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As the old saying goes: “Once is an accident, twice is unlucky but three times is a pattern."
Nin Pandit, who was the principal private secretary in No 10 and ran the prime minister’s team, was not a household name by any means, but nevertheless she was an important cog in Sir Keir Starmer’s Downing Street operation.
The departure happened while the prime minister was away on holiday in what might be a poor attempt at keeping his fingerprints off it, but her sudden departure has underlined a growing sense of dysfunction at the core of this Labour government.
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Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer(PA)
After all, this is now the third senior figure in Starmer’s inner circle effectively to be shown the door in less than a year.
Last October, Sue (now Baroness) Gray was forced out after what appeared to be a power struggle with her replacement, Morgan McSweeney.
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McSweeney had been responsible in many ways for Sir Keir becoming leader as part of the efforts to transform Labour after the Jeremy Corbyn years. He ran the rebuilding of the party, the general election campaign and, since forcing out Gray, has had an iron grip on the operation.
The second departure came in March, when director of communications Matt Doyle was unceremoniously ousted from what can charitably be described as an underperforming media operation at the heart of the government.
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Now, just six months later, Pandit becomes the third casualty of a top team that is still not firing on all cylinders.
There are a number of issues here. First, is that Starmer has a loyalty problem. He tends to stick by those who worked with him previously and give them the top jobs, even if they are not capable of fulfilling them. This was widely believed to be the case with Mr Doyle, whose operation at times seemed overwhelmed by the enormity of the realities of government.
Baroness Gray was different. She had been brought in because Starmer believed she, as a highly regarded and experienced former civil servant who knew about the inner levers of power in Whitehall, would be able to get the party’s agenda through government. When she failed to deliver, she became an obvious and easy target for what amounted to a sacking to allow for a much-needed change of direction.
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Downing Street chief of staff Morgan McSweeney(PA)
Ironically, Ms Pandit was part of that change of direction, and her appointment was announced in the same press release that signalled Gray’s departure.
She was a McSweeney appointment aimed at bringing organisation and focus to the operation. The fact, though, that the criticisms have only increased and Mr McSweeney’s sacking has been at the top of a wish list of rebellious Labour MPs leading up to the summer meant that somebody needed to go.
The real question is: who is this protecting?
Someone has had to carry the can for continued perceived failures, bad poll ratings, an unsettled parliamentary party, and a government struggling to deal with growing economic woes and the continuing migrant crisis.
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All the time, though, Nigel Farage and Reform appear to be stalking Labour in their old heartlands, as this week proved when Nigel Farage was at the centre of almost every single political story while the PM was on holiday.
The problem is that Pandit’s departure only points to weakness and dysfunction. It is not going to change the dire political narrative that has hung around this government like a bad stench.