Labour email blunder

Alastair Campbell is at the centre of a row after an obscene outburst aimed at BBC journalists.

He sent an email telling Newsnight to "f*** off... you t***s" after it probed his role in Labour's controversial campaign posters. The message came after the Standard revealed that Mr Campbell was being blamed by the party's advertising agency for the internet posters.

They showed Michael Howard as "Fagin" and as a flying pig and were branded anti-Semitic before being withdrawn. After Newsnightthe BBC's flagship current affairs programme, followed up the story they received the email apparently written in a fury by Mr Campbell.

The message by the former spin chief and now election strategy supremo was littered with grammatical and punctuation errors. It referred to Trevor Beattie, the head of advertising agency TBWA. It read: "Just spoke to trev. think tbwa shd give statement to newsnight saying party and agency work together well and nobody here has spoken to standard.

"Posters done by tbwa according to polotical (sic) brief. Now f*** off and cover something important you t***s!" Mr Campbell's blunder came after signs of panic in Labour over the poster storm. And his behaviour raised that Mr Campbell, who resigned from No 10 after he became "the story", was once again becoming the focus of controversy.

A Newsnight insider said there had been astonishment when Mr Campbell's email arrived. "We thought he had gone bonkers," he said.

Mr Campbell's former deputy Tim Allan defended him last night as an asset to the party.

But he admitted: "Judging by his email, it is time to disengage the Blackberry (a handset for sending and receiving emails) and re-engage the brain."

The email row comes after a fortnight of mounting controversy over the posters, which were withdrawn after Labour was deluged with complaints from its own supporters.

Senior members of the Board of Deputies of British Jews plus a longstanding and generous Jewish donor to the party, Sir Sigmund Sternberg, made complaints.

A Labour spokesman confirmed that Mr Campbell was the author of the email and said it was sent to the BBC by missage-take.

He said: "Newsnight emailed Alastair and he thought it was an email from someone else and responded directly.

"He sent a second email as soon as he realised he had sent it to Newsnight saying he was sorry."

Mr Campbell's subsequent email suggested the matter should be ignored as a joke, and implied that Newsnight presenter Jeremy Paxman would agree.

It read: "Not very good at this email Blackberry malarkey. Just looked at log, have realised email meant for colleagues at TBWA was sent to you.

"Final sentence of earlier email probably a bit colourful and personal considering we have never actually met but I'm sure you share the same sense of humour as your star presenter Mr P."

Mr Campbell's confusion may have arisen because the exchange was prompted by an email from a Newsnight staffer called Andrew McFadyen.

It is possible that the spin doctor thought he was replying to a mesconcerns-from Pat McFadden, a senior aide to the Prime Minister. The row will put intense new pressure on Labour to explain exactly who devised the shocking posters and how they were produced. Mr Campbell's phrase "according to a political brief " suggests that the posters were, indeed, concocted at Labour headquarters and that TBWA merely produced the final artwork.

Mr Campbell's claim that the Evening Standard did not speak to the agency is not true.

A reporter spoke to both TBWA and the Labour Party and took statements from spokesmen for each.

The Evening Standard rang TBWA five times yesterday and was referred to a spokeswoman.

The spokeswoman's comments were double-checked with her and she insisted she spoke on behalf of the agency.

She also referred us to the Labour Party.