Wife of Starmer’s comms chief had direct knowledge of Labour Together’s investigation into journalists
Tory and SNP chiefs call for Labour minister Simons to ‘come clean’ as we reveal new details of PR firm’s campaign to discredit journalists
By Peter Geoghegan and Khadija Sharife
The wife of Keir Starmer’s comms chief had direct knowledge of Labour Together’s controversial investigation into journalists and their sources, documents seen by Democracy for Sale reveal.
Kate Forrester, a former Labour party advisor, ran the PR firm APCO Worldwide’s London Office in 2023 when it was hired by Labour Together to dig dirt on journalists from the Sunday Times and other outlets. She also sat on the Starmerite think tank’s advisory board.
The controversial investigation was commissioned by Josh Simons who was Labour Together’s director, and is now a minister in Keir Starmer’s government.
Simons has continually refused to answer questions about why he paid a PR firm to dig dirt on reporters investigating Labour Together’s failure to declare £730,000 in donations. That money was used to support Starmer’s successful leadership campaign.
Forrester is married to Paul Ovenden, who was Starmer’s head of communications at the time of Labour Together’s investigation. Ovenden resigned from government last year after explicit text messages he had sent about veteran Labour MP Diane Abbott came to light.
News of Forrester’s involvement has prompted calls for Starmer, Simons and Labour Together to explain what they knew about the investigation and when.
A Labour MP has already written three times to the party’s general secretary calling for an inquiry. Now opposition MPs are also calling for action.
“Labour Together and Josh Simons should come clean about who knew what, and when, and end this saga once and for all,” Conservative chairman Kevin Hollinrake MP told Democracy for Sale.
“There are serious questions to answer about whether the Labour Party and Keir Starmer were aware of Labour Together’s plot to investigate journalists who were searching for the truth”.
APCO’s briefings for Labour Together listed journalists including Gabriel Pogrund and Harry Yorke at the Sunday Times, the Guardian’s Henry Dyer and Paul Holden as “significant persons of interest”, and discussed ways to identify their sources.
In a phone call with Democracy for Sale, Forrester confirmed that she had received some of the briefings, produced by former Times journalist Tom Harper, who also worked out of APCO’s London office.
“I was aware of the work happening,” Forrester said. “I may have been copied in on some emails,” she said, adding that “my involvement was very sort of peripheral”.
Forrester added that she did not know whether senior Labour figures received the briefings.
A missing hack?
Simons, who ran Labour Together before becoming an MP in 2024, has refused to speak to Democracy for Sale – or many other media outlets – but has said on Twitter/X that APCO was hired to investigate a “suspected illegal hack of sensitive materials”.
Documents seen by Democracy for Sale speculate that stories about Labour Together’s undeclared funding may have come from a hack of the Electoral Commission, or from Russia or China. No evidence was produced to support these claims, and no evidence has been provided of a hack of Labour Together itself, as Simons suggested.
APCO did not respond to questions about the alleged hack, but told Politico it was retained by Labour Together to research “a news article and upcoming published works to inform its communication strategy”. There was no mention of investigating a hack.
Asked about this discrepancy, Forrester said: “I’m not sure about the ins and outs of where exactly they thought the breach might have been. I think that’s probably a question for [Labour Together]”.
A source close to Labour Together said that questions about the supposed hack should be directed to Simons. Another well-placed source said that Simons was trying to control the narrative by shifting the focus to APCO and their work. The minister has not responded to our repeated questions and requests for comment.
SNP Westminster leader Stephen Flynn said “The more you read, the murkier this entire episode appears to get – I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect a now Labour Government Minister to answer some pretty serious questions.
“Journalists are the cornerstone of our democracy, they should be able to work free from fear or favour – and certainly from apparent external investigation by Labour entities,” Flynn added.
“In order to create narratives”
Simons has also said on Twitter that claims that APCO was asked to investigate journalists are “nonsense.”
But a copy of APCO’s contract with Labour Together, seen by Democracy for Sale, states that the PR firm “will investigate the sourcing, funding and origins of a Sunday Times article about Labour Together, as well as upcoming works by authors Paul Holden and Matt Taibbi.” Holden and Taibbi have both written critically about Labour Together.
The contract, worth at least £30,000, goes on to say that APCO’s “approach should provide a body of evidence that could be packaged up for us in the media in order to create narratives that would proactively undermine any future attacks on Labour Together.”
Morgan McSweeney, Starmer’s chief of staff, was aware of APCO’s investigation into journalists during his time running Labour Together. McSweeney resigned last weekend.
Forrester joined Labour Together as an adviser in October 2023, a month before APCO was hired. At the time, Politico reported that the think tank had added “a swathe of heavy-hitters” to its advisory board, including “APCO public affairs bod Kate Forrester”. Forrester said she never attended an advisory board meeting.
Forrester, who previously worked as a journalist and as an adviser to Labour MP Jim McMahon, left APCO in January to join lobbyists Anacta. The firm is run by Teddy Ryan, who is married to Labour general secretary Hollie Ridley.
This week, Ridley rejected a call from John McDonnell for an investigation into Labour Together, saying the think tank is “neither affiliated to nor controlled by the party”. Ahead of the 2024 general election, Labour Together donated £1.45 million to Labour and £280,000 to 23 MPs, and several senior cabinet ministers have close ties to the organisation.
Forrester is not the only former Labour advisor who has been on APCO’s books. In November 2024, Mark Simpson left his role as Starmer’s head of international policy to become director of the firm’s London affairs team.
The Public Relations and Communication Association has launched an investigation into APCO’s work for Labour Together.
Labour Together and the Labour party declined to comment on this story. Josh Simons, the Cabinet Office and APCO did not reply to our requests for comment.
I get the feeling that this might result in stopping investigative journalism. If they dig too deep then the people that don't like that will come after them. The voice of the press is what keeps a democracy in place. If they become afraid to publish for fear of whom they upset that will have consequences for the country and essentially the world. Those tricksters working both sides against the middle just for the power need to be taken out of politics. The country needs to have accountability or we'll be in the same boat as the USA.