Starmer facing calls for inquiry over Labour think tank’s investigation into journalists

Labour Together, which helped the prime minister’s election to become party leader, reportedly paid £36,000 for the probe

Sir Keir Starmer is facing calls to order an inquiry into a Labour think tank’s investigation into journalists as he struggles to move on from the woes facing his premiership.

Foreign Office minister Stephen Doughty said it would be “only right” to have an probe into Labour Together, which helped Sir Keir win the Labour leadership.

The calls heap pressure on government minister Josh Simons, who commissioned the 2023 report on reporters investigating the group’s funding.

The prime minister is under pressure to order an inquiry (Peter Nicholls/PA) (PA Wire)

The Sunday Times reported that the contents of an investigation by PR consultancy Apco were informally shared with Labour figures in 2024, including current cabinet ministers and special advisers.

The paper said it contained pages of “deeply personal and false claims” about one of the journalists Gabriel Pogrund. It also discussed his Jewish background and included false claims about personal and professional relationships. It was also reported to have made “baseless claims” that the emails underpinning the journalists’ story were likely to have come from a hack of the Electoral Commission, suspected to have been carried out by the Kremlin .

Mr Simons was an ally of Morgan McSweeney, who previously ran Labour Together and who resigned from No 10 last week as the Mandelson scandal engulfed Downing Street. Mr Simons told the paper he said he had asked for information to be removed before passing the report to the intelligence agency GCHQ. No other British journalists were investigated as part of any document he or Labour Together ever received, he also said.

John McDonnell, Labour’s former chancellor, has called for an independent inquiry into the affair.

He said it was clear to him as ”secretary of the NUJ’s parliamentary group if true this is unacceptable”.

Another Labour MP, Karl Turner, called on the prime minister himself to look at the issue and said he should meet Mr McDonnell “to discuss” it.

Nadhim Zahawi, the former Conservative chancellor who has since defected to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, led demands for Sir Keir to reveal what he knew of the investigation.

He said: “This is a huge story. If this was any other party, the calls for an investigation would be deafening..”

Mr Doughty told Times Radio: “It's only right that if there is an investigation, that's able to run its course, and that we understand what happened. I want to see a country where journalists are able to do their job without fear or favour.”