Starmer’s Director of Strategy Paul Ovenden has resigned this afternoon after the Mail published details about sexually explicit emails concerning Diane Abbott. According to the Mail, Ovenden stood down today following the publication of the 2017 messages in which he recounted a story about “a game of ‘shag, marry, kill’ involving Abbott”. He resigned to avoid becoming a “distraction“. A government source tells Guido:
“Paul was one of the most important architects of last year’s landslide election and Keir has relied on him heavily every day since. His loss to the project is monumental”.
Yet another massive resignation from the top…
Justice minister Alex Davies-Jones told the Today Programme it wasn’t ‘appropriate’ to ask whether or not David Lammy was shopping prior to DPMQs instead of trying to sort out the released prisoner:
“He was preparing for Deputy Prime Minister’s Questions. He was preparing to stand in for the Prime Minister, the first ever black person to do so… He cracked a joke because his poppy had fallen off this suit, which he also addressed during the Deputy Prime Minister’s Questions… I don’t think it’s appropriate to get into the weeds of if he was shopping or not in the morning.”