As Sir Keir Starmer’s enforcer in Cabinet, Pat McFadden told the disgraced peer that every meeting he had with members of the Parliamentary Labour Party concerned the question: “Who can we tax in order to pay benefits to others?”
The comments were seized on by the Conservatives, who branded Labour “the welfare party”.
The frank exchange forms part of the Government’s release of more than 1,500 pages of emails and WhatsApp messages relating to Lord Mandelson’s time as the UK’s ambassador to the US.
The document release on Monday – the largest laid before Parliament since the 2016 Chilcot Inquiry – was demanded by MPs in the wake of Lord Mandelson’s sacking and fresh revelations about his friendship with the convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
The damning emails and texts paint a picture of a Government at war with itself, led by a Prime Minister lacking the flair to tackle the challenges facing Britain.
Among the explosive exchanges between Lord Mandelson and McFadden were texts sent in the weeks before a major Government climbdown over welfare cuts.
Last July, No. 10 backed down on £5 billion of cuts to personal independence payments. The climbdown is regarded as the moment Sir Keir ceded power to the soft Left of the parliamentary Labour Party.
McFadden is now the Work and Pensions Secretary, in charge of Britain’s ballooning welfare bill....<<<Read More>>>>...
