{"id":288205,"date":"2026-02-09T02:24:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T02:24:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/288205\/"},"modified":"2026-02-09T02:24:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T02:24:07","slug":"keir-starmer-battles-to-save-his-premiership-after-resignation-of-cork-man-morgan-mcsweeney-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/288205\/","title":{"rendered":"Keir Starmer battles to save his premiership after resignation of Cork man Morgan McSweeney \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

UK prime minister Keir Starmer<\/a> was battling to save his premiership on Sunday night, following the resignation of his closest aide<\/a>, Cork man Morgan McSweeney<\/a>.<\/p>\n

McSweeney, the backroom mastermind behind Starmer\u2019s rise to the Labour<\/a> leadership and the party\u2019s return to power, quit over the decision to appoint the Jeffrey Epstein<\/a>-linked Peter Mandelson<\/a> as the UK\u2019s ambassador in Washington.<\/p>\n

McSweeney acknowledged in his resignation statement that he advised Starmer to give his old mentor Mandelson the job. He said this was \u201cwrong\u201d given the extent of Mandelson\u2019s links to US sex offender Epstein, which Starmer has said the former ambassador \u201clied\u201d about.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Mandelson] has damaged our party, our country and trust in politics itself. In the circumstances, the only honourable course is to step aside,\u201d said McSweeney.<\/p>\n

While the Irishman\u2019s position had been under pressure for days<\/a> as a furore over Mandelson consumed Westminster, McSweeney\u2019s resignation on Sunday mid-afternoon still took senior members of Starmer\u2019s cabinet by surprise.<\/p>\n

Pat McFadden, one of the UK cabinet\u2019s most experienced members, had just hours earlier said it made \u201cno sense\u201d for McSweeney to go to relieve pressure on Starmer, \u201cif the prime minister stays\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think it would make any difference at all,\u201d he told the BBC.<\/p>\n

In a further sign the Irishman\u2019s resignation was hastily executed, a permanent replacement was not lined up. Four hours after his exit, it was announced that McSweeney\u2019s two deputies would do his job in an acting capacity to prevent a power vacuum at the heart of Starmer\u2019s Downing Street operation.<\/p>\n

Some of Starmer\u2019s critics on Labour\u2019s backbenches remained adamant that McSweeney\u2019s exit would not save the prime minister, whose position is in peril over Mandelson, and also over Labour\u2019s disastrous slide in polls.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0How much did Keir Starmer really know about Peter Mandelson\u2019s ties to Epstein?Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Kim Johnson, Labour MP for Liverpool Riverside, told Sky News the \u201cbuck stops\u201d with Starmer and his position was \u201cuntenable\u201d. Brian Leishman, a Scottish MP, said Starmer should \u201clook at his own position and question whether he should follow McSweeney\u2019s lead\u201d.<\/p>\n

Starmer did not mention the Mandelson scandal in his reaction to the exit of McSweeney, with whom he said it was an \u201chonour\u201d to work. He said he had \u201cturned around\u201d Labour\u2019s fortunes: \u201cOur party and I owe him a debt of gratitude.\u201d<\/p>\n

McSweeney, originally from near Macroom in Cork, worked with Labour in the UK for 25 years. He was a protege of Mandelson during the Tony Blair years.<\/p>\n

He later became close to Starmer, whom he helped to rout the left-wing acolytes of former leader Jeremy Corbyn<\/a>, repositioning the party back towards the political centre.<\/p>\n

Allies of McSweeney paid tribute to him on Sunday night. One Labour MP told The Irish Times he would be \u201csorely missed for his political brilliance\u201d.<\/p>\n

Another former colleague said McSweeney had been isolated recently and had wanted to go last September, but was talked into staying: \u201cWe are now entering the phase of the process where people realise that advisers are not, in fact, the problem.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0UK police search properties in investigation into Mandelson over Epstein tiesOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Yet McSweeney also had a legion of internal enemies, including among Labour\u2019s so-called \u201csoft left\u201d divisions. He was resented for being instrumental in the exit of senior figures such as former cabinet member Louise Haigh, forced out in 2024<\/a>.<\/p>\n

McSweeney also tangled with Starmer\u2019s former chief of staff, Sue Gray, who was also forced out of Downing Street<\/a> before he took her job.<\/p>\n

Westminster observers speculated that the Irishman\u2019s exit may buy Starmer a small amount of breathing space should he choose to fight on, but not much.<\/p>\n

If the UK prime minister survives the coming weeks, his next moment of danger could come after a February 26th byelection in greater Manchester, where Labour is under pressure from Reform UK and the Greens. If he survives that, he may come under pressure again following difficult Scottish and Welsh elections in May.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UK prime minister Keir Starmer was battling to save his premiership on Sunday night, following the resignation of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":288206,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,11111,71223,1194,1193,136383,43,15033,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-288205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-jeffrey-epstein","tag-jeremy-corbyn","tag-keir-starmer","tag-labour-party-uk","tag-morgan-mcsweeney","tag-news","tag-peter-mandelson","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288205","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=288205"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288205\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288206"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}