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Lammy warned Starmer against appointing Mandelson as US ambassador – report
The deputy prime minister, David Lammy, warned Keir Starmer not to appoint Peter Mandelson as the UK’s ambassador to Washington because of his links to the late paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, the Telegraph is reporting.
Lammy, who was the foreign secretary at the time, had backed extending the term of Karen Pierce as ambassador as she was viewed as being well-connected within the Trump administration’s team, according to the Telegraph, which has based its reporting on conversations with Lammy’s friends with knowledge on the subject.
The disclosure comes as it also emerged in a report by the Times that Angela Rayner had told friends that she warned Starmer not to appoint Mandelson as ambassador to the US last February.
The Times has been told that Rayner, the former deputy prime minister, privately warned Starmer that bringing Mandelson back into government would be an error as public evidence showed Mandelson and Epstein had maintained a close friendship despite Epstein’s conviction for child sex offences in 2008.
But Starmer is reported to have ignored Rayner’s advice and believed Mandelson’s claim that he “barely knew” Epstein.
Key events
While the fallout of the release of the Epstein files has dominated UK politics for the last week, in France, the aftershock is also being felt.
My colleague reports Angelique Chrisafis reports on a veteran French politician quitting as head of prestigious institute after Epstein links revealed.
Jack Lang, a former French culture minister, has resigned as head of Paris’s prestigious Arab World Institute after revelations of his past contacts with the disgraced financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and the launch of a financial investigation by French prosecutors.
Lang, 86, resigned on Saturday night before he was due to attend an urgent meeting called by the French foreign ministry to discuss his links to Epstein. You can read more here:
Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth refused to set out a timeline for a Welsh independence referendum.
He told Laura Kuenssberg earlier today that he wanted a referendum “as soon as the people of Wales are ready for it”.
The party, which stands for Welsh independence, won the Caerphilly byelection in November, beating the Reform candidate, who came in second.
Now, ap Iorwerth hopes he will become leader of the Welsh Senedd.
In case you missed our exclusive story yesterday, The Liberal Democrats have urged the UK’s financial regulator to immediately investigate Peter Mandelson, saying his apparent decision to leak highly confidential government information to the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein may have led to insider trading.
You can read more here:
Cross-party pressure is mounting around the scandal. We reported earlier Conservative shadow minister Alex Burghart was asked if he had any sympathy with Starmer, who said he was lied to when appointing Mandelson as US ambassador.
Josh Halliday
As Nigel Farage cut the ribbon on Reform UK’s byelection headquarters in Greater Manchester this week, Labour’s candidate, Angeliki Stogia, sat tearfully in a cafe nearby.
Politicians do not often show their emotion but for Stogia, who arrived in Britain as a student from Greece in 1995, this is personal. “I am angry,” she said of Farage’s party. “I am very, very angry. How dare they come here and spread this division?”
Her voice breaking, she added: “For them, this is a show. For me, this is my community. This is my people.”
Westminster byelections are often bruising affairs but the battle for Gorton and Denton is one of the most unpredictable contests, with the highest stakes, in years. Labour is fighting both Reform UK and the Green party to cling on to its 13,000-vote majority after the retirement last month of Andrew Gwynne, who stepped down after the “vile” Trigger Me Timbers WhatsApp scandal.
Starmer’s government is engulfed in crisis over Peter Mandelson’s links to Jeffrey Epstein, and defeat on 26 February is likely to prompt further calls for the prime minister to quit. You can read more here:
Peter Walker
Peter Walker is senior political correspondent for the Guardian
Reform UK’s flagship council has been accused of telling a “blatant lie” after its claim of nearly £40m in savings on net zero was found to be based on hypothetical projects for which there was no documentation.
Kent county council, which has a £2.5bn annual budget, is one of 10 where Nigel Farage’s party has outright control and is seen as a test case for whether the insurgent party can govern competently.
Soon after being elected, the council leader, Linden Kemkaran, promised the party’s “department of local government efficiency”, or Dolge, would bring a “laser-like focus on getting value for money”.
The council’s leadership claimed it had found £100m in savings, £39.5m of which come from what it said was two net zero-related projects: £32m by scrapping a programme to make properties more environmentally friendly, and £7.5m by not making the council’s fleet of vehicles electric by 2030.
After Kemkaran announced these at a council meeting last July, Polly Billington, a Labour MP in Kent, requested details of the apparent savings via a freedom of information request, setting off a months-long battle with the council. You can read more here:
Former Labour prime minister Gordon Brown has said the government needs to introduce an “anti-corruption commission” to “root out any criminality in UK political life”.
In an opinion piece for the Guardian, Brown wrote:
We need an independent anti-corruption commission to be appointed by parliament, with the commissioner given the remit and power in law, as our review promised, to root out any criminality in UK political life by detecting and punishing it wherever and whenever it occurs.
And to remove all doubt as to our determination, parliament should be quite specific in naming “corruption” a new statutory offence, as the Law Commission has proposed and Transparency International has sought in the public office (accountability) bill going through parliament.
The anti-corruption champion, Margaret Hodge, has done her best with a limited remit, but the commissioner should have statutory powers of search and seizure and access to bank records, and all public bodies should be required to fully cooperate. Australia has led the way in introducing such an agency and that can be a blueprint for rapid reform.
Peter Mandelson was business secretary during Gordon Brown’s premiership, when he appears to have leaked an economic briefing to Jeffrey Epstein, who was serving a jail sentence at the time for soliciting prostitution from a minor.
Lammy warned Starmer against appointing Mandelson as US ambassador – report
The deputy prime minister, David Lammy, warned Keir Starmer not to appoint Peter Mandelson as the UK’s ambassador to Washington because of his links to the late paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, the Telegraph is reporting.
Lammy, who was the foreign secretary at the time, had backed extending the term of Karen Pierce as ambassador as she was viewed as being well-connected within the Trump administration’s team, according to the Telegraph, which has based its reporting on conversations with Lammy’s friends with knowledge on the subject.
The disclosure comes as it also emerged in a report by the Times that Angela Rayner had told friends that she warned Starmer not to appoint Mandelson as ambassador to the US last February.
The Times has been told that Rayner, the former deputy prime minister, privately warned Starmer that bringing Mandelson back into government would be an error as public evidence showed Mandelson and Epstein had maintained a close friendship despite Epstein’s conviction for child sex offences in 2008.
But Starmer is reported to have ignored Rayner’s advice and believed Mandelson’s claim that he “barely knew” Epstein.
The Guardian’s policy editor, Kiran Stacey, has a full report on the growing pressure on Peter Mandelson to hand back his US ambassador payout and the impact the scandal is having on Keir Starmer’s crumbling premiership:
Speaking to Sky News this morning, Conservative shadow minister Alex Burghart said:
This administration under Keir Starmer has failed. It has U-turned, I think, what, 14 or 15 times now.
It has had two resets in the past five months, and it is now caught up in the worst political scandal of my lifetime.
And it’s time for a new type of politics. I think that type of politics is embodied by Kemi Badenoch, who is honest, straight-talking and decent, and I’m very proud to be part of her shadow cabinet.
Starmer’s position is untenable, shadow minister says
Conservative shadow minister Alex Burghart was asked if he had any sympathy with Starmer, who said he was lied to when appointing Mandelson as US ambassador.
Burghart, the shadow chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, and the shadow secretary of state for Northern Ireland, responded:
He was lied to by someone who was known to be a serial liar. There’s no excuse for the fact that he made the wrong judgment.
He was in possession of enough facts to have not made that appointment and he did anyway and I am afraid, Laura, he now has to take responsibility for that …
I don’t think his position is tenable. This is really an issue for the Labour party. The Labour party will have to decide whether it is going to remove him or not …
One of the things the Conservative opposition can do is table a motion of no confidence. There is no point in us doing that if other people won’t support it …
What we have said to Labour MPs is if they want to talk to our whips about that motion we will be very happy to have those conversations.
Fire Brigades Union boss calls for Starmer to go over Mandelson scandal
Meanwhile, Steve Wright, the head of the Fire Brigades’ Union, has became the first boss of a Labour-affiliated union to call on the prime minister to stand down.
Wright told the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme:
I think everybody’s thinking it, and people are just not saying it at the moment.
And unfortunately we’re seeing MPs being wheeled out again today to sweep up the mess behind the prime minister at the moment.
And it seems that the prime minister isn’t taking advice from elected people within his own government. We’ve seen that he didn’t listen to the former deputy prime minister.
He hasn’t listened to his current deputy prime minister. He’s listening to a factional group which are making bad decisions, it seems.
And I want to see the change that was promised and that this country needs.
Wright has previously criticised Labour’s decision to block Andy Burnham from standing in the 26 February Gorton and Denton byelection and has warned against the threat from Reform UK.
Pat McFadden was interviewed by Laura Kuenssberg on her Sunday politics programme. Here are the key takeaways:
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McFadden said Starmer made a “mistake” but acted in “good faith” when appointing Mandelson as US ambassador last year.
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McFadden said there was no mention of Jeffrey Epstein on the day Mandelson was appointed in “many media circles” including the BBC.
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McFadden said Starmer should “continue with what he is doing”, and said changing prime minister every “18 months to 2 years” has a damaging reputational and economic cost to the country.
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McFadden said Starmer is “more frustrated than anyone” that damaging headlines since the new year have distracted from the government’s agenda, namely on the cost of living.
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When asked if he thinks Starmer’s leadership is in big trouble, McFadden replied: “I don’t think it should be.”
Pat McFadden said Peter Mandelson, a former EU trade commissioner and ex-business secretary, was appointed ambassador to the US because he was seen as a skilled political operator with the Trump administration.
The work and pensions secretary told Sky News:
In the end the judgment was, they were looking for someone who could operate at the highest political level with the Trump administration, who knew business, who knew trade.
Now that turns out to have been the wrong decision, and it’s blown up in the most spectacular manner. But it’s important for your viewers to understand why on earth was this appointment made in the first place, and that is the reason.
Starmer admits he ‘made a bad mistake’ but should stay PM as he has a ‘five-year mandate’, minister says
McFadden defended Keir Starmer and his embattled chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, who are both under intense pressure over Mandelson’s ambassador appointment.
McFadden said:
I believe he (the prime minister) should stay. I think he’s got a five-year mandate, which was just voted for 18 months or so ago in a general election. His task is by no means complete, barely begun.
And I also think it is not good for the country to change its prime minister every 18 months or two years is leading to chaos and uncertainty, economically, politically and reputationally around the world.
So I know this has been a difficult week, but I think we should stick with the prime minister, support him. He admits he’s made a bad mistake here. He has apologised for it, and I’m sure he will learn from that going forward.
McFadden added that Starmer “has acted in good faith throughout this” and is “horrified” by the recent revelations about Mandelson’s ties with Epstein.
Although Starmer last week apologised for believing Mandelson’s “lies”, he did not apologise for giving him the job even though it was known at the time that Mandelson had continued his relationship with Epstein even after the latter had been convicted of trafficking a child for sex.
Asked whether McSweeney, who was close to Mandelson, should go, McFadden said: “I don’t think he should … In the end, it’s a prime ministerial appointment, and I think the stuff about Morgan McSweeney is sort of beside the point.”
The Metropolitan police is investigating Peter Mandelson over allegations of misconduct in public office. Police have already searched two properties connected to Mandelson as part of the investigation into claims that he passed market-sensitive information to Jeffrey Epstein.
McFadden was asked by Trevor Phillips whether he was aware if the police had approached Keir Starmer during their inquiries into Mandelson. “I am not aware of that,” McFadden said. Starmer has not been accused of any wrongdoing.
Minister says he feels angry and betrayed over Mandelson’s actions
McFadden is asked how he feels given he has known Mandelson a long time. He says how he feels is secondary to the feelings of the “women who were involved in this”, which is the most important thing in what he describes as a “terrible tale”.
McFadden said:
How I feel is a mixture of bewilderment, anger … this is somebody I’ve known on a political level for 30 years.
I was his minister, junior minister, at the department of business during the financial crisis. And, you know, that was a time of all hands to the pumps, banks collapsing, businesses collapsing, people wondering whether they could keep their homes or not.
And the idea that he was live downloading some of the information about that to this person in America who I’d never heard of, for many years afterwards – it is shocking.
Asked if he feels “betrayed”. McFadden replied: “Yeah I do and it is a strange thing in politics that you can have a close political relationship with someone but there can be this entire other side of their life that you have no knowledge of and no involvement in whatsoever which has all exploded into the public realm.”
As a reminder, recent disclosures from the Epstein files appeared to suggest Peter Mandelson sent emails to Jeffrey Epstein containing confidential information that the government was receiving to deal with the global financial crash while he was business secretary under Gordon Brown. You can read more in our explainer here.
Mandelson should hand back Foreign Office payoff or give it to charity, cabinet minister says
The work and pensions secretary, Pat McFadden, has spoken to Trevor Phillips on his Sky News politics programme.
McFadden was asked about the size of Mandelson’s payout from the Foreign Office. McFadden said he did not know how much Mandelson was entitled to, adding that figure would be negotiated between “him and his employers”.
Asked if he should give it back or donate it to charity on a moral basis, the minister said: “I think he probably should, yes. Either of those – either give it back or give it to a charity.
“Perhaps one involving violence against women and girls. I think taking a payoff in these circumstances, I don’t think the public will think much of that.”
Foreign Office to review Mandelson’s reported five-figure US ambassador payoff
Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of UK politics as speculation over Keir Starmer’s future as prime minister continues.
Peter Mandelson is under increasing pressure to return the payoff he received after being sacked as ambassador to the US in September over his friendship with the late child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The taxpayer-funded payoff he received after being dismissed last year could be as high as £55,000 before tax and deductions, the Sunday Times reported, with the exit payment equivalent to three months’ salary from the Foreign Office.
Although the salary has not been publicly listed by the government, the US ambassador post usually ranks at the highest end in the diplomatic service – between £155,000 and £220,000 per year.
Full details about Mandelson’s payoff will be revealed to parliament after MPs backed a call for disclosure of papers relating to his time in the government.
Sources told the Sunday Times that Mandelson had asked for a much more money than he ended up receiving. We have not been able to independently verify the contents oft the Sunday Times’ report yet.
Allies of Starmer said the peer should give the taxpayer-funded handout back or donate it to a victims’ charity. The Foreign Office said a review had been launched “in light of further information that has now been revealed”.
A Foreign Office spokesperson said:
Peter Mandelson’s civil service employment was terminated in accordance with legal advice and the terms and conditions of his employment.
Normal civil services HR processes were followed. Further information will be provided to parliament as part of the government response to the motion passed last week which is being coordinated by the Cabinet Office.
