Labour infighting over alleged appointments cover-up fuels calls for Starmer to quit
Leadership in turmoil...gilt yields climb and the pound weakens
The fallout from the release of documents related to U.S. billionaire sex offender Jeffrey Epstein is now shaking the political standing of U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer. Responsibility for appointing former Business Secretary Peter Mandelson, who is embroiled in a controversy over his ties to Epstein, as ambassador to the United States is becoming a growing issue both inside and outside the ruling Labour Party.
On February 5 (local time), major British media outlets reported in unison that Starmer’s leadership is in jeopardy. The BBC said, “Starmer no longer has the capacity to withstand a situation like this,” while the Financial Times (FT) reported that “there is a view that the Mandelson affair has opened the endgame for Starmer at 10 Downing Street.”
The core of the controversy is the process by which Prime Minister Starmer appointed Mandelson, whose relationship with Epstein was known, as ambassador to the United States. At Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) in the House of Commons on the 4th, Starmer claimed that Downing Street had repeatedly checked the nature of the relationship, but that Mandelson had distorted the scope when he explained it. He said, “Mandelson has betrayed the country, Parliament and the Labour Party,” adding, “I regret appointing him.”
Starmer said he would release the documents related to the vetting process, but also announced that some documents would be withheld on the grounds of national security, diplomacy and ongoing police investigations. In response, former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner and other Labour MPs denounced this as a “cover-up,” and the government ultimately decided to submit all documents to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee, leaving it to the committee to decide what to release.
Internal backlash is intensifying. Labour MPs criticized Starmer for initially refusing to accept responsibility and hiding behind the appointments process. Some MPs have called for the dismissal of Chief of Staff Morgan McSweeney, and Bloomberg reported that there is now a mood within the party that people have begun “counting down” Starmer’s remaining time in office.
With Starmer’s approval ratings already plunging, Health Secretary Wes Streeting, Energy Security Secretary Ed Miliband and Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham are being mentioned as potential successors for prime minister.
The opposition has also joined the offensive. The Conservative Party, the largest opposition party, argued that appointing someone whose friendship with Epstein was already known to some extent was a misjudgment in itself, and demanded that all personnel-related documents be made public. While Starmer acknowledged that the relationship was raised during the vetting process, he repeatedly stressed that Mandelson had distorted the facts.
As political uncertainty has grown, financial markets have reacted. On the day, the yield on 10-year U.K. government bonds climbed to as high as 4.59% during trading, the highest level since November last year, while the value of the pound fell 0.4% against the dollar. Deutsche Bank said in a report that “the weakness in gilts reflects concerns about the possibility of Prime Minister Starmer being replaced.”
The government is moving to strip Mandelson of his peerage and remove him from the Privy Council, while the European Union (EU) Commission has also launched an investigation into whether he committed any rule violations during his previous tenure as EU Trade Commissioner.
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