Keir Starmer turns to Morgan McSweeney to solve Labour’s teething problems

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When Sir Keir Starmer first approached Sue Gray as his chief of staff early last year, he believed the experienced civil servant would bring her long Whitehall experience to Labour’s preparations for government.

He hoped she would become a poacher-turned-gamekeeper, able to cut through Britain’s sometimes swollen bureaucracy and teach Labor politicians – after fourteen years in opposition – about the machinery of government.

Starmer’s defense of Gray on Sunday, after just 90 days as Britain’s prime minister, was an admission that the plan had failed. Gray had been criticized by colleagues for slow decision-making, micromanagement and for not being sufficiently political.

The arrival of Morgan McSweeney as her successor marks a striking change in approach. As the architect of Starmer’s leadership victory and the landslide in the July general election, McSweeney is of great strategic importance. “We need hard men there,” a minister said on Monday.

Yet he has no experience working in government, let alone such a powerful job.

“This won’t solve everything overnight,” one well-placed Labor figure admitted. “It’s not the perfect setup, but it’s better than what we had before.”

Recent reporting about Gray, whose salary was higher than Starmer’s, had portrayed her as an all-powerful control freak. “Who is our real Prime Minister?” the Daily Mail asked in September alongside a photo of her with US President Joe Biden.

John McTernan, a former Labor aide, said Gray’s departure showed that “everyone is disposable in politics” no matter how senior he is.

“Being chief of staff is one of the most difficult jobs in politics. . . There will always be monkeys sitting in the cheap seats throwing peanuts at you,” he said. “But no one on the staff is bigger than the boss.”

In early 2020, Starmer won the Labor leadership and soon abandoned his left-wing team in favor of more centrist, Blairite advisers.

While opposition leader Starmer repeatedly changed chief of staff – from McSweeney, to former Chancellor of the Exchequer Sam White and then to Gray.

Now that the dust has settled, questions remain over whether the new setup in Downing Street will be enough to end the Labor government’s teething problems.

Critics accused Gray of hoarding decisions, creating bottlenecks in government and presiding over a Downing Street culture that was overly reactive and short-term thinking.

A Number 10 colleague said Gray had refused to work with some people, blocked advice to the prime minister and failed to adequately prepare the party for government. “No matter how bad it sounded from the outside, multiply it by 100,” they said.

Another person in Starmer’s inner circle said: “She made enemies pretty much everywhere in different ways.”

Still, some Labor officials wonder how McSweeney, respected as a skilled fixer, will improve strategic thinking and policy implementation. His previous stint as Starmer’s chief of staff in opposition lasted just a few months. One Labor figure said: “There are questions that remain unanswered. This was probably necessary, but did it solve everything?

An ally of McSweeney said he was unfairly portrayed as an obsessive psephologist interested only in the mechanics of winning elections rather than government.

“People really underestimate how interested he is in ideas. He is not seen as a technocrat, but he has talked about ideas with other center-left governments around the world, discussing things like ‘What should a radical housing offer look like?'” the person said.

Instinctively he would want to take on Whitehall and bend it to the will of the Labor Party, rather than letting the civil service dictate what the government should do, that person said. “He is a firecracker and a breaker by temperament, rather than a shaper and manager.”

Gray’s departure on Sunday came against the backdrop of falling approval ratings and a damaging “freebies” scandal. The internal reshuffle has reassured some newly elected Labor MPs. “Anything that provides renewed focus is helpful,” said one.

Starmer still needs to appoint a political secretary to liaise with backbench MPs – one suggestion is former Work and Pensions Secretary Jonathan Ashworth, who lost his seat at the election.

In a brutal twist, it was Simon Case – who is dismissed as Cabinet Secretary – who was sent to negotiate the terms of Gray’s departure. She will now play a role as an envoy between Downing Street and the regions and countries, the terms of which are not yet clear.

Alastair Campbell, Downing Street’s former head of communications, said it was unfair to portray the situation as a shambles. “These can all be fixed, but you can’t make too many mistakes in government. . . I hope this is the reset that is needed,” he told the BBC.