Contribution
My Lords, this scandal began with the Prime Minister’s decision to appoint Peter Mandelson as His Majesty’s ambassador to Washington. Mandelson is a man whose relationship with Jeffrey Epstein was already known to be a profound reputational risk and whose later published record included cash payments and benefits from Epstein, including travel.
At the core of this story is not merely a failure of process; it is a failure of judgment. It is the Prime Minister’s failure, and it shows a callous disregard for the victims of one of the most notorious sex offenders of modern times.
In truth, we have learned little that is surprising from what is actually in these documents. It is no surprise that Lord Mandelson displayed contempt for the Prime Minister, for cabinet government and for officials and advisers alike, despite his public utterances. He described No. 10 as “beleaguered and bereft”, said it needed a “complete revamp” and claimed that senior people in Downing Street did not know what the Prime Minister wanted; indeed, that most of them did not think that the Prime Minister knew what he wanted.
Of equal concern is that, clearly, Ministers spent a lot of time discussing party politics with a supposedly politically impartial official. Can the Minister confirm that that failure to uphold the impartiality of the Civil Service is in contravention of the Ministerial Code?
What is most revealing is not what the documents contain; it is what they do not contain. Nowhere is there candid written submission, whether from officials or political advisers, saying, “Prime Minister, this appointment is unwise. This candidate carries unacceptable reputational risk. This office demands a higher standard”. We have not been shown a written decision from the Prime Minister or the Foreign Secretary authorising the appointment on the merits. Instead, we are given peripheral documents: process, risk, choreography, vetting, and announcement handling. One chain says simply that
“a political appointment has been agreed”.
The Cabinet Secretary later records that earlier advice explained the Prime Minister’s right to
“make such an appointment and the process for doing so but did not give specific advice on candidates”.
So, for all the Prime Minister’s talk of leadership, the record before us suggests that not one person serving him felt able or willing to advise him candidly in writing that this appointment was folly. That is a remarkable indictment of the culture at the centre of government.
It is also deeply ironic. This is a Prime Minister who has staked much of his moral authority on the Hillsborough law and a statutory duty of candour. He has said that such a duty is needed so that the truth is not optional and cover-ups are impossible and that the law would change the balance of power so that the state can never hide from the people it should serve. Those are admirable sentiments. They arise from hard and bitter experience: Hillsborough, infected blood, Covid—all where families were forced to fight the state, not only for justice but for records, evidence and truth.
Perhaps the one person in government who did, in private, take the duty of candour seriously was Pat McFadden, who told Lord Mandelson:
“Every meeting I have is: ‘Who can we tax in order to pay benefits to others?’ They’re asking the wrong questions”.
What a shame that he felt that that duty did not extend to the electorate.
Does the Minister appreciate how surreal it is for a Government to preach candour in public office while, in relation to one of the gravest scandals in British diplomatic history, they appear assiduously to have avoided creating clear records of advice and decision? Candour is not merely what Ministers say at a Dispatch Box after the event. Candour is what advisers write down when the powerful are about to make a grave mistake.
There is a further problem. The Government acknowledge that material has been withheld so as not to prejudice an ongoing Metropolitan Police investigation, and say that further publication may follow. But where is the schedule? How many relevant documents have been withheld? What categories do they fall into? Who authored them? What dates do they cover? What broad subjects do they concern? I ask the noble Baroness to undertake that the Government will provide the House with a clear account of what has been withheld and why.
Finally, responsibility cannot be outsourced to officials, advisers or process. The responsibility lies with the Prime Minister. If further confirmation were needed of Lord Mandelson’s total unsuitability, it is found in the extraordinary discovery that after his appointment had been publicly announced, he still planned to participate in UBS’s Greater China Conference in Shanghai in his Global Counsel capacity, and that he would be paid for it. Officials further recorded that he asked to start on the FCDO payroll in order to facilitate that private engagement. This was a man with no proper regard for propriety, ethics or the dignity of public office, and he has been driven from office and from public life. The remaining question is how long the Prime Minister who appointed him can credibly remain.