Keir

Starmer seeks broader powers to police internet access and child safety as U.K. weighs under-16 social media ban British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will move to secure broader powers to regulate internet access, arguing the U.K. must accelerate protections for children as digital risks evolve rapidly and platform rules shift faster than legislation can keep up. The push, announced as the government advances its review of online child safety, follows a plan unveiled last month to consult on an Australian-style ban on social…

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has called on Manchester United co-owner Jim Ratcliffe to apologise after the billionaire said in a television interview that the United Kingdom “has been colonised by immigrants.” Responding to coverage of the remarks in a post on X, Starmer wrote: “Offensive and wrong. Britain is a proud, tolerant and diverse country. Jim Ratcliffe should apologise.” Ratcliffe, the founder and chairman of chemicals group Ineos, made the comments during an interview with Sky News. “You can’t have an economy…

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has called on Manchester United co-owner Jim Ratcliffe to apologise for saying the country has been “colonised by immigrants,” denouncing the remarks as “offensive and wrong.” Ratcliffe, the billionaire founder and chairman of chemicals group Ineos, made the comments in an interview with Sky News. “You can’t have an economy with nine million people on benefits and huge levels of immigrants coming in,” he said. “I mean, the UK is being colonised. It’s costing too much money. The UK has been…

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will chair a cabinet meeting after weathering fresh calls from within Labour to resign, as his top ministers moved quickly to close ranks and project stability at the heart of government. The routine session follows a day of turbulence set off when Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar urged Starmer to step down over the fallout from the Peter Mandelson controversy. Sarwar is the most senior Labour figure to demand the prime minister’s resignation, warning the “distraction” from Downing…

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is facing calls to step down as his team reels from the fallout of appointing Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the U.S., a move that has boomeranged amid disclosures about Mandelson’s ties to convicted U.S. sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Here is how a resignation or a Labour leadership challenge would unfold — and what it would take to replace a sitting prime minister. What happens if Starmer resigns? If Starmer quits, the Labour Party would immediately begin a leadership contest to choose his…

Starmer’s 18-month slide: From landslide to crisis as Mandelson fallout empties No. 10 Keir Starmer marched Labour back into Downing Street in July 2024 with a commanding majority and a promise of sober, competent government. Eighteen months later, the prime minister is fighting for authority after his chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, and communications chief, Tim Allan, resigned in the wake of a deepening Peter Mandelson scandal. Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar urged him to quit, saying the “distraction needs to end and…

Keir Starmer’s authority is under acute scrutiny after top aides quit, an exodus that narrows the circle of trust around the prime minister and invites a cascade of political risk. In Westminster, personnel is policy; who sits at the No. 10 table often determines what reaches the floor of the House, how a message lands with voters and whether a leadership’s grip tightens or slips. When senior advisers walk out together, it rarely happens by accident—and it rarely ends at the door. The immediate consequence is practical. A…

LONDON — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will face his MPs this week as he fights for his political survival after his chief of staff resigned over the fallout from the Peter Mandelson appointment and its links to Jeffrey Epstein. Starmer is expected to address a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party amid anger over his decision to name Mandelson ambassador to the United States, despite knowing Mandelson’s association with Epstein continued after the financier’s conviction for child sex offenses. The government is…

Gordon Brown said the crisis engulfing Keir Starmer over Peter Mandelson was “serious” and that the Labour leader had been “too slow to do the right things,” even as he backed Starmer as “a man of integrity” who had been “betrayed” by his former Cabinet ally. The intervention from the former prime minister came as the Metropolitan Police confirmed its misconduct-in-public-office investigation into Mandelson will “take some time,” after officers searched properties in London and Wiltshire. Mandelson has not been arrested. “I…

Keir Starmer’s defense of his decision to appoint Peter Mandelson as Britain’s ambassador to Washington — that he did not grasp the depth of Mandelson’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein — does not withstand the weight of what was already widely known. The scandal now engulfing Downing Street is not a bolt from the blue; it is the foreseeable consequence of elevating a man whose entanglements, instincts and methods were part of the public record. And it has exposed the operating system of this government more starkly than…