Starmer had to choose between his chief of staff and the architect of Labour’s election victory, Morgan McSweeney

In the days running up to the Labour party conference one of Keir Starmer’s most senior aides took him aside and told him he had to get a grip of his No 10 operation after weeks of damaging headlines over tensions within his top team.

The aide was not alone. A handful of other advisers and friends had made a similar plea to the prime minister. Downing Street was dysfunctional, they told him, and the whole government was at risk of being undermined.