Keir Starmer is facing another bruising day in Parliament over the scandal surrounding Peter Mandelson’s appointment as US ambassador, as Donald Trump weighed in, appearing to give the prime minister support.
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 Mandelson’s appointment.
Robbins, until last week the most senior civil servant in the Foreign Office, will reportedly tell the Foreign Affairs Committee that the government pressured him into clearing Mandelson, despite the peer’s relationship with paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein, and business links to Russia and China.
Ahead ot Robbins’s appearance, Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said both he and then foreign secretary David Lammy had had concerns about Mandelson’s appointment.
He told Sky News Mandelson should never have been appointed and added: “I steered well clear of Peter Mandelson when I became Labour leader in 2010.”
He went on to say: “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.”
Mandelson, who spent nine months as US ambassador before fresh details of his relationship with Epstein emerged, was a political appointment to the plum diplomatic role, rather than the Washington job going to a career diplomat.
The repeated crisis of Mandelson’s appointment has threatened to topple Starmer’s premiership several times, with his own party frustrated by the crisis and opposition parties demanding he resign.
On Tuesday, the prime minister appeared to get backing from an unlikely source, the US president.
He wrote on his Truth Social platform: “Prime Minister Keir Starmer of the United Kingdom acknowledged that he ‘exercised wrong judgement’ when he chose his Ambassador to Washington.
“I agree, he was a really bad pick. Plenty of time to recover, however! President DJT.”
Trump’s latest comments are markedly different from his recent ones about the prime minister, which have criticised his lack of support for the United States’ war with Iran.
Trump’s support is unlikely to impress MPs questioning Robbins on Tuesday.
The Times also reported that Robbins will use his “box office” appearance at the committee to reveal he did not see the formal recommendation by vetting officials that Mandelson should not be given clearance, while insisting the UK Security Vetting (UKSV) process is only advisory.
On Monday, the prime minister said he challenged Robbins over why he went against the recommendation of UKSV.
“I did ask him and I didn’t accept his explanation,” Starmer told the Commons. “That’s why I sacked him.”
The prime minister also said he would not have appointed Mandelson if he had known the peer had failed the checks and insisted there was no pressure from No 10 to push through the high-profile appointment.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch applied for the emergency Commons debate about the scandal, telling MPs it was “a matter of national security because the prime minister has admitted appointing a known serious security risk to our most sensitive diplomatic post”.
It is not known which minister will appear at the debate on behalf of the government.
Starmer said in his appearance in the Commons on Monday afternoon that the government was investigating security concerns relating to Mandelson’s time as US ambassador.
He also said the terms of a probe into government security vetting have been updated in light of the latest revelations about Mandelson and the inquiry will be led by Sir Adrian Fulford, a senior judge and chairman of the Southport Inquiry.
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