Starmer to face second bruising day over Mandelson scandal – as Trump weighs in ...Middle East

Sir Keir Starmer is to face another bruising day in Parliament over the scandal surrounding Lord Peter Mandelson’s appointment as US ambassador.

Sir Olly Robbins will have a chance to respond to the Prime Minister, who blamed the sacked senior civil servant for “deliberately” keeping him in the dark over Lord Mandelson’s failure to pass security vetting checks before taking the Washington DC posting.

The House of Commons will subject the Prime Minister’s latest efforts to lay out the facts of the scandal to further scrutiny on Tuesday, as MPs hold an emergency debate on Lord Mandelson’s appointment.

Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump has weighed in on the scandal overnight, saying he agrees Mandelson was a “really bad pick” for ambassador. “Plenty of time to recover, however!”

Follow The i Paper’s live blog for the latest updates.

Mandelson ‘should never have been appointed’, Cabinet minister says

Ed Miliband has said then-Foreign Secretary David Lammy and he had both raised concerns about Peter Mandelson’s appointment as UK ambassador to the US.

The Energy Secretary said Mandelson should never have been appointed over his known links with Jeffrey Epstein, his lobbying work and his record of being sacked twice from government.

He told Sky News: “You’re saying he should never have been appointed and I agree with you.”

Asked if Sir Keir Starmer should lose his job, he said: “I don’t think so, no. Obviously I don’t.

“I think prime ministers make errors. Prime ministers are fallible. Prime ministers are human. ”

Miliband added that he “steered well clear of Peter Mandelson when I became Labour leader in 2010”.

Asked what he thought when Lord Mandelson’s appointment was announced, he said: “That it could blow up, that it could go wrong.”

He added: “I had a conversation with David Lammy about it before the appointment and I said I was worried about it … I think he was worried about it too.”

‘Prime ministers make mistakes,’ Ed Miliband says

Ed Miliband has backed Sir Keir Starmer, saying prime ministers should not have to resign every time they made a mistake.

The Energy Secretary told the BBC: “You’re asking me should Keir Starmer resign over the appointment of Lord Mandelson? And I’m saying to you, no, I don’t think he should.

“Because I think if every time a prime minister made a mistake they resigned, we would shuttle through prime ministers like nobody’s business.

“Prime ministers make mistakes.

“I think on big judgments for this country, the biggest judgment of all, whether to join the war against Iran, Keir Starmer made a big and fundamental correct judgment.”

Miliband told the broadcaster he had not spoken to Starmer directly about appointing Mandelson.

“Maybe I wasn’t the person that people would necessarily ask, I think people knew my view on Peter Mandelson.”

Analysis: Robbins will present his defence – after Starmer set out case for the prosecution

Over more than two hours in the Commons yesterday, Sir Keir Starmer set out the case for the prosecution.

When he appears before the Foreign Affairs Committee today, Sir Olly Robbins, sacked by the PM last week as Foreign Office permanent secretary, will present his defence.

Under intense pressure from opposition parties and some of his own MPs over his handling of the appointment of Lord Peter Mandelson as ambassador to Washington, the Prime Minister doubled down on his own position.

Starmer insists he has not misled Parliament and, had he known Mandelson had not been given the all-clear by UK Security Vetting, he would not have sent him to the US.

The PM has already enraged some former civil servants by sacking Robbins for apparently following the rulebook to the letter.

But the PM has risked fuelling that row by saying that Robbins took the “deliberate decision” to withhold the fact there had been a vetting failure.

It is an extraordinary allegation and one which the former foreign office chief is expected to robustly defend.

According to an account by Starmer in the Commons, Robbins insists that he could not have told the PM because there is a protocol not to disclose vetting information to ministers and prime ministers.

Starmer says he does not accept this position – because the rules only forbid revealing the details of the security checks, not the fact of whether vetting has been passed or failed.But during that committee hearing today, Robbins also faces questions from MPs over the steps he took to ensure Mandelson’s appointment went through.

In evidence to the committee last November, Robbins said Mandelson’s clearance was “faster than some people’s clearances will have been … because we advanced him up the queue”.

MPs will want to know what pressure the then civil servant came under to expedite that appointment – one that has already cost several senior government figures their jobs and still hangs over the Prime Minister.

Good morning – and welcome back

Welcome back to The i Paper’s politics blog on Tuesday, 21 April.

There’s another bruising day ahead for Sir Keir Starmer.

Today, Sir Olly Robbins – the civil servant who was sacked over the Lord Peter Mandelson security vetting row – will face MPs at the Foreign Affairs Committee.

We expect this to kick off at 9am – and we’ll have updates here throughout.

Starmer had blamed the senior civil servant for “deliberately” keeping him in the dark over Lord Mandelson’s failure to pass security vetting checks before taking the Washington DC posting.

Robbins, who is denying any wrongdoing in the vetting process, has been taking legal advice on whether to launch an employment tribunal against the Government after he was sacked by Starmer over the row.

He was locked in exit negotiations with the Government on Monday amid suggestions his payout could cost taxpayers as much as £340,000.

The Prime Minister yesterday admitted that he should not have hired Mandelson for the diplomatic role in a Commons statement, but asserted again that he was not told the ex-Labour peer failed his vetting process.

The House of Commons will subject Starmer to further scrutiny on Tuesday, as MPs hold an emergency debate on the appointment of Mandelson to the key diplomatic role.

Stick with us for updates throughout the day.

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