Starmer’s survival depends on the fate of his right-hand man

The name Morgan McSweeney may not be on the lips of many people down the pub or at the school gate, but it is one that those in the Westminster bubble are obsessed with.

Labour MPs have always been aware of the Downing Street chief of staff’s power and importance, as something they consider to be either a toxic poison at the heart of government or a means to future preferment and promotion.

So the fact that they are telling Keir Starmer he has to sack his chief of staff – or potentially lose his own job – reveals a prime minister in serious trouble.

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There have at times even been mutterings in Westminster’s corridors that this is not Starmer’s government at all, but rather McSweeney’s – that the prime minister has, in many ways, been the frontman for a project that is actually being directed by an unelected official in Downing Street.

Tales from the last ministerial reshuffle emphasise his influence. The three people removed from the cabinet were all people McSweeney wanted out, according to sources.

Angela Rayner may have been forced to resign over her tax affairs, but there had been a long, concerted campaign by the Blairite wing of the party, of which McSweeney is a key member, to remove her. Who was it that authorised the revealing and damaging readout of Rayner’s comments on immigration in a cabinet meeting just before the summer? That could only have happened with McSweeney’s blessing.

Lucy Powell, now back after winning the election to be the party’s deputy leader, was removed as Commons leader because “she kept standing up to McSweeney and telling him he was wrong”, according to an ally of hers.

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Ian Murray was replaced by Douglas Alexander as Scottish secretary “because of McSweeney’s obsession with Blair-era figures”. Alexander, a very capable individual, was a minister and campaign chief in Tony Blair’s and Gordon Brown’s governments.

“McSweeney was desperate to get him in the cabinet, and Ian was expendable,” a source told The Independent.

But now there is growing anger towards McSweeney over his links with Peter Mandelson.

The 48-year-old not only pushed for Mandelson’s appointment as ambassador to the US, but also tried to prevent his sacking, according to reports.

To understand the current project, you need to go back to the Jeremy Corbyn years, when McSweeney was at the forefront of trying to save the party from disappearing forever down a far-left black hole.

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As director of Labour Together, he effectively organised the fightback, and handpicked Starmer as the man to take over from Corbyn and turn the ship around.

Labour’s success in the general election, which McSweeney ran, was the vindication of that project, but unfortunately, the party came into office without much of a policy plan.

And it all started with McSweeney removing an obstacle to his authority – Sue Gray, who had been brought in as the original chief of staff before he replaced her.

As the welfare crisis mounted last year, with scores of Labour MPs threatening to vote the government’s policy down, the calls to remove McSweeney grew very loud indeed. And they have not really quietened since.

The Mandelson scandal, however, has sent them stratospheric.

But herein lies the problem. If this government is more a McSweeney government than a Starmer one, the prime minister may have the authority to sack his chief of staff – but where does it leave him?

Without McSweeney, Starmer is hugely weakened and the suggestions of a leadership coup within weeks become very realistic.