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Keir Starmer has seen off an immediate challenge to his position from Labour’s leader in Scotland, telling his MPs he was “not prepared to walk away” from power and plunge the country into chaos.
But the prime minister emerged badly damaged from a tumultuous 24 hours that brought his premiership to the brink, leaving his party united for now but fearful of what the coming days and weeks will bring.
Starmer survived a day of high drama after his full cabinet rallied behind him but, despite public displays of support, several warned he was not out of danger, with one adding his leadership was “in the endgame”.
As months of despair over the government’s situation came to a head, potential leadership rivals including Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting appeared to be readying for a future contest.
The chaos unfurled as Starmer fought to reassert control over his party after accepting the resignation of his closest adviser, Morgan McSweeney, amid anger over the appointment of Peter Mandelson as the ambassador to the US.
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Anas Sarwar, the Scots Labour leader, urged Starmer to step down amid fury that the UK government has severely damaged support. “The distraction needs to end, and the leadership in Downing Street has to change,” he said.
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Rayner threw her weight behind the prime minister, bringing a halt to a potential coup, minutes after the Guardian revealed an unfinished website claiming to launch her leadership campaign was temporarily published.
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Streeting published private WhatsApp messages with Mandelson – including ones which questioned Starmer’s communications skills and the government’s growth plan – in an effort to draw a line under his relationship with the disgraced peer.
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Tim Allan, Starmer’s director of communications, quit after only five months in the job, to “allow a new No 10 team to be built”, leaving the prime minister looking for his fifth communications chief since he took office.
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Chris Wormald, the UK’s most senior civil servant, is negotiating his exit from the role as part of a broader shake-up of Downing Street, the Guardian has learned, adding to the sense of turmoil at the top of government.
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Labour insiders fear that McSweeney’s departure leaves the prime minister dangerously exposed as he heads towards a series of policy and electoral challenges – including the Gorton and Denton byelection later this month – that could determine his political future.
Starmer addressed his fate head on when he told more than 400 MPs and peers at a parliamentary Labour party (PLP) meeting on Monday night that he would fight any challenge that came his way, warning rivals: “I have won every fight I’ve ever been in. I fought to change the Labour party to allow us to win an election again. People told me I couldn’t do it.
“I have had my detractors every step along the way, and I’ve got them now. Detractors that don’t want a Labour government at all, and certainly not one to succeed.
“But I’ll tell you this, after having fought so hard for the chance to change our country, I’m not prepared to walk away from my mandate and my responsibility to my country, or to plunge us into chaos, as others have done.”
MPs leaving the meeting said there had been a genuine mood shift, lifted by Starmer’s promises to remake his relationship with MPs, acknowledgment of past mistakes and his clear lines of attack on Reform UK, which he described as the “fight of our times”.
But others said that with Labour trailing behind Nigel Farage’s party in the polls, and the cost of living crisis still biting, they doubted whether Starmer could turn things around. One cabinet minister said MPs had been galvanised by the “common enemy” but did not think “we are out of the woods yet”.
The ambush by Sarwar appeared to be a serious threat to the prime minister, coming after months of Labour figures privately questioning Starmer’s authority, but after cabinet ministers and Labour MPs publicly rallied round, it became clear he would fight another day.
At a hastily arranged press conference in Glasgow earlier in the day, Sarwar said there had been “too many mistakes” by No 10 since Starmer came to power and that while the prime minister was a “decent man” he was undermining Labour’s ability to win the Scottish parliament elections in May.
The Scottish party leader is said to be furious that the UK government’s decisions have severely damaged support for Scottish Labour, with the SNP’s John Swinney now appearing to be on course to stay in Bute House.
Recent opinion polls show Labour trailing in third place behind the Scottish National party and Reform. Sarwar and his advisers have calculated it will be impossible for Starmer to recover after the scandal over Peter Mandelson’s links to Jeffrey Epstein.
MPs said it was made abundantly clear to them that they should tweet their loyalty to Starmer. “It was a ‘tweet or we’ll have your fingers’ moment,” one said. One Labour source even claimed that No 10 had threatened them with the sack unless they went public with their support. No 10 denied this.
But several MPs said that it was a genuine moment of clarity after Sarwar called for Starmer to go. “I think they saw what the abyss looks like,” one MP said. Another said: “It looked more and more insane as it went on.”
Rayner, Starmer’s former deputy, urged Labour colleagues to “come together, remember our values and put them into practice as a team”, but just moments before the Guardian revealed an unfinished website claiming to launch her leadership campaign was published temporarily in January.
Meanwhile, the domain name angelaforleader.co.uk was registered within minutes of the apparent publishing error, at 9.48am on 27 January, with the same company – Webfusion – as her official parliamentary site.
Rayner denied any links to the website, with her team dismissing it as a “fake”, while one ally described it as a “false flag” operation. But there was no indication the site had been deliberately shared or leaked to journalists or political figures.
In what appeared to be an effort to ready himself for a potential leadership contest, Streeting published private WhatsApp messages between the pair, including his prediction he would be “toast” at the next general election.
The publication of the exchanges, in which Streeting said the government had no growth strategy and questioned Starmer’s communications skills, came after the friendship threatened to be a significant liability to his ambitions.
However, the health secretary publicly supported Starmer, saying that “people should give him a hearing”. His allies rejected suggestions that he had been coordinating with Sarwar, who is also close to McSweeney.
On a day of turmoil insider Downing Street, and less than 24 hours after McSweeney stood down, Tim Allan, Starmer’s director of communications, quit. “I have decided to stand down to allow a new No 10 team to be built. I wish the PM and his team every success,” he said.
Allan appeared to have swiftly changed his WhatsApp profile to a picture of a golf ball with the caption “Out of Office. Gone Golfing.” It leaves Starmer looking for his fifth communications chief since he took office in July 2024.
The Guardian also revealed that Chris Wormald, the most senior civil servant in Downing Street, is negotiating his exit as part of a wider shake-up of Starmer’s operation, adding to the sense of turmoil at the top of government.
