Keir Starmer survived a key vote over whether he should face an inquiry into claims that he misled Parliament about the appointment of Peter Mandelson as UK ambassador to Washington. Had he lost Tuesday’s vote, he’d have been referred to the Privileges Committee that forced the resignation of Boris Johnson. The PM described the Tory-led motion – called after it emerged that Mandelson had been installed despite failing part of the vetting process – as a “stunt”.
Before the vote, Morgan McSweeney, the PM’s former chief of staff, and Philip Barton, former head of the Foreign Office, testified to a select committee about their roles in the vetting of Mandelson. Both agreed that some pressure had been applied to officials to expedite the process, but maintained that this had had no bearing on the final decision to clear Mandelson.
Barrage awaits
Starmer deserved to win this vote, said The Independent. From all the public testimony and documentation that has emerged thus far, it’s clear Starmer didn’t intentionally mislead Parliament. He didn’t know that concerns were raised about Mandelson during the vetting process because Olly Robbins – the civil servant who oversaw the appointment and who was sacked as Foreign Office chief a fortnight ago – chose not to tell him.
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Robbins thought those concerns had been adequately addressed and merely informed the PM that “due process” had been followed, and that Mandelson had cleared the vetting. On this matter, Starmer “has no case to answer”.
Still, the PM hasn’t emerged that well from this episode, said The Guardian. His assurance to the Commons last week that “no pressure existed whatsoever” in relation to Mandelson’s vetting sits uneasily with other testimony. And of course the appointment itself reflects badly on his judgement. The fact that Starmer had to impose a three-line whip on Labour MPs to support him in the vote only highlighted his weakness, said The Times.
While the result earned him a reprieve, next week’s local elections could prove fatal for his premiership. Starmer has “dodged a bullet, but a barrage awaits”.
Bunker mentality
The “vast majority” of Labour MPs are right behind Starmer – or so he claimed in an interview this week. He probably believes it, said Dan Hodges in The Mail on Sunday, such is the “bunker mentality” in No. 10. Yet talking to Labour MPs around Westminster last week, I struggled to find one who still had any confidence in his leadership.
As one Labour grandee put it: “The parliamentary party used to think he was useless but basically decent. After this week they still think he’s useless, but also that he’s a guy who will stab them and anyone else to save himself.”
Starmer’s peremptory firing of Olly Robbins has proved a tipping point for many in his party, said Ailbhe Rea in The New Statesman. Several Cabinet ministers now privately admit that “they have ‘given up’ after months of grumbling determination to ‘make Keir work’”.
Difficult decisions
The irony, said Camilla Cavendish in the Financial Times, is that the Mandelson affair is “the least of [Starmer’s] mistakes”. Had he taken full responsibility for it from the outset, admitting that the appointment was a gamble that didn’t pay off, it might soon have blown over. The PM deserves more blame for his fundamental failure to deliver his promised “change” agenda, owing to an “almost obstinate lack of interest in making the difficult decisions that his job requires”.
While Ed Miliband has pursued clean energy projects and Wes Streeting has “challenged vested interests” in the NHS, the rest of the system has “drifted”. In this respect, Starmer’s administration has come to resemble Boris Johnson’s: there's “a vacuum where the principal should be”.
But is this really the moment to replace Starmer with yet another PM, asked Simon Jenkins in The Guardian. Surely not. They would be our seventh in a decade. Britain can’t afford to keep staging leadership dramas every time a PM makes an error of judgement.
The focus on personalities certainly isn’t helpful, said Polly Toynbee in the same paper. What we really need is radical action to rescue Britain from its slump: an urgent move to rejoin the EU, for instance, and an acceptance that the pensions triple lock is unaffordable. Labour has three full years ahead with a huge working majority of 165. “What matters is not who but what comes next.”