STARMER AND MANDELSON – THE REAL QUESTION IS WHY?

Marilyn Tyzack

The scandal engulfing Starmer, partly caused by his uncritical support of and dependence on Mandelson and McSweeney, should come as no surprise to anyone with even the faintest interest in the machinations in the labour party over decades.

The fact that Morgan McSweeney has been allowed to resign, not sacked is another indicator of the rot at the heart of New Labour.

The mystery lies though, in why, Starmer and before him, Blair took so many personal and political risks in keeping such a controversial figure close to the heart of their governments. Mandelson’s appointment as an Ambassador to the USA raised more than a few eyebrows at the time. Morgan McSweeney lobbied hard for him to be given this role and for that and for that alone he has lost his job. The fact that Keir Starmer was forced to admit, last Wednesday that he was aware of Mandelson’s relationship with Epstein before he selected him as Ambassador in 2024 is shocking.

This, in addition to further disclosures that Mandelson leaked highly confidential and market sensitive information to Jeffrey Epstein while he was business secretary under Gordon Brown, has caused a political storm that the Labour Party and Starmer may not recover from. On Monday Tim Allen, Downing Street’s Director of Communications also resigned, and Scottish Labour Leader, Anas Sarwar, who has previously supported Starmer, called on the Prime Minister to resign as well.

But to ask that question, again, why was there such loyalty to a man who, even without the latest revelations was clearly high risk?

The answer may lie somewhere in the murky world of the fight for what was seen as the soul of Labour after the popularity and near victory of Jeremy Corbyn in 2017. The right wing think tank, Labour Together funded by shadowy figures such as Martin Taylor, Trevor Chinn and Gary Lubner who mainly made their fortunes from hedge funds was formed in 2015 to ensure that Jeremy Corbyn was attacked, isolated, alienated and disempowered.

The strategy of purporting to be in tune with the left with those ten pledges, while declaring war on the left once elected was clearly out of the playbook of this think tank, led by Mandelson and McSweeney.

Six months before the latest revelations I attempted to answer this question in an article in the now closed Critical Mass magazine, — accessible  via a web archive – Keir Starmer’s Crisis of  Leadership.

 I argued that Keir Starmer’s leadership was being shaped not by political conviction or even intuition but by the quiet dominance of a small, unelected cadre of advisers — with Peter Mandelson and Morgan McSweeney’s influence woven through the project from the outset.

I suggested that Starmer’s ruthless consolidation of power extended beyond the broken promises of his leadership campaign and that shadowy advisors and other agents assisted him in mortally wounding the opposition by weaponising anti-Semitism. This was inflated into a witch hunt, targeting not only Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, but swathes of left-wing MPs and members. In fact, Peter Mandelson made no secret over his dislike of Corbyn and the now well-known quote that he would “work every single day to bring to an end Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party,” supports this.

At the time this article was published it was dismissed by some as factional noise with one complainant saying, “it was hysterical nonsense.”

Yet the latest scandal over Mandelson has brought those concerns back into the centre of political debate. The latest scandal is just further evidence of a leadership hollowed out by managerialism, guided by advisers whose priorities sit far from the political beliefs the party once claimed to represent.

The crisis now engulfing Labour is not an abrupt shock but the culmination of long established patterns: a leadership shaped by a tight inner circle, a reliance on advisers whose influence far exceeds their accountability, and a series of choices that have distanced the party from its political roots. The warnings were visible months ago, even if they were easy to dismiss at the time.

What remains most troubling is not simply the misjudgements themselves, but the deeper question they expose about who has the power and how and why this power was obtained and exercised.  For all the scrutiny now being applied, the underlying motivations that allowed such influences to take root and spread deep into the heart of the current Labour administration remain hidden.   We have our suspicions, but maybe only history will have the answer.