Peter Mandelson to step down from the House of Lords

It comes amid further news of Lord Mandelson’s relationship with the paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.

The announcement was made in the upper chamber by the Lord Speaker this afternoon (Tuesday, February 3).

It comes after Downing Street piled pressure on the disgraced former ambassador to Washington to resign and stop using his title.

Earlier, the government said it had referred to the police an assessment of how Mandelson handled sensitive government information while he was a minister.

Why is Peter Mandelson set to step down?

The news comes after emails appeared to show conversations between Mandelson and Epstein about government and political matters while the former was serving as business secretary and the de-facto deputy prime in Gordon Brown’s government.

An initial review by the Cabinet Office of documents released by the US Department of Justice has found that emails sent by Lord Mandelson to the paedophile financier Epstein likely contain market sensitive information relating to the 2008 financial crash and official activities thereafter to stabilise the economy.

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The Metropolitan Police yesterday said it was aware of the latest release of files related to Epstein and confirmed it had received “a number of reports relating to alleged misconduct in a public office”. 

Yesterday (Monday, February 2), Ella Marriott, Commander of the Met, said: “The reports will all be reviewed to determine if they meet the criminal threshold for investigation.

“As with any matter, if new and relevant information is brought to our attention we will assess it, and investigate as appropriate.”