Well, well, well. The spotlight is back on Sir Keir Starmer’s chief of staff Morgan McSweeney – and not in a good way. It transpires that the Labour Together founder’s lawyer advised him that he should mark £700,000 of undisclosed donations as an ‘admin error’, according to a leaked document from 2021 published by the Conservatives yesterday. How curious…
The revelation comes after Labour Together, the pro-Starmer think tank, was fined £14,250 in 2021 for more than 20 breaches of electoral law. McSweeney was the director of the organisation between 2017 and 2020 and is now under fire over this latest development. More than £700,000 of donations were not properly registered, with £100,000 gifted to the think tank while McSweeney was running Starmer’s Labour leadership campaign in 2020. (Mr S would remind readers that Labour Together then went on to take credit for Starmer’s victory.) After McSweeney stepped down from the role, his successor informed the Electoral Commission that the donations had not been reported – and a probe began.
The leaked emails showed that McSweeney was contacted, with Labour’s lawyer Gerald Shamash querying his failure to report the donated money. Shamash admitted there was ‘no easy way’ to explain the failure to disclose the donations – especially after the Electoral Commission had told McSweeney in 2017 that Labour Together had to declare any donation of more than £7,500. The lawyer suggested it is ‘perhaps best’ if the problem was put down to an ‘admin error’. Talk about transparency, eh?
The then-think tank director initially heeded the advice, declaring £50,000 in February 2018 and £12,500 in July that year – although then didn’t register anything until he left the organisation in 2020. The Labour lawyer pointed this out too in an email to McSweeney in February 2021: ‘You had initially reported and signed off donations so presumably you were aware of your obligations as a members’ association to register?’
Now the Electoral Commission is considering the latest update, after receiving a letter from the Conservative party. A week ago, Labour Together noted that: ‘Labour Together proactively raised concerns about its own reporting of donations to the Electoral Commission in 2020. The Electoral Commission’s investigation, with which Labour Together fully co-operated, was completed in 2021.’
And as for McSweeney himself? His colleague Pat McFadden has said he has full confidence in him – which is not quite the kiss of death Starmer’s votes of public support have delivered in recent weeks. But it’s never good when the staffer becomes the story…
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