Dr Kieran Mullan

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bolsover (Natalie Fleet). Actually, in writing my speech, I had people like her in mind: the Labour MPs who I know are genuinely passionate about tackling violence against women and girls. They use that passion to criticise us, and what we did or did not do in government—and I respect that—and sometimes to criticise their own Government. It is those MPs that the Prime Minister is trying to throw under the bus today. It is those MPs who I do not think would ever have agreed to the judgment the Prime Minister made, that it was “worth the risk”. This is not some hidden or secret position that the Government took; a Minister said on the record in an interview that the decision to appoint Peter Mandelson was “worth the risk”. What does that mean? What are we talking about here? What was it worth? It was worth disrespecting, denigrating and betraying the victims of Jeffrey Epstein by appointing someone who chose to associate with a convicted paedophile. That is the risk that the Prime Minister chose to take. I do not think it is a risk that the hon. Member for Bolsover would have taken, or the former Deputy Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner), or many of those other Members; they would have made a different judgment. There is a pattern here, and those of us on the Opposition side of the House know what it is like. When Prime Ministers are weak and struggling to maintain their authority, they will go further and further in doing things that their own Members do not want them to do, in order to save their own skin. Members can come to regret supporting that.