Calls mount for the British Prime Minister to resign as the Mandelson-Epstein scandal leaves Starmer’s spin doctors having to argue that he is ignorant and not in command of his own government, rather than admit that he has been “deliberately dishonest”.
One of Britain’s most senior Civil Servants, Sir Oliver ‘Olly’ Robbins was sacked on Thursday night after it was revealed that the Labour grandee hand-picked to be the Ambassador to the United States, Peter Mandelson, actually failed his security services vetting process but was appointed anyway. Mandelson was Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s political appointee, and the official version of events is being treated with high suspicion, but Downing Street insists Starmer will not be resigning over the matter, leaving Robbins to play the “sacrificial lamb”.
On Friday morning, after Robbins’ overnight ouster Prime Minister Starmer employed his usual rhetorical approach of portraying himself as a member of the aggrieved public, and a victim of events, rather than as the leader of the government. Laying out his version of events, that Robbins secretly and unilaterally approved Mandelson to be ambassador despite being a known security risk, Starmer told broadcasters from Paris, where he is co-hosting a defence summit:
That I wasn’t told that Peter Mandelson when he was appointed is staggering. That I wasn’t told that he’d failed security vetting when I was telling Parliament that due process had been followed is unforgivable. I was not told, no minister was told, and I’m absolutely furious about that. What I intend to do is go to Parliament on Monday to set out all the relevant facts in true transparency, so Parliament has the full picture.
So while it is as of now the official government position is the Prime Minister shouldn’t have to resign because he has no idea what’s going on in his own government, and this exculpates him from responsibility for the consequences of his own decisions, critics appear unconvinced. The Daily Telegraph cites Westminster insiders that nobody in the Civil Service believes the official version of events, and that it is ridiculous to say “shrewd political operator” Robbins would have decided to unilaterally overrule the vetting process without telling anyone.
The paper further states today that Robbins had months ago told friends he was fearful of being set up as a “fall guy” and was determined not to be stitched up to save Starmer’s skin over the Mandelson crisis.
Brexit pioneer and Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, accused the Prime Minister of dishonesty, and of having misled the country, and called on him to resign. Sacked Civil Service Robbins is no friend to the right, Farage said while noting his malignant influence during the Brexit era, but nevertheless is very highly intelligent and capable and consequently “there is absolutely no way” he would do something so stupid.
Mr Farage said “not a single word” of the official denial by Starmer’s spokesman this morning was “believable in any way. He added on Robbins: “I disagree with is politics… [but] there is no way a man like that would unilaterally make a decision of this kind. And equally, the Prime Minister cannot stand up and say that Mandelson passed security vetting and now claim later that he wasn’t told. That’s not incompetence, even Keir Starmer isn’t that incompetent. It’s outright, blatant dishonesty.”
Starmer clinging on to power flies in the face of his own standards for the office of the Prime Minister, as expressed while he was in opposition and flaunted as virtues at election-time. Indeed, according to Sir Keir Starmer himself, whether the Prime Minister lied to Parliament and the country, or if he was ignorant of the goings-on in his own government, both are unacceptable in a leader, who had long claimed before he took power that leaders should understand “the buck stops here“.
Also speaking out today on the unfolding crisis of competence and accountability in the British government is Danny Kruger, a former Conservative brought into Reform by Farage to prepare the party for government, a back-room operation charged with doing deep thinking on the biggest problems standing in the way of good governance.
Reflecting on the facts as they appear, Kruger stated it is now the case that “the Government doesn’t run the government”, noting the downstream effects of the Tony Blair-era project to depoliticise politics by taking power and responsibility away from elected officials and shunting it away to civil servants and arms-length bodies, known as Quangos. He said:
It’s almost incredible they weren’t told. Either way the system is totally out of control. Politicians who won’t lead; unaccountable officials in charge, and laws to stop them telling ministers the facts.
…The issue isn’t just that the PM is so weak he hides behind ‘process’ on everything – it’s that the system deliberately enables this, giving ministers high-sounding principles (‘independent vetting’) to evade responsibility. So the Kafkaesque scenario of the PM defending himself with the claim ‘process was followed’ when the process simply meant ‘nothing to do with the PM’.
There aren’t many people left in British politics at this stage who aren’t calling for the Prime Minister to resign. Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said this morning that whatever version of events now proves to be true, “all roads lead to a resignation”. She said: “At some point, there is deliberate dishonesty whether it’s the cover-up story or the original story. One of these is deliberate dishonesty. They can’t all be true, that’s why I know he is lying.”
The Green Party, presently enjoying record-high polling on the back of Labour’s failures, also called for Starmer to step down. Their leader Zack Polanski said: “There’s no way today should end without Starmer’s resignation. Any other outcome would an absurd scenario where this Labour Government, and all in it, would be laughing in our faces”.