Angela Rayner pledges her ‘full support’ to Keir Starmer as Cabinet rallies around beleaguered PM: RECAP

Sir Keir Starmer has ended arguably the most difficult day of his Downing Street tenure in a better position than it started.

After facing a huge challenge to his authority when Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar called for his resignation, the PM received backing from Angela Rayner and rallied his MPs at a meeting on Monday evening.

Here is a summary of what has been a dramatic day:

• After the Lord Peter Mandelson scandal which shook the Labour government to the core, Starmer faced calls to resign throughout Monday from Nigel Farage, Kemi Badenoch and Zack Polanski.
• The situation went from bad to worse when the PM’s executive director of communications, Tim Allan, stood down from his position.
• Later, Sarwar said he viewed Sir Keir as a ‘friend’ and a ‘decent man’ but there had been ‘too many mistakes’.
• However a statement released by Rachel Reeves on X strengthened Starmer’s position. The Chancellor of the Exchequer claimed that ‘with Keir as our Prime Minister we are turning the country around.’
• Former Deputy PM Angela Rayner also publicly supported the Labour leader.
• Starmer later addressed a packed meeting of Labour MPs where he insisted he has no intentions of leaving his post. ‘I have won every fight I have been in,’ he claimed.

The Daily Mail’s political experts Greg Heffer and James Tapsfield have explained exactly what was said during Sir Keir Starmer’s showdown meeting with Labour MPs on Monday evening.

Read here:

Amid the ongoing drama in government, Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey has called for a general election.

He told broadcasters on Monday:

Labour were elected to bring change to the country and to end the chaos we saw under the Conservatives. But Keir Starmer has failed to deliver, and we still have this daily soap opera. And it’s damaging the country.”

Labour MPs have either got to sort this out among themselves, or there is going to have to be a general election.

Our political correspondent Sam Merriman has written an extended piece on the revelations about Wes Streeting’s messages with the disgraced Lord Peter Mandelson.

Read here:

Sir Keir Starmer is reportedly ending what has been a turbulent day in a stronger position than when it started.

Environment Secretary Emma Reynolds is the latest senior Labour figure to pledge her support to the PM.

She told GB News:

We have a united front here, and the meeting of the parliamentary Labour party, which I have just come from, there was a real sense of unity in that room behind Keir Starmer because we need this Labour government to face outwards, not inwards, not having fights with ourselves, but actually focusing on delivering the change that we have a five-year mandate to do.

The under-pressure Prime Minister came out fighting at his meeting with Labour MPs on Monday evening, claiming he has no plans to resign.

Now, we can bring you more from the PM’s speech, where he is said to have described Labour’s battle with Reform UK as ‘the fight of our lives’.

I have won every fight I’ve ever been in. I fought to change the Crown Prosecution Service so it better served victims of violence against women and girls. I fought to change the Labour Party to allow us to win an election again.

People told me I couldn’t do it. And then they gradually said, you might just get over the line. We won with a landslide majority. Every fight I’ve been in, I have won.

Detractors that don’t want a Labour government at all, and certainly not one to succeed. I have had detractors every step of the way, and I’ve got them now.

But I’ll tell you this, after having fought so hard for the chance to change our country, I’m not prepared to walk away from my mandate and my responsibility to my country, or to plunge us into chaos, as others have done.

In a defiant speech given to the Parliamentary Labour Party this evening, Sir Keir Starmer revealed he has no intentions of resigning.

‘I have won every fight I’ve ever been in,’ he said. ‘I’m not prepared to walk away.’

It came after widespread calls for Sir Keir to resign from opposition leaders such as Kemi Badenoch, Nigel Farage and Zack Polanski.

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar also asked Starmer to stand down in a bombshell press conference on Monday.

Keir Starmer has left this evening’s meeting where he addressed the Parliamentary Labour Party.

The Prime Minister is reported to have stayed for around an hour, and was met by huge rounds of applause and a standing ovation on his arrival.

In messages sharing with Sky News between Wes Streeting and Lord Mandelson, the Health Secretary spoke of three main issues – his election worries, the war in Israel and the government’s growth plan.

Election fears

In a text sent to Mandelson in March 2025, Streeting wrote: ‘I fear we’re in big trouble here – and I am toast at the next election.

‘We just lost our safest ward in Redbridge (51% Muslim, Ilford S) to a Gaza independent. At this rate I don’t think we’ll hold either of the two Ilford seats.

‘There isn’t a clear answer to the question: why Labour?’

Labour’s lack of a growth plan

A short time later, Mandelson replies: ‘The government doesn’t have an economic philosophy which is then followed through in a programme of policies.’

To which Streeting comes back: ‘No growth strategy at all.’

Israeli war crimes

Later, in July 2025, Streeting reveals his thoughts about the conflict in Palestine.

‘Morally and politically, I think we need to join France,’ he wrote. ‘Morally, because Israel is committing war crimes before our eyes.

‘Their government talks the language of ethnic cleansing and I have met with our own medics out there who describe the most chilling and distressing scenes of calculated brutality against women and children.

‘Politically, a Commons vote will be engineered in September on recognition and we will lose it if we’re not ahead of it.

‘There are no circumstances in which people like me or Shabana [Mahmood] could abstain or vote against, for example.’

Wes Streeting has said he has ‘nothing to hide’ about his relationship with Lord Mandelson.

The British ambassador to the US resigned from his post last week after revelations about his friendship with paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Streeting is reported to have shown texts between him and Mandelson to Sky News, which show the Ilford North MP claiming he is ‘toast at the next election’.

The Health Secretary also said the government ‘has no growth strategy’, according to a report by the publication.

In an interview on Monday about the WhatsApp messages, Streeting said:

‘I did not know about the nature of Peter Mandelson’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein after his conviction and had I known, I would not have wanted him anywhere near Washington, anywhere near the Labour Party or anywhere near me or my family.’