Ben Obese-Jecty

Madam Deputy Speaker, “Why does the Prime Minister think everybody else’s actions have consequences except his own?”—[Official Report, 20 April 2022; Vol. 712, c. 155.] That is a question the country would like an answer to. It is, given the appearance of several recently defenestrated senior civil servants, a prescient question. But it is not my question—it is the Prime Minister’s own question from 2022. How hollow those words must feel now. The testimonies from Sir Oliver Robbins last week, and from his predecessor, Sir Philip Barton, and the Prime Minister’s former chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, this morning—all casualties trailing in the wake of a Prime Minister who will stop at nothing to save his own skin—have torpedoed what last vestiges of credibility the Prime Minister is desperately clinging on to. The Prime Minister set the conditions for Peter Mandelson to be the UK ambassador to the United States with a devil-may-care attitude with regard to the consequences. The public announcement of his appointment in December 2024, His Majesty the King being informed and the agrément with the United States being secured all before vetting had taken place ensured that the appointment was a fait accompli. Peter Mandelson then being granted access to the FCDO building and higher-classification briefings before he was granted developed vetting reveals a shockingly lax approach to our national security, but it is not without precedent. We saw much of the same laissez-faire attitude with a previous ministerial appointment: that of the Prime Minister’s special envoy to the British Indian Ocean Territory, Jonathan Powell. A similar pattern was followed, with access to the FCDO granted and access to classified documents, use of unsecured email for communications and question marks over potential foreign influence all confirmed to have taken place prior to his developed vetting within the last few hours by Morgan McSweeney. That was six months prior to the Mandelson farrago. As I said at PMQs last week, playing fast and loose with national security is a key characteristic of the Prime Minister’s chumocracy. The question of Mandelson’s security clearance itself poses a host of further questions. When Peter Mandelson commenced his role, he had already been given developed vetting, although UKSV had highlighted concerns—that is now well established. But if full due process was followed, why was Olly Robbins sacked? On 4 February, less than a week before Mandelson started his role, the appointments and interchange officer of the FCDO informed him via email that the role required STRAP-level clearance in addition to DV and that a new STRAP application would need to be made. Sir Oliver Robbins confirmed that it was clear to him that Mandelson had received STRAP clearance from the STRAP authorities. During the urgent question in the Chamber on 16 March, I asked the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister what level of security clearance Mandelson had been granted, notwithstanding the minutiae of whether developed vetting is a clearance level and STRAP is a role-specific access. The reply I received from the Minister for the Indo-Pacific, the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra)—somewhat conveniently one hour after The Guardian broke its story—stated only that Mandelson had developed vetting upon commencement of his role on 10 February. So when was his STRAP application made, and when was it granted? When I asked the Prime Minister last week, despite his legendary forensic eye for detail, he had no idea. Did the intelligence services also have access to the UKSV vetting report? The wider question is this: what assessment did the US intelligence services make of Peter Mandelson? Did he pass vetting by the US Department of State? As the nexus for all Five Eyes intelligence and US-UK eyes-only intelligence coming from the United States, was Mandelson granted access to all the available intelligence in order to discharge all his responsibilities as ambassador? Would the US, for example, have given him visibility of TK-level imagery? What assessment have the Government made of the damage this debacle has done to the UK’s relationship with the United States? It is surely no coincidence that the special relationship has soured at the same time that this fiasco has unravelled, quite apart from the other faux pas that the Government have made in recent weeks. Even more damning in Sir Olly Robbins’ testimony was the Prime Minister’s dogged determination to reward the now Lord Doyle: “I was under strict instruction not to discuss that with the then Foreign Secretary, which was uncomfortable… I found it very hard to think how I would explain to the office what the credentials of Matthew were to be in an important head of mission role, when I was in danger of making very senior, very experienced diplomats leave the office.” The fact is that the Prime Minister put pressure on the FCDO to give Lord Doyle a head of mission role in the diplomatic service in March last year despite his complete lack of qualification for the role. That same individual later had the Labour Whip removed owing to his relationship with Sean Morton, a man subsequently convicted of possessing indecent images of children. The Prime Minister deliberately directed that information to be withheld from the then Foreign Secretary; I suspect that is not the first time he has done that. Those two men with proximity to convicted paedophiles were both Labour peers and both key figures in the Starmer project—the Government’s cronyism is second only to their nepotism. Given what we know about the role that Peter Mandelson played in the last reshuffle, what confidence can the general public have that Ministers who owe their careers to him will vote honestly in the coming vote? It is not on the Opposition side of the House that we have to worry about whether Peter Mandelson paid for anybody’s wedding. The laissez-faire attitude to Peter Mandelson’s appointment has illustrated the nonchalance, arrogance and incompetence of the Government under this milquetoast premiership. There is a key question that we come back to once again: why does the Prime Minister think everybody’s actions have consequences except his own? The public must be assured that there has been an investigation into whether the Prime Minister misled the House. The Privileges Committee must investigate the Prime Minister. Labour MPs must vote for the motion, for transparency and truth, not the defence of a Prime Minister who does not deserve their blinkered loyalty.