The News Agents

A key cabinet member, Hilary Benn, was asked this lunch time if Wes Streeting was still the Health Secretary. Astonishingly he said he did not know. Is Streeting about to launch a leadership campaign? is Starmer preparing to fight him? And could all this chaos somehow leave Ed Miliband in poll position as PM? Later, the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner launches an investigation into Nigel Fara...

Anyone who thought Keir Starmer was about to succumb to pressure from the 80 strong list of MPs who turned against him were in for a shock this morning when they found a PM defiant and refusing to even discuss a leadership challenge. Can he hold them off? Is his position more or less perilous today? And what is Andy Burnham doing at Euston? Jess Philips has become the most senior minister to resig...

It's always risky when a Prime Minister's speech becomes billed as a 'reset' and 'make or break' but Keir Starmer's address this morning was exactly that. Facing a surprise possible leadership challenge from backbencher Catherine West - and a growing number of MPS in open mutiny - Starmer insisted he would prove his doubters wrong, face any contest head on, and keep Britain from ushering in "dange...

The morning after elections, political parties send their leaders out to areas where they outperformed expectations to try and sell a narrative about their results, even on the bruising nights. Such was the scale of Labour's defeat that for much of the night, it wasn't clear whether there was anywhere they could send Starmer. Eventually, he headed to Ealing where Labour kept control of the council...

It’s polling day in elections across Great Britain. Labour is braced for a battering, at the hands of insurgent forces on every side. Birmingham is a microcosm of that picture: an unloved Labour administration dealing with complex problems and complex politics. But here it’s not just the Greens and Reform the party must contend with, but the rise of the so-called Gaza independents. A new political...

Brighton are known as one of football's best run clubs with a seemingly constant yearly profit margin above £100 million... and today they have officially announced that their 33 year old manager Fabian Hürzeler has signed a new contract. A club on the verge of a second season playing European football and that has recently announced they are the first club the world to have a purpose built women'...

Patrick Radden Keefe, author of Empire of Pain and Say Nothing, is back asking questions of those in power. His new best-seller investigates the mysterious death of young Zac Brettler in the heart of London. What does it tell us about dark money, lies and corruption in this gilded city - now home to the world’s billionaires? And why were the police either unwilling or unable to provide his family...

Donald Trump launched "Project Freedom" over the bank holiday weekend - a "humanitarian gesture", aimed at guaranteeing the safe passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz still stubbornly being controlled by Iran. The Secretary of War, Pete Hegseth, announced today a "red white and blue dome" over the area as he insisted that the US holds all the cards in the conflict. There's just one problem...

In the last weeks, the funding of the Reform party has attracted more and more attention. This is a party which tells us they are heading to Downing street, a party tipped to the top the poll in next week’s English local elections. We now know that Nigel Farage’s party has been given over £12m from a single donor, a Thai based British businessman, crypto billionaire, Christopher Harborne. And we a...

The Bank of England Monetary Policy Report might sound like a dry and dusty economic report - and often it is - but today's made for truly shocking reading for Britain. Its analysis shows living standards are already falling and, as a result of Trump's war in Iran, inflation could go above 6%, and as many as six rises in interest rates might be needed by the end of this year. That would mean rocke...

PSG and Bayern Munich put on one the greatest displays of football in the history of the game on Tuesday night and Vincent Kompany has coached his side of start to break records this season. But does a man who shared the pitch with him 231 times and lifted 5 trophies alongside him, even recognise his old teammate? Joe Hart joins to tell us if he could see Vincent succeeding Pep Guardiola at the Et...

Two men stabbed in broad daylight in Golders Green this morning became the latest victims of what Kemi Badenoch has called a national emergency of antisemitism. The last month has seen multiple attacks on the Jewish community of North London. Is this an orchestrated attack underwritten by Iran? Or is it further proof of the escalation of antisemitism in our country since the war in Gaza and Israel...

Morgan McSweeney was called before MPs to explain HIS version of how Mandelson was hired: was he just finding a great job for a mate? Why hadn’t he responded to all the red flag warnings? Was due process really followed? And had he put Starmer in a position where the PM wasn’t told the whole truth? Later, Tom Baldwin - Starmer’s friend and biographer- on how, and whether, the PM can survive, and w...

Trump has praised King Charles for pressing on with his US state visit in the wake of Saturday night's shooting, calling him ‘brave’. The President’s comments have thrust the King back into the diplomatic spotlight. With tensions between the UK and the US compounding, it seems that Keir Starmer has deployed the King as a literal trump card. So can the King make any difference for the ‘special rela...

In a world of increasing extremes, Liberalism itself has come to be an insult. From 'metropolitan liberal elites' to 'bleeding heart liberals' the liberal establishment seems bewildered and fresh out of devoid of new ideas in the face of populist extremes. Labour, Tories, Liberal Democrats – all now struggling to hold their own against Reform UK and The Green Party, both of which have taken populi...

After Liam Rosenior was sacked just 106 days into his 6-year-deal, life-long Chelsea fan & President of World Athletics, Lord Seb Coe joins Gabby and Mark to talk about Russia's return to the Olympics, his views on The ' Enhanced Games ' and why the world is running out of host cities for major tournaments? Will British athletics be able to capitalise on their new 'golden generation' and when...

Is Keir Starmer a passenger and not a driver in his own government? At the end of a week of crisis management - with a sacked official spilling the beans on the grubby business of the Mandelson appointment - the charge against the Prime Minister that's really stuck is that somehow he’s never in control of anything within his own government. Can Starmer weather this out? Or are his cabinet colleagu...

Keir Starmer came to power promising to clean up politics and end the games at the top of Westminster. Yet this week has brought another sacking, linked to the handling of Peter Mandelson’s appointment, alongside reports of efforts to secure an ambassadorial role for the Prime Minister’s former communications chief, Matthew Doyle. As more details emerge, the picture looks increasingly complicated....

Olly Robbins - the foreign office top civil servant fired by Keir Starmer on Thursday - gave his version of events today. He described an atmosphere of immense pressure over the Peter Mandelson appointment and suggested Downing Street weren’t that interested in the vetting process at all. Was he bullied into giving Mandelson the job? Was Starmer right to sack Robbins? And why was he hunting for an...

Keir Starmer is still pleading his case before MPs. Should he have been told about the failed Mandelson vetting by Olly Robbins? Should he have asked? Who’s fault was it really that he didn’t find out until last Tuesday. And why, critically, did he ignore a letter of advice from then cabinet secretary Simon Case explicitly telling him to vet Mandelson BEFORE appointing him. We still have no clear...

That's the charge from Tory leader Kemi Badenoch, who has called on the Prime Minister to resign today. The Guardian reported last night that Starmer appointed Mandelson as Britain’s ambassador to Washington even though he had failed government security vetting. The PM has said today he is "absolutely furious" he was not told about this - and has sacked Olly Robbins, the top civil servant at the F...

The Pope didn’t mention Trump by name. But speaking to a large congregation on his trip to Cameroon he warned that the world was being "ravaged by tyrants". Has he upped the ante in his war with the president? And as a man of God is he allowed to warn about unjust war - or is that a political intervention? And is this a beed Trump can't win? JD Vance has conveniently told him to stop pontificating...

After Liverpool became the SIXTH English club to fall victim to Luis Enrique's all-conquering PSG in the Champions League - does their unique blend of intensity & swagger feel more and more like an indictment of Premier League pragmatism. So how do they keep peaking at just the right time in the season, why wasn't there more of a battle to sign the likes of Kvicha Kvaratskhelia and which PSG s...

MPs are voting again on a social media ban for U16s today - but the government has only committed to a consultation on the move so as it stands it's unlikely to become law. The clamour for the move is growing, and public opinion is strongly in favour of restricting social media use to adults only. So why is Keir Starmer dragging his feet and losing any capital he could gain from moving on it? Woul...

Today, the United States has imposed a blockade on the Strait of Hormuz, with JD Vance describing Iran’s earlier actions in the war as "economic terrorism". As global fuel markets remain volatile amid the fragile US-Iran ceasefire, the stakes are rising well beyond the region. China has condemned the US naval blockade of Iranian ports as "irresponsible and dangerous". So, with tensions escalating...