Big changes are taking place in the Downing Street Policy Unit right now. Which phase is that now…
Recent additions include Leo Rees on the DSIT brief, a data wonk who for three years worked under the auspices of Will Tanner at Tory-affiliated think tank Onward, only departing in 2022. Labourites can make up their own minds as to how that is going to go…
Staff who made up the LOTO policy unit responsible for writing the Labour manifesto – most of whom remaining are now women – are on the way out. Replacements are ongoing currently…
The policy unit greases the wheels between No10 and ministers. Received wisdom is that you need SpAds in there who understand the political dynamics, have clout, and can operate decisively…
Government sources say there is no intention currently to replace Steph Driver, who departed as Starmer’s director of day-to-day communications last month. Instead the communications team will be bolstered by a new more junior media SpAd who will work the majority of the time under Press Secretary Sophie Nazemi.
The shake-up comes in a period of low morale in Downing Street and wider government. Exits continue, of the voluntary and involuntary varieties…
UPDATE: Some changes now being briefed out:
Statement by Paul Dacre, Editor-in-Chief of Associated Newspapers Limited, following Harry’s loss in court today:
“Prince Harry wrote a sad book which boasted about his killing of 25 Taliban, his drug-taking and, in cringe-making detail, how he lost his virginity. There isn’t a laundry in the cosmos big enough to wash all the dirty linen he has aired about his own family. For him, to complain about HIS privacy being invaded takes, not just the biscuit, but the whole tin. Poor Harry. I feel sorry for the way a confused and angry young man has been drawn into this case. The bitter irony is that his mother, Diana, liked the Mail. We were her paper. We took her side in her acrimonious break up with Charles. She and I would speak and meet. The Mail’s superb royal reporter was her friend and confidante. The truth is that this trumped-up action – which has cost well over £50 million and wasted a huge amount of valuable court time – should never have been brought to trial. That it did, raises profoundly disturbing questions about the conduct of elements of the legal profession. Today’s verdict is not just a victory for Associated’s magnificent journalists – several of whom have had a terrible toll imposed on their health and lives – but a free press generally. Make no mistake. This was a conspiracy, supported by Hacked Off, to destroy a paper. Financed by the orgy-loving, racist Max Mosley and involving the actor Hugh Grant, it was also a sinister bid to resuscitate Leveson Two and impose statutory regulation on the press which, even now, is rearing its ugly head in Labour’s Media Green Paper.”