'Get a grip' The PM had to act - but it may take more to turn the ship around

In the days running up to Labour party conference one of Keir Starmer's most senior aides took him aside and told him he had to "get a grip" of his No 10 operation, after weeks of damaging headlines about tensions within his top team.

- Pippa Crerar

The aide was not alone: a handful of other advisers and friends had made a similar plea. No 10 was dysfunctional, they told Starmer, and the whole government was at risk of being undermined.

At the heart of the problem appeared to be tensions over Sue Gray, the former senior civil servant who had appointed as his chief of staff. She had become an increasingly divisive figure.

While some cabinet ministers stood by Gray, grateful for ensuring they got a hearing and for her sharing how government operated, there were also mis-steps, for which perhaps inevitably she became the lightning rod.

Gray was accused of alienating some of her political colleagues, who accused her of "control freakery", and creating a "bottleneck" in No 10 that delayed policy decisions and appointments.

She provoked further anger when it emerged she was paid £170,000, which was more than the prime minister, while at the same time political special advisers had their pay cut and contracts stalled.

Gray was also criticised over her work on preparations for government. Some on the political side were frustrated that her office controlled the grid of announcements so that even when the pace of activity was frenetic, it did not have a big public impact.