Peter Mandelson assured the British government it would “never regret” appointing him as UK ambassador to the United States, according to the documents
After months of inactivity, Mount Mandelson erupted with renewed volcanic force yesterday.
Newly-released files expose a culture of dysfunction, cronyism and cynical “anything goes” in the highest reaches of government.
These secret documents further undermine Sir Keir Starmer’s premiership, and reveal the folly of “continuation Blair” in Number Ten.
The Prime Minister stands accused of failing to follow top-level advice to ensure that Lord Mandelson got security vetting before appointing him ambassador to the USA.
Vain and truculent to the end, Mandy refuses to give up his private phone. But the cache of emails, texts and WhatsApp messages show that senior government ministers talked off-the-record, and shared some of his disloyal doubts about the Prime Minister.
Our Man in Washington privately trashes the Labour government as “rubbish,” slates the Prime Minister for “not leading from the front” and claims in private talks with Cabinet minister Pat McFadden that Sir Keir “doesn’t know what he wants.”
But a raft of ministers and advisers suck up to Mandy on his appointment to the top diplomatic job, and share chats on confidential government business. They will today be regretting their gossipy exchanges.
Of course, had not the scandal of Mandelson and his lies over links with US paedophile Jeffrey Epstein broken last autumn, we would never know how close plausible Peter was to his old pals in the Blairite elite. McFadden would not have gone public on Labour MPs asking “who can we tax to pay benefit to others.”
Milord Peter himself, sacked after nine months in post, shows up as a fawning fool to Donald Trump, offering the oaf in the Oval Office a gold-initialled faux Budget red-box.
Dysfunction Downing Street is exposed in Mandy’s exchange with also-sacked chief of staff Morgan McSweeney allegedly dismissing the PM as “weak,” and prone to buckling under back-bench pressure.
McSweeney, a protege of Mandy, played a key role in the Blairite coterie that ran the government from the start in 2024, implementing the Tony legacy. Another member, former Health Secretary Wes Streeting, seeking to oust Sir Keir, does not come out well in the latest chapter in this sordid saga.
And yesterday’s Westminster drama cannot but harm Andy Burnham’s chances of winning the hard-fought Makerfield by-election on 18 June, further destabilising the Labour leadership.
Despite yesterday’s avalanche of documents, there are still many questions to be asked. What has been redacted, in deference to the ongoing Met police inquiry into Mandy’s possible misconduct in public office? Where are the direct communications between Sir Keir and Milord Mandy?
Mandelson’s long, drawn-out and damaging downfall may yet bring down other high-profile Labour figures with him, as he did the first time he was disgraced over lying about his home loan, revealed in my unauthorised biography of the Great Illusioner.
I was never under any illusions about him. And I still can’t understand why a whole generations of Labour politicians fell for his phoney charm. They ken the noo.
Mandy first quit in Dec 1998, book came out in 1999