Watch the moment a GB News star furiously slapped down a Labour MP after she insisted Sir Keir Starmer’s integrity was still intact – despite boiling backlash over the Lord Mandelson scandal.
Joining GB News this morning, the MP for Hyndburn discussed the impact of the blazing fiasco dividing up her party between staunch defendants of the PM and those calling for a new leader.
On the People’s Channel, Ms Smith insisted Sir Keir should not resign, breaking from the ranks of many of her fellow MPs who have demanded the resignation of either their party boss or his Chief of Staff Morgan McSweeney.
But earlier this week, a Welsh Labour MP told the BBC: “Starmer has to go – do the decent thing. Angela Rayner is probably leading a revolt but she is not the solution.”
So far, John McDonnell, Clive Lewis, Rachael Maskell, Nadia Whittome and Neil Duncan-Jordan are leading the charge, explicitly calling for Sir Keir to step down.
The former Deputy Prime Minister is rumoured to be ramping up a leadership bid while many accuse Sir Keir and his top team of circling the drain in Downing Street.
The MP added: “I think other stories that are circulating are incredibly unhelpful. We’ve got to be really, really clear in terms of care and his leadership and what led him to take this decision.
“But fundamentally, what’s important here is that Keir has apologised. I don’t think there’ll be many people more angry than him with how Manderson has conducted himself.”
Anne Diamond delivered a scathing takedown of the MP live on-air
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GB NEWS
She further said journalists were “desperate” to find those looking to oppose Sir Keir, saying: “That’s just not what I’ve heard.”
On GB News, the Hyndburn MP hit out at Lord Mandelson’s “fundamental betrayal of the party and country” adding his relationship with convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein was “abhorrent beyond words”.
But when the MP tried to shift the focus onto other matters of the day because she no longer wanted to discussed the scandal swallowing up her party, Anne Diamond unleashed a furious rant before Ms Smith.
The GB News presenter interjected: “But it’s your leader. Excuse me.
Keir Starmer claimed Peter Mandelson misled him over his links to Jeffrey Epstein | PA
“It is your leader and the Prime Minister who created this crisis by appointing Peter Mandelson, when everybody else seemed to know he was a dodgy character and shouldn’t have been appointed.
“You can’t blame journalists. You can’t blame the press. You can’t blame people wanting to talk about this now because we want to know why Lord Mandelson was appointed.
Ms Smith pointed out: “But I think what’s really interesting is that you weren’t pushing this degree of the story when he was appointed.
“The information that was available was far more limited at that time. And the Tories, the Conservatives, the Opposition are exactly the same in their sort of propositions now.
“Where were they shouting so loudly about the clarity of this case when the appointment was made? The truth is, everybody makes an error of judgement.”
She continued: “What I know at this point and what I know of Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, is that he took on this job of turning our country around when everything we looked at was in dire, dire straits, whether it was the NHS, the state of our roads.
“That is not what I hear time and time again when I’m speaking to my constituency. I’ve had people write to me in support of Keir in recent days who also feel that what the country really needs is stability.
“We got into this habit of new Prime Minister after new Prime Minister because we had utter chaos.”
Ms Smith then pivoted to share sympathy for MPs who became politicians because they care for their communities.
She told Stephen and Anne: “We want to make a difference to our country, and we believe that we can make things better.
“Then we get tarnished by this same brush, by these types of stories, because our political system and the challenges of the current context far too often drive the wrong type of people to seek that leadership.
“But do I think Keir Starmer is aligned with the likes of Boris Johnson or Liz Truss or Nigel Farage? No, I do not.
“And I do not think many people doubt his integrity, the type of leadership he offers and why he came into this job.”