A thorough independent investigation is now needed into the workings of Labour Together, argues Frank Hansen.

Many Labour members agree that there needs to be a complete overhaul of the Party’s deadening, factional culture. But can Labour Party democracy and policies based on Labour values be restored as long as the current clique control the Party and the Government?   

There certainly needs to be a thorough, independent investigation into the way that Labour Together (LT) has acted within the party and its impact on the Government. This should examine  LT’s  influence over policy, Party finances, procedures, candidates and selections starting from July 2017 when Morgan McSweeney was appointed LT’s Company Secretary.

It should focus on LT and McSweeny’s links to Mandelson, the funds LT received from  rich donors, the factional patronage it has selectively bestowed within the Party  and the serious allegations of dirty tricks, which led a policy shift to the right and a severe degradation of Party democracy nationally and locally. 

Paul Holden’s book, The Fraud, contains serious allegations about LT’s manipulative behaviour. Some of the main concerns are well known, such as influence over the appointment of Mandelson as Ambassador to the US, LT’s use of donations – of which  over £730,000 were unlawfully not declared to the Electoral Commission, leading to LT being fined, and the appointment of consultants (the APCO contract) to vet, and it seems discredit and smear journalists, who were investigating LT’s activities. The APCO report contained false claims of Russian involvement in providing hacked information used by journalists. These claims were then raised with the security services by LT’s Josh Simons as a national security issue and were ignored as baseless. 

Now that Mandelson, McSweeney and Simons have resigned, it appears that Labour Together believe that the scandal can be resolved by its own internal investigations  Sally Morgan – Labour Peer and former Blair advisor – who is Chair of LT’s board, said that the organisation had reviewed APCO’s work – which they described as “indefensible”, and said that the Board had not been shown the contract or the report. So nothing to do we us, it would seem? She claimed that LT was now “making a clean break from the past, continuing to support Labour in power” by introducing an audit/risk committee and a whistleblowing process. 

This type of approach is akin to sweeping things under the carpet and is completely unacceptable. It only deals with the tip of the iceberg – Simons and the APCO report – and then in a perfunctory way, typical of an organisation trying to manage their own reputation, rather than addressing the real issues. 

In fact the only formal independent investigation to date hardly touched on LT. It was carried out by the PM’s advisor on ministerial standards who concluded that Simons had not breached the ministerial code, but there was “potential reputational damage” in him remaining in Government – he still of course represents the Labour Party in Parliament. The police investigation – while welcome – is focused on Mandelson’s behaviour when in public office under Brown.

So, as yet, there is still no independent enquiry into LT’s activities within the Party. We are still waiting for the release  of the Mandelson papers regarding his appointment as Ambassador – they are expected in March – and have been delayed “due to the police’s investigation”. It needs to be remembered that it was pressure by backbench Labour MPs in Parliament that forced Starmer and the Government to agree that that Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee should look into what papers should be considered, instead of it being left to top civil servants and the executive. This may and should trigger a number of issues concerning LT and now is the time to continue to push for a thorough investigation.

Pressure needs to be maintained to prevent this scandal being buried by those who do not wish the full truth to emerge. While the LT Board may be claiming that it has cleaned up its act and it’s now business as usual, the Party needs to react by suspending any dealing with LT pending a wider, independent investigation.

The allegations contained in The Fraud go way beyond the Mandelson’s appointment as Ambassador and Simon’s APCO commission and need to be addressed if Party democracy and Labour values are to be restored.

Some of the key allegations made in his book, summarised from a recent Labour Hub interview with its author Paul Holden are: 

• McSweeney, as LT Company Secretary from July 2017 and  supported with over £800,000m in donations, of which over £730,000 were not declared to the Electoral Commission, pursued a covert fight against Corbynism. He paid for vast amounts of internal Party polling and helped right-wing Labour candidates in their internal Labour elections, all while Labour Together was presenting in public that it was working as a project to “bring the Party’s traditions together in collaborative conversation”.

• From July 2019, McSweeney began working with Starmer to shape his leadership campaign. “According to Labour Together’s own legend, the organisation then worked to help Sir Keir win the Labour leadership campaign between January 2020 and April 2020, despite telling the public that they were not supporting any particular candidate.” As we know Starmer was elected on a continuity “for the many” programme which was soon abandoned.

• After a period of relative dormancy, Labour Together was effectively relaunched in 2023 under the leadership of Josh Simons, a friend of McSweeney. By then, McSweeney had engineered Peter Mandelson’s return to intervening in the minutiae of Party management, primarily directed at remaking the Labour Party in their joint image.  Labour Together in this period acted as a policy shop for the incoming Labour government, and  published reports that rolled the pitch for McSweeney’s electoral strategy to pitch the Party right on economic and cultural issues. It became a clearing-house through which funds from millionaire, billionaire and pro-Israel donors would be funnelled to provide support to MP candidates who had been hand-picked by McSweeney, with the alleged input and support of Mandelson.  Simons would be one of several McSweenyite insiders who would be parachuted into a safe Labour seat during the July 2024 General Election. 

• Labour Together, under Josh Simons’ direction, appointed a company called APCO Worldwide to respond to the reporting of investigative journalists. “The focus was on producing a ‘body of evidence’ that could be used to ‘proactively undermine’ the factually accurate public interest reporting on Labour Together.”  Labour Together continues to receive very significant amounts of donor funding from ultra-rich patrons (£3.3m from 8^th July 2024 to January 2026). It now uses this money to write largely right-leaning policy, and its access and influence to convince the Labour Party to adopt One recent example of this is Digital ID, a policy pushed by Labour Together and the Tony Blair Institute. 

Since 2019 we have witnessed a considerable and unprecedented number of expulsions and resignations from the party. A culture of top-down control has been imposed, with long serving councillors, such as North of Tyne Mayor Jamie Driscoll, being vetoed and local Parties being prevented from selecting their local and Parliamentary – and council – candidates. We are even told not to attend certain demonstrations which we would have supported in the past. This trend towards control and authoritarianism also runs through some of the Government’s policies on civil liberties and immigration. Labour is ceasing to be a grassroots movement that can attract mass support and make real change on behalf of working people.

If Labour is to survive, this needs to end and we need to ensure that democracy is restored by breaking the grip that certain interest groups, such as LT and their financial backers, have on the Party. For this we need a change of leadership and a party that is committed to democratic reform and open discussion.

 Frank Hansen is a former Councillor in the London Borough of Brent.

Restore Labour Democracy! Five union General Secretaries and two dozen Labour MPs launched a statement last month to Restore Labour Democracy. You can sign it here.

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