Pressure mounts on Starmer even as top aide resigns
FT News Briefing
Forhecz Topher
4.4 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 9 February 2026
⏱️ 13 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s chief of staff resigned amid controversy over the Mandelson scandal, and Japan’s conservative governing party have won a landslide victory in snap elections. Plus, top academics have dismissed Federal Reserve chair Kevin Warsh’s claim that an AI-induced productivity boom will create room for interest rate cuts. And, Syria has struck a deal that would give them control over major oil and gas fields offering a potential boost to its fragile economy.
Mentioned in this podcast:
Starmer battles to stay in Number 10 after dramatic exit of McSweeney
Sanae Takaichi’s LDP wins supermajority in Japan election
Economists reject Kevin Warsh’s claim that AI boom will enable rate cuts
Syria courts energy majors as it takes control of oilfields
Note: The FT does not use generative AI to voice its podcasts
Today’s FT News Briefing was hosted by Victoria Craig, and produced by Julia Webster. Our show was mixed by Alex Higgins. Additional help from Peter Barber. Our executive producer is Topher Forhecz. Cheryl Brumley is the FT’s Global Head of Audio. The show’s theme music is by Metaphor Music.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Good morning from the Financial Times. |
| 0:06.0 | Today is Monday, February 9th, and this is your FT News briefing. |
| 0:11.0 | The UK Prime Minister seeks to extinguish a widening political scandal, while Japan's Premier rides to victory in a snap election. |
| 0:19.0 | Plus, Syria looks to the oil industry to shore up a fragile economic recovery. |
| 0:25.3 | I'm Victoria Craig, and here's the news you need to start your day. |
| 0:36.5 | UK Prime Minister Sir Kier Starmar is bracing for fallout of the Lord Peter Mandelson scandal |
| 0:42.4 | to intensify. On Sunday, Starmor's chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, resigned. McSweeney claimed he |
| 0:48.9 | claimed he was the reason the Prime Minister appointed Mandelson to serveK. ambassador to the U.S. |
| 0:54.8 | Mandelson was dismissed in September following revelations about his relationship with child sex |
| 0:59.9 | offender Jeffrey Epstein. A spokesperson for Mandelson said he, quote, regrets believing |
| 1:04.9 | Epstein's lies about his criminality. Starmor, meanwhile, apologized last week to Epstein's |
| 1:10.5 | victims for giving |
| 1:11.4 | Mandelson the role. He also agreed to allow Parliament to release a trove of thousands of documents |
| 1:17.2 | this week related to the appointment. While members of the Prime Minister's party called for |
| 1:22.3 | McSweeney to quit, some say his departure will not resolve questions about Starmers' judgment. |
| 1:33.7 | Japan's prime minister cruised to victory in a snap election on Sunday, |
| 1:38.3 | Sanei Takeichi led her Liberal Democratic Party to secure a single-party majority in the lower house of parliament. It comes after |
| 1:45.6 | the shortest campaign in the country's modern history, which lasted just two weeks. Leo Lewis is the FTs |
| 1:51.8 | Tokyo Bureau Chief. He joins me now to break all of this down. Hi, Leo. |
| 1:55.9 | Hello there. So Takeichi has been in power for just three months. She called this election because she wanted a mandate to govern from voters, not just her party. Do we have a sense yet of what she's going to do with this victory? |
| 2:09.5 | She's been a little bit vague during the campaign. She's been very, very good at presenting herself as an agent of change. She's been very, very good at presenting herself as an agent of change. |
| 2:24.9 | She's been very, very good at presenting herself as somebody that understands the kind of pain of ordinary Japanese, particularly with rising prices. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Forhecz Topher, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Forhecz Topher and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.