the press between him and Epstein.

26:47and I wonder whether the role came about because people figured that a senior royal had to be sort of out of the UK, out of the gossip columns, out of, as it were, harm's way and they gave him something that they thought would play to his strengths. And the police in Thames Valley have now confirmed they're assessing information after these emails appeared that show Andrew had shared information from official visits. and I've been looking at some of those emails as well. They specifically name Vietnam, they name Singapore but even in 2010, the Duke, this is from the Epstein files, writes to Jeffrey Epstein, I will call you later this evening after I've had my chat with my Libyan contact to see what we can arrange for you in Tripoli and Epstein just says, I'm in Abu Dhabi.