Ex-Labour comms chief suspended over links to sex offender

Lord Doyle, Sir Keir Starmer's former director of communications, has been suspended from Labour's parliamentary party over his links with a convicted sex offender.

The peer said he would not take the Labour whip and apologised for his past association with Sean Morton, a former Labour councillor in Moray who admitted indecent child image offences in 2017.

It comes after the Sunday Times reported that Lord Doyle campaigned for Morton after he was charged with possessing and distributing indecent images of children in December 2016.

"At the point of my campaigning support, Morton repeatedly asserted to all those who knew him his innocence, including initially in court," Lord Doyle said.

He added: "To have not ceased support ahead of a judicial conclusion was a clear error of judgement for which I apologise unreservedly.

"Those of us who took [Morton] at his word were clearly mistaken. I have never sought to dismiss or diminish the seriousness of the offences for which he was rightly convicted. They are clearly abhorrent and I have never questioned his conviction.

"Following his conviction any contact was extremely limited and I have not seen or spoken to him in years. Twice I was at events organised by other people, which he attended, and once I saw him to check on his welfare after concerns were raised through others."

Lord Doyle, a veteran Labour spin doctor who was the party's head of press between 1998 and 2005 before working for Lord Blunkett and Sir Tony Blair, was given a peerage by Sir Keir in December. He was sworn in as a member of the House of Lords last month.

The Sunday Times first reported about Lord Doyle's campaigning for Morton in December last year and last week the Conservatives called for details of the peer's vetting to be published.

A Labour Party spokesperson said: "All complaints are assessed thoroughly in line with our rules and procedures."

The party is undertaking an investigation and Lord Doyle's Labour whip in the House of Lords has been withdrawn while this is ongoing.

Sir Keir faced questions about Lord Doyle's peerage on Monday during a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party, when the prime minister rallied MPs behind his leadership.

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch wrote to Sir Keir last week to call on him to "explain why you appointed another friend of a child sex offender to a prestigious post".

It comes after the PM confirmed he had appointed Lord Mandelson to the role of US ambassador despite knowing about his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

The PM apologised to Epstein's victims for believing Mandelson's "lies" about the extent of his relationship with the financier.

After Lord Doyle was suspended, Badenoch said the PM must "come clean about what he was told" before making Doyle a peer, adding: "We won't let this go."

The move puts pressure on Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar to explain why his MSP Pam Duncan-Glancy retains the party whip at the Scottish Parliament after she remained close friends with Morton.

In December, Duncan-Glancy quit as the party's education spokeswoman over her links with Morton but she remains a Labour MSP.

She admitted a "serious error of personal judgement" and said she would not be seeking re-election in May after it emerged she maintained contact with the former Labour councillor following his 2017 conviction.

The Daily Record has since reported that Duncan-Glancy continued her friendship with Morton after he was jailed for further offences and that he attended her birthday party late last year.

The SNP has called on Labour's leader in Scotland, Anas Sawar, to remove the whip from Duncan-Glancy.

SNP MSP Rona Mackay said: "It's high time Anas Sarwar ditched the double-standards, and put victims first, not his own narrow party interests."

Morton was jailed in January last year after pleading guilty to possessing indecent photographs of children and breaching his sexual offences order. He was given two 16-month sentences, backdated to May 2024.