Table of Contents
History is repeating itself – and Britain’s prime minister may not survive it. I am old enough to remember the Profumo affair. It had everything: sex, spies, Soviet intrigue, political paranoia – and careers destroyed in its wake.
In the early 1960s, Britain’s Secretary of State for War John Profumo was having an affair with call-girl Christine Keeler. At the same time, Keeler was involved with a Soviet naval attaché, Yevgeny Ivanov. Suddenly, pillow talk became a matter of national security.
Was defence policy being whispered in bed? Was classified information leaking through intimacy? No one could ever prove it. But suspicion was enough.
Then came Mandy Rice-Davies, with her immortal line: “Well, he would, wouldn’t he?” – a phrase that encapsulated the public’s growing belief that politicians would say anything to save themselves.
What followed was not just scandal: It was a purge. People were quietly moved aside. Careers were derailed and others were sent to distant posts: not because they were guilty, but because they were inconvenient. Institutions closed ranks and truth became secondary.
A prime minister fell. A government collapsed. Public trust was shattered. Now, more than 60 years later, Britain is watching the same pattern unfold. And at the centre of it stands Keir Starmer.
As prime minister, Starmer is now digging himself into a political hole – and doing it with remarkable speed. He insists that the appointment of Mandelson to one of the most powerful diplomatic positions in the world – ambassador in Washington – was made without full knowledge of Mandelson’s background. We are asked to believe that this happened without proper awareness of his reputation, without understanding his long-standing links to Russian-connected business interests and without grasping that he was, to put it mildly, a deeply controversial figure. In modern government, that explanation is worse than incompetence. It is implausible.
Either Starmer knew and approved the appointment anyway. Or he didn’t know – which raises serious questions about who is really running his administration.
Neither answer inspires confidence.
And so the familiar machinery has begun to grind into action. Quiet briefings. Careful denials. Selective leaks. Strategic reshuffles. Damage control dressed up as ‘routine management’. This is no longer about one man – it is about a system scrambling to protect itself.
Just as in the Profumo era, the priority is no longer accountability: it is containment. Minimise the fallout. Control the narrative. Move the problem elsewhere and hope the public gets bored.
But history tells us how this ends. Profumo was not destroyed by the affair – he was destroyed by the lie. The cover-up did more damage than the scandal itself. And that is exactly the trap Starmer is now walking into. Every denial tightens it. Every half-answer weakens him. Every new revelation makes yesterday’s explanation look hollow. Public confidence is draining away in real time.
What is being exposed here is not just a bad appointment: it is a failure of judgement at the very top. A prime minister who cannot convincingly explain how power is exercised under his watch is on borrowed time. Profumo proved that and Starmer is now learning the same lesson – the hard way. In my view, this will be his undoing.
Not because of one individual. Not because of one scandal. But because it reveals a deeper weakness: a leadership that reacts, deflects and denies instead of confronting reality. If this crisis continues on its present course, he will not survive it.
By April, he may well be gone. And once again, Britain will learn the oldest lesson in politics: when leaders protect themselves first, the public always pays the price.
