Starmer’s Mandelson problem isn’t process, it’s judgement

Sir Keir Starmer has tried using a simple explanation for the Mandelson affair: he didn’t know.

The Prime Minister has repeatedly insisted he was unaware of the “depth” of Peter Mandelson’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein when he appointed him Britain’s ambassador to Washington. Mandelson, he says, misled him. Officials failed him. New information has since come to light which would have stopped the appointment “had I known it at the time”.

In Parliament on 10 September 2025, Starmer was categorical. “Full due process was followed during this appointment, as it is with all ambassadors,” he told MPs.

The documents released yesterday show that claim just wasn’t true.

Let’s go through it. Mandelson was a controversial appointment from the very beginning – and even if one had somehow missed his other dodgy departures from British politics, the Cabinet Office attempted to ensure the Prime Minister was properly briefed. A two-page due diligence report was placed on Starmer’s desk warning him of the “reputational risks” from Mandelson’s association with paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Officials noted a JPMorgan report describing the two men as “particularly close”. They recorded that Mandelson’s contact with Epstein continued after the financier had been convicted of child sex offences. They also flagged reports that Mandelson had stayed at Epstein’s house while he was in jail.

The Prime Minister could not miss it. Surely this was evidence enough not to go through with the appointment? And yet he did.

Starmer’s defence since Mandelson’s messy dismissal has been that the former ambassador misrepresented the relationship with Epstein. In February, the Prime Minister said the former US ambassador had “portrayed Epstein as someone he barely knew. And when that became clear and it was not true, I sacked him.”

But the papers released today show that officials had already outlined the essential facts before the appointment was made. The warning lights were flashing well in advance.

Not just that. Jonathan Powell, Starmer’s own National Security Adviser, described the appointment process at the time as “weirdly rushed” and “unusual”. He raised his concerns with Morgan McSweeney, then Starmer’s chief of staff. Starmer, the documents show, may have had “political conversations around this”.

Philip Barton too, then the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office, had his “reservations about the appointment”. Both were overruled.

What followed was hardly a forensic examination of the candidate from the former director of public prosecutions.

In response to the due diligence document raising reputational concerns, Mandelson was asked just three questions by McSweeney. He answered them. His responses were accepted at face value.

There is, throughout this process, an extraordinary lack of curiosity from those responsible for testing the appointment, with so few appearing to raise their concerns.

David Lammy told the press that he had opposed Mandelson’s appointment as ambassador. The official record suggests otherwise. A letter from Barton notes “the Foreign Secretary, who agrees with the recommendation”. At the time, that Foreign Secretary was Lammy.

Then there is the question of process – the very thing Starmer assured Parliament had been properly followed.

Emails indicate Mandelson was offered a “higher tiers” briefing on 6 January, granting access to highly classified Foreign Office material. But his developed vetting – the formal security clearance required for such access – was not completed until 29 January.

In other words, Starmer ordered such a speedy appointment that Mandelson was briefed on sensitive information before the vetting process had finished. That is a clear departure from the normal procedures.

For a role as sensitive as ambassador to the United States, it marks an unusually casual approach to risk.

After being dismissed, Mandelson said his “chief concern” was returning from Washington with “maximum dignity”. He initially sought £547,201 in severance – the value for his four-year contract. He eventually received £75,000.

Quite why he received anything at all given the circumstances of his dismissal is unclear. As Tory MPs Mims Davies and Alicia Kearns pushed for any such payment to be reveal, they were continually batted away – even though officials noted that there was “no prohibition” on publishing the terms.

One message released in the documents hints at the reasoning. Without “a positive indication”, officials warned, there was a “potential” that Mandelson might go public with some of his claims. Which claims those might be remain unclear.

In the release of summaries and internal correspondence came the Prime Minister’s box note – comments from private office and special advisers on a paper or submission, that has a box for the Prime Minister to leave his thoughts – left empty.

As shadow chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster Alex Burghart wrote on Twitter: “I’ve worked in No10 – Spads and Private Secretary provide comments AND we’d expect the PM to write in his view. All that has been left out – why?”

The absence matters because the Mandelson affair ultimately turns on judgement, the Prime Minister’s to be precise.

Labour would prefer it to be seen as a failure of process: a misleading figure, incomplete information, and a government system that did not function as intended.

But the documents suggest something much simpler. The warnings were there. Senior officials raised concerns. The due diligence report spelt out the reputational risks in plain English.

The real question is not what the Prime Minister didn’t know.

It is why, having been told what he did know, he went ahead anyway.