A Labour minister who claimed to be “surprised” and “furious” at a PR agency’s work to investigate journalists on his behalf had been accused of being personally involved in naming them to British intelligence officials.
Josh Simons, who was running the think-tank Labour Together at the time, falsely linked journalists to pro-Russian propaganda.
He was also involved in telling security officials a journalist was “living with” the daughter of a former adviser to Jeremy Corbyn.
Officials were told by Mr Simons’ team Mr Corbyn’s former adviser was “suspected of links to Russian intelligence”, the Guardian reports.
The disclosures are contained in emails Mr Simons and his chief of staff at Labour Together sent to the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), a division of the spy agency GCHQ, in 2024.
A spokesman for Mr Simons said: “These claims are untrue.”
Mr Simons was elected as a Member of Parliament in the 2024 general election, to which he represents the Makerfield constituency in Great Manchester.
He was appointed a Parliamentary Secretary for the Cabinet Office in 2025 and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital Government at the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology on January 9.
Josh Simons used to work for Labour Together but is now a minister
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GOV.UK
The emails reportedly lay out in detail what Mr Simons and his team wrote to intelligence officials in an effort to get them to investigate the sourcing behind a story in The Sunday Times about Labour Together’s failure to disclose political donations.
When informed by The Guardian about what had been communicated about them to intelligence officials, some of those named in the emails accused Simons of orchestrating a “McCarthyite smear” campaign that left them feeling “violated”.
In late 2023, Mr Simons commissioned APCO Worldwide, an American lobbying and public affairs agency to investigate the “sourcing, funding and origin” of the story.
He has claimed he was disturbed to find the APCO report had explored unnecessary information about one of the Times’ journalists.
Morgan McSweeney resigned on February 8 after the Peter Mandelson scandal
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GETTYBut the emails show Mr Simons named the same journalist in an email to intelligence officials weeks after receiving the report in question.
He and his chief of staff at the think-tank, Ben Szreter, told the NCSC they suspected The Sunday Times piece may be linked to a bigger “coordinated effort to discredit” Labour Together to undermine the Prime Minister and his then-chief adviser, Morgan McSweeney.
Consequently, Mr Simons has been facing calls for his resignation over his decision to commission the report into the story, which revealed a hefty £730,000 of undeclared donations to the thinktank.
The Electoral Commission fined Labour Together more than £14,000 for failing to declare this money.
Mr McSweeney, the Prime Minister’s ex-chief adviser, was running the think-tank when the undeclared donations were received.
The Labour minister is now under investigation by the Cabinet Office’s propriety and ethics team who are understanding what role Mr Simons played in the commissioning and dissemination of the APCO report.
Facing the pressure to step down, he has said in statements to the media he was “surprised”, “shocked”, “distressed” and “furious” to discover the report he had commissioned had been “extended beyond the contract by including unnecessary information about Gabriel Pogrund”, Whitehall Editor at The Sunday Times.
He added the information on Mr Pogrund had been “immediately removed” by the think-tank before the report was passed on to intelligence officials.
However, the emails seen by reporters show when Mr Simons and Mr Szreter passed on the APCO report to the intelligence authorities, they named Mr Pogrund and his colleague Harry Yorke, the newspaper’s Deputy Political Editor, suggesting their story could be linked to a Russian disinformation campaign.
Speaking to the People’s Channel, former Labour MP Stephen Pound said: “To be honest, there’s a stench about this that I’m not happy with.
“Gabriel Pogrund is a very, very well respected journalist.”
They also passed on highly personal information about Paul Holden, a freelance reporter who was also credited in The Sunday Times article.
In one email, Mr Simons told intelligence officials material published by the paper may be linked to “people known to be operating in a pro-Kremlin propaganda network with links to Russian intelligence”.
There is no credible evidence to support the now Labour minister’s claims or that their story, which was published in 2023, was anything but reporting a breach of electoral law by the think-tank.
It is reported the NCSC had a meeting with Mr Simons, but ultimately advised him they would not investigate his report and pointed out the information leaked to journalists could have been obtained through various channels.