Pat McFadden told Peter Mandelson in May last year: "Every meeting I have is ‘who can we tax in order to pay benefits to others’."

Pat McFadden told Peter Mandelson in May last year: "Every meeting I have is ‘who can we tax in order to pay benefits to others’."

In a damning assessment of his own government, Sir Keir Starmer's former Cabinet enforcer Pat McFadden said it was asking the 'wrong questions'.

Hundreds of documents showed ministers and officials sniping at each other over the fate of Keir Starmer's 'beleaguered' Government.

McFadden is the Work and Pensions Secretary. That he thinks Labour is being far too generous on benefits and too gungho on taxes is seismic.

Keir Starmer will gather ministers in Downing Street amid the fallout from 1,500 pages of evidence about Mandelson's disastrous appointment as US ambassador.