Five unanswered questions on Keir Starmer’s Mandelson debacle
Downing Street has tried to do a lot of explaining, as has Keir Starmer himself.But there are still plenty of things we do not know about how Peter Mandelson failed security vetting, and what the prime minister did or did not know about it.A fairly key question.Downing Street is clear: it is “staggering” that Mandelson failed vetting, and that the Foreign Office not only overruled this but told no one in No 10.However, Ciaran Martin, a former top civil servant with past involvement in vetting work – and a close friend of the ousted Olly Robbins – said this was an oversimplification.
Rather than vetting being a simple yes or no, he told the BBC, it was a balance of risks, and entirely standard for officials to decide whether this was acceptable,The prime minister told MPs that “full due process” had been followed in appointing Mandelson,Asked if parliament had been misled, even if this was not the PM’s fault, No 10 appeared to accept this was possible, saying: “The prime minister feels that he should update parliament on Monday on the basis that parliament should have known about this and should now know about this,” That is not a “no”,The perhaps obvious answer is: well, yes.
But if you accept the idea of a No 10 operation kept entirely in the dark by its own Foreign Office, then even here there are elements to be questioned, such as the emergence of a journalist’s question to Downing Street’s then head of press in September last year asking about sources saying Mandelson did not clear vetting.Did No 10 check this? Its version is that officials “repeatedly asked for the facts of the case” but were simply not told.This remains uncertain.The prime minister is scheduled to address MPs in the Commons on Monday afternoon, and there will be no shortage of questions, not least from the various opposition party leaders who have already called on him to resign.As far as can be ascertained, Downing Street is confident enough of the basic facts of the case to have asked Robbins, who was the head civil servant in the Foreign Office, to resign on Thursday night.
But at the same time, a full and formal investigation into what happened, and why, has not yet begun, so we can expect Starmer to, when necessary, hide behind the need to wait for fuller information.This is as much a political question as anything else.But there is a plausible case for believing that the Foreign Office decided to overrule the worries about Mandelson for one very simple reason: Starmer had already named him as ambassador to Washington.The UK already had someone very capable in the job, in career diplomat Karen Pierce, but the advent of a second Donald Trump presidency saw No 10 hit on the idea of a high-profile political appointee, one seen as able to navigate the murky waters of a Trump White House.Given this decision was taken at the very top, it would have been a difficult moment for the Foreign Office to call No 10 and say: “Sorry, you’ll have to think again.
” So, were they effectively bounced into it? No 10 says Starmer had no clue that vetting could be overruled, and so cannot be blamed.Others may think differently.
Olly Robbins and Mandelson’s vetting: what did he do, why – and who knew?
Fiddling with his reading glasses, the then cabinet secretary, Sir Chris Wormald – sitting alongside the most senior civil servant in the Foreign Office, Sir Olly Robbins – suddenly appeared a little tense.The bonhomie evident in earlier answers had quite disappeared.It was 3 November 2025, and Peter Mandelson had been removed from his post as ambassador to the US two months earlier, after the disclosure of Jeffrey Epstein’s emails.MPs on the cross-party foreign affairs select committee were grilling the most senior civil servants involved in Mandelson’s appointment about the vetting and due diligence.Just over an hour in, Fleur Anderson, the MP for Putney, asked what can now be seen as a crucial question about the process: “In general, what is the end product of all that vetting? Does it all get put into one report? Who receives that report?”“The report is received by the employing department and employing line manager – in this case, that would be Sir Oliver,” Wormald responded, looking to his left towards Robbins
Five unanswered questions on Keir Starmer’s Mandelson debacle
Downing Street has tried to do a lot of explaining, as has Keir Starmer himself. But there are still plenty of things we do not know about how Peter Mandelson failed security vetting, and what the prime minister did or did not know about it.A fairly key question. Downing Street is clear: it is “staggering” that Mandelson failed vetting, and that the Foreign Office not only overruled this but told no one in No 10.However, Ciaran Martin, a former top civil servant with past involvement in vetting work – and a close friend of the ousted Olly Robbins – said this was an oversimplification
‘Almost like a Bond villain’: why Labour MPs expect Starmer to cling on as PM
It still feels improbable that the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, will face a formal challenge even if, as assumed, his Labour party performs disastrously in next month’s local elections. But for many of his MPs, the latest revelations about Peter Mandelson have emphasised that the question is simply one of when, not if.“It does seems incredible that he didn’t know, but the problem is that it’s quite possible as well,” was the summary of one backbencher, in response to No 10’s insistence that no one had told the prime minister that his pick to be the UK ambassador to Washington had failed his security vetting.Some MPs believe the Mandelson vetting fiasco could be terminally damaging for a prime minister who, as one said, had painted himself as “whiter than white”. “I can’t see how he survives this,” one said
Starmer says it is ‘staggering’ and ‘unforgivable’ he was not told Mandelson failed vetting – as it happened
The prime minister has spoken to reporters in Paris this morning, saying it is “unforgivable” and “staggering” he wasn’t told Peter Mandelson was denied security clearance.He said:double quotation markThat I wasn’t told that he’d failed security vetting when I was telling parliament that due process had been followed is unforgivable.Not only was I not told, no minister was told and I’m absolutely furious about it.Keir Starmer added:double quotation markIt is totally unacceptable that the prime minister making an appointment is not told that security vetting has been failed.He added he will “set out all the relevant facts in true transparency” to parliament on Monday
Peter Mandelson’s failed security vetting: a timeline of the controversy
Keir Starmer is facing calls to resign after the Guardian revealed that Peter Mandelson failed the developed vetting process over his appointment as US ambassador – but was able to take up the post after the Foreign Office overruled the recommendation.Here is the timeline of Mandelson’s controversial appointment and the fallout it has caused.Labour wins a landslide election victory engineered by Mandelson’s protege Morgan McSweeney, of whom Mandelson once said: “I don’t know who and how and when he was invented. But whoever it was, they will find their place in heaven.” Mandelson said the election win was “an extraordinary achievement for Keir Starmer and his team”
More than half of Britons support rejoining EU 10 years on from Brexit vote
Support for rejoining the EU rather than simply rejoining the single market is growing among British voters, with more than 80% of Labour, Liberal Democrat and Green party supporters favouring this option, according to research mapping voter attitudes 10 years after the Brexit referendum.Labour’s “muted” approach to the issue means it risks losing support among progressive voters and in “red wall” constituencies, experts have said as part of research by Best for Britain.While 61% of all voters supported the government’s current approach to EU relations, only 19% did so “strongly”, the research showed.A full return to the EU was supported by 53% of all voters with support at 83% among Labour voters, 84% Liberal Democrat and 82% Green, the polling found.Of Conservative and Reform voters, 39% and 18% backed the policy respectively, Best for Britain found
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