People didn't know who they were voting for
In the corridors of British power, a think tank that helped engineer a prime minister's rise stands accused of turning the instruments of public relations into weapons against the journalists who dared to follow the money. The resignation of Cabinet Office minister Josh Simons, who paid £36,000 to investigate reporters examining Labour Together's undisclosed donations, has laid bare a troubling question: when those who govern treat scrutiny as a threat to be neutralised rather than a duty to be endured, what remains of the democratic compact? The episode is less about one minister's misconduct than about the culture of a political project that, critics argue, built its ascent on concealment and now wields state-adjacent power to protect that foundation.
- A Cabinet Office minister paid an American PR firm to compile dossiers on investigative journalists — including locating one reporter's home address — after they exposed over £700,000 in undisclosed donations to his think tank.
- The smear campaign falsely branded a journalist who had spent years exposing Russian arms dealing as a Russian intelligence asset, a lie circulated to editors in an effort to bury the original funding story before a general election.
- The strategy largely succeeded: spooked by the whispering campaign, most outlets declined to pursue the Labour Together funding scandal, and voters went to the polls without a full picture of who had bankrolled Keir Starmer's rise to power.
- Simons resigned in February 2026 but faced no disciplinary action after a Cabinet Office inquiry — conducted by his own department — cleared him, while the journalist targeted was never asked to give evidence.
- Press freedom organisations, civil liberties groups, and two dozen Labour MPs are now demanding an independent inquiry, warning that the surveillance of journalists and suppression of public-interest reporting signal democratic backsliding at the heart of government.
In January 2024, Cabinet Office minister Josh Simons attempted to report an investigative journalist to Britain's National Cybersecurity Centre, alleging the reporter had received material from a Russia-linked hack. The allegation was false, the security agency declined to act, and yet Simons continued briefing journalists with the same claim. Behind the smear lay a £36,000 contract with American PR firm APCO, hired to dig into the personal lives of reporters investigating his think tank's finances.
Labour Together is not widely known to the public, but it sits at the centre of British political power, having helped engineer Keir Starmer's path to the Labour leadership. In late 2023, journalists at The Times revealed the think tank had failed to disclose more than £700,000 in political donations made during the years it was backing Starmer's campaign. The story barely travelled beyond the paper that broke it.
The reason, it now appears, is that Labour Together moved quickly to contain the damage. APCO's resulting dossier, codenamed 'Operation Cannon,' gathered intimate details about one journalist's faith, relationships, and family. For researcher Paul Holden, whose work had fed into The Times investigation, the firm went further — using software to identify his home address and his partner's identity, details he had kept private for genuine security reasons given his years exposing Russian arms networks. When Simons began circulating the claim that Holden was a Russian intelligence asset, it was not merely defamatory; it was designed to frighten.
The Guardian's political editor Pippa Crerar was among those briefed with the allegation. She verified the facts, assessed the source's motivation, and declined to publish. Her public explanation was a quiet lesson in journalistic standards: you check before you print. But the whispering campaign had done its work. Voters went to the polls without knowing the full story of who had funded the political project now running the country.
Holden's verdict was stark: the public had been deceived about who they were electing, and the resulting erosion of democratic trust had helped create the conditions for the far right to gain ground. He described Labour Together's operating method as one built on systematic dishonesty, and characterised the government it produced as among the most authoritarian Britain has seen.
Simons resigned in late February 2026 but faced no formal sanction. A Cabinet Office inquiry — conducted within the very department he had led — cleared him of breaching the ministerial code, and Holden was never invited to give evidence. Baroness Sally Morgan, now chair of Labour Together, conceded the PR firm's work was 'indefensible' and that the board had never seen the contract or its findings. Two dozen Labour MPs have called for an independent investigation. Press freedom organisations including Index on Censorship and the National Union of Journalists have warned that the surveillance of reporters and the suppression of public-interest journalism are incompatible with democratic governance.
The figures who built Labour Together remain in government. Whether this episode prompts genuine accountability or simply recedes into the machinery of power it helped create remains the open and uncomfortable question.
In January 2024, a Cabinet Office minister named Josh Simons attempted to report an investigative journalist to Britain's National Cybersecurity Centre, claiming the journalist had received information from a Russia-linked hack. The allegation was false. The security agency declined to investigate. But Simons pressed ahead anyway, briefing journalists with the same accusation. What made this episode remarkable was not the lie itself, but what lay behind it: Simons had paid an American PR firm £36,000 to dig into the personal lives of reporters who were investigating his think tank's finances.
Labour Together is not a household name, but it sits at the heart of British power. The think tank helped engineer Keir Starmer's rise to Labour leadership and counts senior government ministers among its members and funders. In November 2023, journalists Gabriel Pogrund and Harry Yorke published an investigation in The Times revealing that Labour Together had failed to disclose over £700,000 in political donations during the years it was backing Starmer's campaign. The money came from wealthy donors including a pro-Israel businessman and a hedge fund manager. The story should have been significant. It barely spread beyond The Times.
What happened next explains why. Labour Together hired APCO, a public affairs company, to investigate the journalists who broke the story. The resulting dossier, codenamed "Operation Cannon," included intimate details about one reporter's faith, relationships, and family background. For Paul Holden, an investigative journalist whose research had fed into The Times piece, the firm went further: they used software to locate his home address and identify his partner, information he had kept private for security reasons. Holden had spent years exposing Russian arms dealing and could not safely travel east of Poland. When Simons began circulating claims that Holden was a Russian intelligence asset, it was not merely false—it was designed to terrify.
The strategy appeared to work. When The Guardian's political editor Pippa Crerar was briefed with the same Russian spy allegation, she checked the facts, spoke to sources, and considered the motivation of the person spreading the rumor. She decided not to publish. In a post on social media, she explained the basic work of journalism: you verify before you print. The allegation failed that test. But the damage was done. Other outlets, apparently spooked by the whispering campaign, largely ignored Labour Together's funding scandal. Voters went to the polls without knowing where the money behind Starmer's rise had come from.
Holden's assessment was blunt: the public had been deceived about who they were voting for. Had Labour faced proper scrutiny before taking power, he argued, the resulting crisis of confidence in democracy might not have opened space for the far right to flourish. He characterized the political project behind Labour Together as one built on "dishonesty, misdirection and deceptions" as its core operating method. Once in government, he said, it had become "one of the most authoritarian governments this country has ever had."
The scandal has triggered alarm among press freedom advocates. Julie Posetti, chair of the Centre for Journalism and Democracy at City St George's, told Middle East Eye that Labour Together's actions "represent a threat to media freedom in the UK." Nik Williams of Index on Censorship called the surveillance of journalists "deeply alarming" and warned that such tactics signal democratic backsliding. The National Union of Journalists demanded stronger legislation to prevent organizations from targeting reporters and their sources. Multiple civil liberties groups issued statements warning that efforts to conceal information of public interest or attack journalists for doing their job are incompatible with democratic obligations.
Simons resigned in late February 2026, but faced no disciplinary action. An investigation by the Cabinet Office—the very department Simons worked in—cleared him of breaching the ministerial code, despite concerns about its integrity. Holden was never asked to give evidence. Two dozen Labour MPs have called for an independent inquiry. Baroness Sally Morgan, who now chairs Labour Together, acknowledged that the PR firm's work was "indefensible" and that the board had never seen the contract or the final report. She said the think tank has since implemented new governance measures. But the figures who shaped Labour Together's rise remain in government, including Prime Minister Starmer himself. The question now is whether the incident will prompt real change in how power polices the press, or whether it signals something deeper about the culture of the government that emerged from this think tank's machinery.
Notable Quotes
The scope of the work carried out by APCO, commissioned by the then director of Labour Together, was indefensible.— Baroness Sally Morgan, Chair of Labour Together
This is a political project which uses dishonesty, misdirection and deceptions as its key political mode of operation.— Paul Holden, investigative journalist
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
Why did Labour Together feel the need to hire a PR firm to investigate journalists in the first place?
Because the journalists were about to expose something the think tank had worked hard to hide—over £700,000 in undisclosed donations that had funded Starmer's leadership campaign. If voters knew where that money came from, it would undermine the image Labour Together had carefully constructed.
But couldn't they have just ignored the story?
They could have. But the story was going to run in The Times, a major outlet. They were panicked. So instead of defending their funding or explaining it, they decided to attack the people doing the reporting.
By claiming they were Russian spies?
Yes. It's a particularly vicious tactic because it's designed to make other journalists afraid to touch the story. If you're a reporter and you hear that someone investigating a political group has been flagged as a security risk, you hesitate. You second-guess yourself. That hesitation is the whole point.
Did it work?
Largely, yes. The story barely spread beyond The Times. Other outlets stayed away. Voters didn't know what they needed to know before they cast their ballots.
What troubles me most is that this came from inside government.
Exactly. Simons was a Cabinet Office minister. He had access to security agencies, to the press, to the machinery of state. He used all of it to silence reporting about his own organization. That's not a scandal about one bad actor—it's a structural problem about how power protects itself.
Is there any accountability?
Simons resigned, but wasn't disciplined. The Cabinet Office investigated itself and cleared him. The people who built Labour Together are still in government. That's the real story.