Labour revolt fears grow as Starmer battles probe over alleged misconduct and secrecy

27 April 2026 , 13:06

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Sir Keir Starmer is reportedly preparing plans to ensure Labour MPs vote against any move to refer him to a parliamentary sleaze inquiry over the appointment of Lord Mandelson.

Speaker of the House of Commons Lindsay Hoyle is expected to allow a debate and vote on Tuesday on whether to refer Starmer to the privileges committee over allegations he misled Parliament, The Times reports.

The Tories and other opposition parties have accused Starmer of misleading MPs by claiming that “due process” was followed in the appointment of Lord Mandelson as ambassador to the US and there was “no pressure whatsoever”.

Starmer’s claims were contradicted last week by Sir Olly Robbins, whom Starmer sacked as permanent secretary at the Foreign Office. Robbins said there was “constant pressure” over Mandelson’s appointment.

Downing Street had hoped that the Speaker would deny any request for a debate and vote on the question of his honesty. The Times has been told that Hoyle is likely to grant the request because the procedural bar for doing so is “relatively low”. Parliamentary rules state that complaints must not be “frivolous”.

The government is strongly opposing the move and is said by concerned ministers to be in “defiant mode”. The Times has been told that the plan is to whip MPs to oppose any attempt to refer Starmer to a parliamentary investigation, although the government will wait to see the wording of any motion before deciding.

Boris Johnson, the former Tory prime minister, was left with no choice but to wave through his referral to the privileges committee over the Downing Street parties scandal because of anger on his own benches. It ended Johnson’s career in frontline politics. Any attempt by Starmer to compel Labour MPs to shut down scrutiny of his conduct could risk a backlash.

Speaker of the House of Commons Sir Lindsay Hoyle during Prime Minister’s Questions. dqxikeidqkikdinv

Sir Alan Johnson and Lord Blunkett, Labour former cabinet ministers, issued a joint statement opposing the vote, saying: “The fact that Kemi Badenoch has changed the accusations she is levelling against the PM on an almost daily basis as her claims have failed to stand up to scrutiny shows what this is really about. This is a nakedly political stunt with no substance ahead of the May elections.

“Any comparison with Boris Johnson is absurd. When parliament referred that matter to the privileges committee, a police investigation had directly disproved his categoric statements that he knew nothing about the breach of lockdown rules.”

They said referring Starmer would be a “waste of public money and a diversion from the major challenges this country faces”.

Starmer goes into the week fighting for his political future. He believes the Mandelson scandal is distracting from his efforts to protect Britons from the cost of living crisis caused by the US war with Iran. He is due to make a speech on Monday, as the government warned that Britons will face eight months of higher prices once the conflict ends and the Strait of Hormuz reopens.

As well as the vote over referring Starmer to the privileges committee, there will be a double session of the foreign affairs select committee about the Mandelson appointment.

It will hear from Morgan McSweeney, the prime minister’s former chief of staff, who was instrumental in Mandelson’s appointment. He will be questioned on claims he told Sir Philip Barton, Robbins’ predecessor, to “just f***ing approve” the peer’s move to Washington, which he denies.

Barton is also due to give evidence to the committee on Tuesday and is expected to support claims there was pressure from Downing Street over the appointment.

Philip Barton of the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office speaking at the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons conference.

The privileges committee found in 2023 that Johnson, then the prime minister, had lied in the Commons over the lockdown parties. MPs voted in April 2022 for it to investigate him. He was forced to resign in the July after losing the support of his cabinet and stood down as an MP the following year after the committee concluded he had committed “serious contempt” by intentionally misleading the Commons.

Labour backbenchers said they would use Monday to discuss the debate, although they expected to be on a three-line whip for the vote. “Starmer says he has the support of MPs but that’s not how anyone I know sees it and many want him gone,” one said. “But that is a very different matter from people choosing to go through the lobby with Tories on a vote of confidence in the prime minister.”

Graham Stringer, the Labour MP for Blackley & Middleton South, said: “The prime minister is a busted flush. I just want him to leave in the way that enables the party to produce the best leader who will get it out of both the government’s mess and our electoral mess. I haven’t spoken to any Labor MP who thinks he should fight the next election.”

In an interview with The Sunday Times, Starmer said “there are different types of pressure,” and that Robbins only faced demands to ask “can we get this done quickly”. He said Robbins was not under pressure to disregard security vetting. “[Robbins] was really clear in his mind that wasn’t pressure that was put on him,” Starmer said.

He is also facing questions over reports he broke the ministerial code by failing to declare a meeting in Washington with a client of Mandelson’s lobbying firm. He visited the headquarters of Palantir, a software company with government contracts, in February 2025, while Mandelson was ambassador.

Downing Street claims the event was not a meeting and therefore does not require official declaration. However, the Ministry of Defence, whose officials also attended, described it as a meeting, the Sunday Telegraph reported.