When a new left party was chaotically launched back in July – and attracted 500,000 sign-ups within days – Labour was divided on its significance. Some senior sources spoke of an existential moment, warning that the likes of Wes Streeting, Shabana Mahmood and even Keir Starmer could lose their seats. Others invoked the People’s Front of Judea/Judean People’s Front and Logan Roy’s declaration in Succession: “You are not serious people.” It is the latter group that has proved prescient. For months the tensions between Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana have been clear: he was exasperated by her unilateral launch of the party and her later claim that he “capitulated” over the definition of anti-Semitism. But fissures exploded yesterday: Sultana launched a new paid membership system – ...

Wes Streeting has never been shy of deviating from a script. As he prepared to address an NHS conference for LGBT workers, the Health Secretary ripped up the speaking notes that his department had provided – a routine list of stats and policies – and resolved to make an argument instead. It was “laughable”, he went on to say, to claim that rising homophobia and racism was merely a healthy expression of “free speech”, adding that he understood why some people were questioning “whether this government is really on our side”. Streeting, in other words, departed from the official government line, delivered by Business Secretary Peter Kyle at the weekend, who said of Tommy Robinson’s far-right rally: “What we saw yesterday was ...

There was a brief window yesterday when Keir Starmer was not the party leader under greatest pressure. The defection of the cerebral Conservative MP Danny Kruger – a former chief speechwriter to David Cameron – to Reform deepened the Tories’ existential crisis. But it did not take long for Starmer’s own woes to resurge. The resignation of No 10’s director of strategy Paul Ovenden – over sexually explicit messages sent about Diane Abbott in 2017 – may appear less newsworthy than the departures of Angela Rayner and Peter Mandelson. But it represents a far more direct blow to Starmer’s embattled operation. Ovenden, a close ally of Morgan McSweeney, was one of Starmer’s longest-serving aides and respected within Westminster for his sharp political ...

In the 2015 leadership contest, a respected New Labour strategist condemned the “moronic MPs” who, despite their political differences with Jeremy Corbyn, nominated him to ensure a proper debate took place. Of all the lessons that might be learnt from that moment in Labour’s history, those who run the party today seem to have drawn only one: that terrible mistake, of permitting an open leadership contest, must never be repeated. That’s why my deputy leadership campaign has lasted just three days. Not because party members don’t want to hear my pitch; not because my ideas are unpopular with the public, and not because I’m unqualified for the job – in each case, the opposite is true. No, my challenge was so ...

Peter Mandelson’s arrival in Washington cocked many Maga eyebrows. Not only was a top New Labour politician taking on a role usually reserved for anonymous civil servants. Here was a man connected to the scandal which most riled the Maga base. In the first few weeks of his tenure, Mandelson’s friendship with Jeffrey Epstein gave many Washington insiders reason to think that his time in the imperial capital would fall flat.  And yet, six months in, Mandelson has carved out alliances with key members of the administration, become a reliable feature on the social scene and served as a bridge between No 10 and the White House during the trade negotiations. Trump conspicuously praised him in the Oval Office as the ...

Angela Rayner was not a popular politician. Labour activists would be kidding themselves if they argued otherwise. Rayner’s ratings never eclipsed Keir Starmer’s. In fact, her approval numbers never once reached positive territory. In August, she was less liked than Jeremy Corbyn, and no more liked than Kemi Badenoch. Which is to say: Angela Rayner was not well liked. She was, however, the least disliked of Labour figures among Labour’s own supporters. Starmer and Reeves annoy almost half of the Labour base these days. Rayner did not. If not much else, she was the members’ candidate. Her replacement will have to be popular in both ways. First inside the party, then outside it. Deputy leader of the Labour Party is not some ...

On the April 1998 Have I Got News For You appearance that made his name to six million viewers, Boris Johnson was accused of aiding a friend’s plan to beat up a journalist. To audience laughter, Johnson described the incident as a “major goof”. Eight years later, in 2006, Johnson confided a new media strategy to an interviewer. He said, “I’ve got a brilliant new strategy, which is to make so many gaffes that nobody knows which one to concentrate on.” Somewhere between those moments, the Ben Stiller film Dodgeball had been released and quickly became Johnson’s favourite. He liked to quote “the five Ds of Dodgeball”: “dodge, duck, dip, dive and dodge!” Now the Guardian thinks it has him on ...

Angela Rayner’s resignation last week threw the fate of her flagship Employment Rights Bill into question. As Deputy Prime Minister, Rayner had been working on the bill – which is popular with voters – alongside Alison McGovern and Justin Madders, the then employment minister and employment rights minister, respectively. McGovern was kept on, becoming local government minister in Keir Starmer’s latest reshuffle. But Madders – widely regarded as the architect of Labour’s New Deal for Working People – was sacked from government. It’s fair to say he’s not very happy about it. “Let’s not pretend that my departure… and Angela’s departure is not something that the business community has been cheering quite loudly for,” Madders told a fringe meeting at the ...