Former Downing Street chief of staff Morgan McSweeney has admitted that Labour did not do enough to prepare for power before the general election, in his first media interview. Speaking to the BBC's Political Thinking with Nick Robinson podcast, McSweeney said the party faced turmoil during its short two years in office, culminating in Sir Keir Starmer's resignation as Prime Minister.
Lack of Preparation for a New Era
McSweeney told the BBC: "I think that we didn’t prepare enough for what kind of world we were going to be in. We are now in a very different era than when Labour was last in government, and I think we didn’t have enough conversations at the top of the party about what that meant, how to prepare for it, what that meant for the state, how the state needed to be reformed, because in lots of ways the state is really out of shape and is unable to deliver for people."
He highlighted public frustration with broken promises, adding: "You have to deliver quite quickly for people for them to see the change quickly, and I think we didn’t come in with enough of a theory about how we would do that, and why that was important."
Moving On to a New Chapter
McSweeney, who remained a private figure during his time in Downing Street, explained his decision to speak publicly: "I need to move on to a new chapter in my life, and to do that, I need to close the old one, and to make clear that that’s happening. I loved working for Labour Party and for a Labour Government. It was an incredible privilege."
He acknowledged his increased visibility over time: "I loved managing election campaigns, and that means that you don’t have a public voice, and you should not be a visible character. That didn’t work out well for me. I became more and more visible the longer I stayed in the job, but I thought I needed to become a bit more public to let people know who I am, and to close a chapter on the past."
Previous Public Appearance
McSweeney has only made one other public-facing appearance, when he spoke at the Foreign Affairs Committee in April to answer questions about his role in appointing Lord Peter Mandelson as the ambassador to the US.
