Leaked WhatsApp Messages Show Labour MPs Demanding Government Leaves X
Labour MPs are urging the government to leave X (Alamy)
4 min read
Exclusive: Leaked WhatsApp messages show Labour MPs urging the government to leave X, arguing that it should "show direction to others in the UK".
In messages seen by PoliticsHome, MPs complained about the government's continued use of X in the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) broadcast community WhatsApp group, where the government posts announcements for backbench MPs to share on their social media pages.
The government asked MPs to share on X, the website formerly known as Twitter, that the legislation to scrap the two-child benefit cap was being introduced on Thursday. However, the message was met with complaints from MPs in the replies.
At the time of writing, at least 13 Labour MPs had responded to the message to argue that the government should no longer expect MPs to post on X, should leave the platform itself, and prioritise communicating government policies on other platforms.
The MPs' arguments included that X owner Elon Musk is "fascist" and that the platform's AI tool, Grok, had put "children in harm's way".
One Labour MP said: "If [Donald] Trump can ignore other platforms and use his own different Truth Social as the main one, what's stopping us?"
Another MP said that it was "surely time to take a stand", while another said that the government should prioritise Bluesky to reach journalists and commentators, and Facebook to reach the wider public.
A different Labour MP agreed that Facebook is "where most of our constituents are".
Meanwhile, another MP replied: "Absolutely agree we need to be putting our messages out in other places. X is worse than ever, especially for women."
Screenshots of the PLP broadcast Whatsapp group, with names and photos of Labour MPs omitted to preserve their anonymity (PoliticsHome)
PoliticsHome has spoken to multiple other MPs, including ministers, who privately agree – with one minister saying that the government's statements on the issue so far were "not good enough".
There are growing calls for Downing Street and Whitehall departments to stop posting on the platform altogether amid outrage over Grok being used to create non-consensual indecent images of women and child sexual abuse imagery.
On Friday, following the backlash, X introduced restrictions meaning only a minority of paying users can use Grok. The AI tool's account posted: “Image generation and editing are currently limited to paying subscribers.”
However, Prime Minister Keir Starmer's spokesperson said on Friday that the move "simply turns an AI feature that allows the creation of unlawful images into a premium service" and was "insulting" to victims of misogyny and sexual violence.
Starmer this week warned X that the government would "take action on this", and the communications regulator Ofcom said earlier in the week that it has "made urgent contact with X and xAl to understand what steps they have taken to comply with their legal duties to protect users in the UK", before it determines whether there are potential compliance issues that warrant investigation.
But some Labour figures want the government to go further and set an example by boycotting the platform. On Thursday, Labour MP Louise Haigh, the former transport secretary, called on the government and her party to quit X, writing in The House that "it is unconscionable to remain on the site any longer".
PoliticsHome understands that the government sees its primary objective as stopping the distribution of sexualised images without people's consent on X. Government figures do not consider leaving the platform to help achieve this, and no such announcement is expected.
Former No 10 director of strategic communications James Lyons told The Rundown podcast that he believed it would be wrong for the government to quit X, arguing that the website remained “an important battleground for ideas”.
However, he admitted that the government is "not going to sway very many people on there because maybe people have already got a fixed view", but argued that it is still "important to contest the space”.
He also revealed that during his time in Downing Street, “X was very much moving down the priority list for the government” in favour of Reddit and other forms of social media.
