By Rory Cassidy,Sophie Huskisson

Copyright dailyrecord

A key aide to Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has stepped down – in another blow for the Labour leader, just days after being forced into a cabinet reshuffle. Paul Ovenden , a senior aide to the Prime Minister, has resigned over a leaked message storm believed to be about a respected Labour MP. It’s claimed Ovenden, the Labour leader’s director of strategy, made lurid and sexually explicit comments . He has left Downing Street over the alleged comments, said to have been made about veteran MP Diane Abbott. The Mirror reports he is one of the PM’s closest aides and has reportedly said he was leaving No 10. He is understood to have said it was over an “inappropriate” conversation he had with colleagues. That is said to have happened while he was working in Labour’s press team in 2017. It comes just days after Angela Rayner resigned as Housing Secretary and Deputy Prime Minister. The MP chose to quit Keir Starmer’s Cabinet after she admitted she had failed to pay enough stamp duty on a flat she purchased on the English south coast. She has also resigned as deputy leader of the Labour Party , with her departure a major set-back for Labour at a time the UK Government is struggling in the polls. The 45-year-old is popular among Labour members due to her working class upbringing and close involvement with the trade union movement, and was viewed by some as a future leader of the party. But Rayner was forced out of the UK Government after facing mounting pressure due to admitting she underpaid stamp duty on a flat she bought in Hove earlier this year. The now former Housing Secretary paid £40,000 less of the surcharge on the property than she should have, as she claimed it was her main home rather than a second home. Ethics watchdog Sir Laurie Magnus said Rayner had “acted with integrity and with a dedicated and exemplary commitment to public service” but concluded she breached the ministerial code over her tax affairs . In a letter to the Prime Minister, Rayner said: “I deeply regret my decision to not seek additional specialist tax advice given both my position as Housing Secretary and my complex family arrangements. “I take full responsibility for this error. I would like to take this opportunity to repeat that it was never my intention to do anything other than pay the right amount. “I must also consider the significant toll that the ongoing pressure of the media is taking on my family. While I rightly expect proper scrutiny on me and my life, my family did not choose to have their private lives interrogated and exposed so publicly. “I have been clear throughout this process that my priority has, and always will be, protecting my children and the strain I am putting them under through staying in post has become unbearable. “Given the findings, and the impact on my family, I have therefore decided to resign as Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, as well as Deputy Leader of the Labour Party.” She added : “For a teenage mum from a council estate in Stockport to serve as the highest level of government has been the honour of my life. “The challenges of government are nothing compared to the challenge of putting food on the table and getting a roof over our head when I brought up kids working as a home help. Too many people face the same across our country.”