Judgement day: Starmer’s Mandelson statement ends in jeers

0:02The Telegraph.

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1:48Camilla: This could be Keir Starmer's darkest day. He's apologised for appointing Peter Mandelson, but not admitted to misleading the House of Commons. Will that get this beleaguered PM off the hook? I was in the Commons to watch his statement, and we explain why everyone was laughing at his weak excuses. I know many members across the House will find these facts to be incredible. Welcome to The Daily Tea with me, Camilla Tomeny. And me, Tim Stanley.

2:26Camilla: Tim, welcome back. I've missed you. You're in your summer suit. Too early. I miscalled it. No, nothing. You've had a little holiday. It was bright and warm when I left the house and now it's freezing cold. So I'm dressed like Roger Moore on safari. Love it. And everyone else is wearing a duffel coat. You're my Roger Moore. Thank you. That's how we sum it up. He is the best Bond. Am I your pussy galore or Miss Moneypain? Move on. Think of you as being Xenia on a top, I think. Oh, my God. Right, you've hot-fitted it back. Thank God you're in a light suit because you basically sprinted from Westminster.

2:56Camilla: Oh, I did, yeah. So we could record this response. I almost forgot to mind the gap, yeah. Yeah, you did. Did you have popcorn? Because it was one of those moments. The Prime Minister... Yes. Let me be clear. I have not misled the House, either knowingly or unknowingly. I have been absolutely clear. I've been working on that while I've been on holiday. The trick is to get something in the back. It's absolutely clear. Oh, come on. Indeed. And I tell you what, he's furious. He is furious. He's furious. Not with himself, though, because he hasn't done anything wrong. But my goodness me, those officials at the Foreign Office, they're in trouble, aren't they, Tim?

3:30In case people think that Parliament is a scripted clown show, the Prime Minister's office let it be known that he was going to be furious before he became furious. Kemi Baden-Ock put out her questions before she asked them. And also, the things that Labour MPs were going to say was leaked to the press before they set them.

3:49Camilla: It's amazing that they have to be told what to say. I mean, this is meant to be a government of service. It's looking like a government of self-service that Labour are working this to their own internal party politics. Well, the Prime Minister was, of course, responding to the revelation last week that Peter Mandelson had failed security vetting and the Foreign Office had chosen not to pass that on to the Prime Minister. He described it. I wrote down some of his words. he described the situation as absolutely unforgivable and, frankly, staggering. Yes. And then he said this. Mr Speaker, I know many members across the House will find these facts to be incredible.

4:36To that... To that... To that, I can only say they are right. It beggars belief that throughout the whole timeline of events, officials in the Foreign Office saw fit to withhold this information from the most senior ministers in our system in government. That is not how the vast majority of people in this country expect politics, government or accountability to work. It reminded me of a moment in history in 1982 when the then Taoiseach of Ireland, Charles Hawhey, discovered that his Attorney General Patrick Connolly had been unwittingly harbouring a man who'd killed two people. And at the time, Hawhey described it as grotesque, unbelievable, bizarre and unprecedented, which earned it the acronym GUBU.

5:27And the thing about that kind of prose, which the Prime Minister tried to use in this speech to indicate to people listening that he is as dumbfounded, shocked and appalled as everyone else, is it keeps bringing us back to the question of why were officials not telling you everything and why didn't you ask?

5:46Camilla: Exactly, from gooboo to boo-boo, because it is incredible, is it not? And to be fair, the mother of the house, Diane Abbott, I think put her finger firmly on the pulse when she said this. On the question of Peter Magdelson, It was in the 90s that Peter Mandelson had to resign for the Cabinet for the first time because of his dealings with the millionaire Geoffrey Robinson. It was a few years later he had to resign for the Cabinet for the second time because of his relationships with the billionaire Hindujar family. Peter Mandelson has a history.

6:35Peter Manson has a history and what this house wants to know is why knowing Peter Manson's history going back now 30 years and given what has been known it's one thing to say as he insists on saying nobody told me Nobody told me anything. Nobody told me. The question is, why didn't the Prime Minister ask? All the while that Keir Starmer was speaking, Diane Abbott was laughing and shaking her head. She was also introduced by the Speaker erroneously as Dame Diane Abbott. The day will come, but it sort of seemed appropriate that he elevated her at that moment.

7:25Camilla: But do you mean Buckingham Palace Day or the Palladium? Are we talking about Panto Day? She is in fact the mother of the House, which is why she gets to go so far in advance in the running order. But she perfectly articulated what everyone was thinking. And she was followed up by other members of the left, notably John McDonnell, who made the point that the prime minister was elected by a narrow base of people within the Labour Party, that he fell back onto the services and support of Morgan McSweeney and Peter Mandelson. And that, alleged McDonnell, is why Mandelson was appointed. It was a political choice.

7:58And it's important to bear this in mind. The hard left has an analysis of what went wrong here. It's not just about ineptitude or wrongen. This is all about Keir Starmer having no political philosophy and relying upon Blairites to tell him what to do.

8:13Camilla: And on a technical point, before we get into the nitty gritty of the to and fro between the prime minister and Kemi Badenok, it has been suggested that actually the advice to the prime minister was if the appointment is political, then you shouldn't announce it before you've done the security vetting. So Starmer has come back and said, I've now changed the process and where there are political appointments, we aren't going to announce it until we know whether or not they're wrong-ins. I mean, that should have been the case in the first place, but I think it's critical. And this has come from Sam Coates of Sky.

8:45Camilla: He's discovered, buried in some of the paperwork that was released, the so-called files that were released by Downing Street, that actually it was made clear to Number 10, you really shouldn't be making announcements about political appointees before the vetting. And that was one of many points Kemi Badeknot landed. But let's just go through the case for the defence milord, seeing as Keir Starmer is very much the lawyer. The Prime Minister began by apologising to the victims and taking personal responsibility for the appointment. At the heart of this, there is also a judgement I made that was wrong.

9:20I should not have appointed Peter Mandelson. I take responsibility for that decision and I apologise again to the victims of the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, who were clearly failed by my decision.

9:34Camilla: He was very much throwing the Foreign Office under the bus... Oh, yes. ..and basically saying, not me, Gov. Let's listen to that defence. The recommendation in the Peter Mandelson case could and should have been shared with me before he took up his post. Mr Speaker, let me make a second point. If I had known before he took up his post that UK SV recommendation was that developed vetting clearance should be denied, I would not have gone ahead with the appointment. The Prime Minister not only passed the buck, but sort of handed it around the Cabinet Office by listing various people who should have been told and were not told.

10:19And it was at this point, while talking about Sir Christopher Wormald, that he started banging the dispatch box. Mr Speaker, last week, the then Cabinet Secretary was clear that when he carried out his review, the Foreign Office did not tell him about the UK SV recommendation that developed vetting clearance should be denied to Peter Mandelson. I find that astonishing. As I said out on this, I do not accept that I could not have been told about the recommendation before Peter Mandelson took up his post. I absolutely do not accept that the then Cabinet Secretary, an official, not a politician, when carrying out his review, could not have been told that UKSV recommended that Peter Mandelson should be denied developed vetting clearance.

11:13It was a vital part of the process that I had asked him to review. Clearly, he could have been told and he should have been told.

11:23Camilla: There was a bit of a stumble in his voice at one point, Tim. You were in the press gallery. How did he actually seem? Because previously you reported him shaking, shaking his papers, looking a bit unsteady. Did he look nervous? Did he look confident? What was his demeanour? I felt he was on top of it at the beginning, but particularly as more questions were asked, including by Kemi, I felt that slightly unraveled. Yes, he was bumbling in response to Kemi, wasn't he? He was, partly because this stuff is really knotty. Again, to quote Diane Abbott, actually the public don't care about process. They care about people being transparent and honest and taking responsibility.

11:58But so it was partly he was stumbling because there were so many facts he had to be on top of. But I got the overall impression of a very good lawyer who had been employed to defend himself and accidentally ended up prosecuting himself.

12:13Camilla: Yes. Because every time he would explain one of these gubu, outrageous and astonishing facts that had come up, it just caused people to start shouting from the back benches, why didn't you ask? Yes. And at one point he said, it's not about them talking about civil servants and someone from the back benches, I'm not quite sure, shouted out, no, it's about you. It's about you. This was him fighting for his political life, but also his political reputation and that reputation that he has built up himself for being a man of decency and integrity, a sticker to the rule book. And this is where Kemi Badenoch came in, because clearly the Tories are nursing the wounds of Boris Johnson's unceremonial ending, not least after that.

13:00Camilla: You know, there's a parallel there because we have spectacular election landslide victory turning into chaos within years. And it's because of that personal animosity between Keir Starmer and Boris Johnson and him very much positioning himself as morally superior to his predecessor that Badenock is basically trying to make the point. Why do you think that the same rules that you applied to Johnson don't apply to you? And there's another parallel, Camilla, which is that Boris's defence was always I was given advice that the infamous parties that he held were in compliance with lockdown rules. So in a sense, he was saying I was let down by my civil servants.

13:41The Prime Minister is saying exactly the same. I wasn't given the full advice that I should have been given. But Keir Starmer's argument back then, well, it was this. Look, there are only two possible explanations. Either he's trashing the ministerial code, or he's claiming he was repeatedly lied to by his own advisers and that he didn't know what was going on in his own house and his own office. Come off it. He really does think that it's one rule for him and another rule for everyone else. That's Keir Starmer speaking in 2022, saying you can't just blame the staff, you have to take responsibility.

14:22Camilla: Kemi Baden-Opp, clear, calm, collected, forensic. She put her glasses on. Quite like that little touch. I am looking at this very seriously and there was no hysteria. It wasn't like a Mel Stride versus Rachel Reeves after the budget moment. Yeah, yeah. Now, she basically went through it all step by step. And it was clever of her to make a point about his inability at PMQs to actually answer the question. And we discussed this last week and then previously with the Speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, becoming increasingly frustrated with the Prime Minister and saying to him, it's not opposition questions. And the Prime Minister's statement today, in it he said, I was informed about this on Tuesday night.

15:07So I think she's really got him on something there, which is that according to the rules, if you misinform the House by accident, it's your responsibility to inform the House at the nearest opportunity available. That would have been on Wednesday, possibly in the middle of PMQs. He chose not to do that. Why? Earlier today, Mr Speaker, Downing Street admitted that the Prime Minister inadvertently misled the House. The Prime Minister has chosen not to repeat that from the dispatch box. I will remind him that under the ministerial code, he has a duty to correct the record at the earliest opportunity.

15:49The Prime Minister says he only found out on Tuesday that Peter Mandelson failed the security vetting. the earliest opportunity to correct the record was Prime Minister's questions on Wednesday, almost a week ago. This is a breach of the ministerial code. Under that code, he is bound to be as open as possible with Parliament and the public in answering questions today. So let me start with what we do know. We know the Prime Minister personally appointed Peter Mandelson to be our ambassador to the United States. We know that Mandelson had a close relationship with a convicted paedophile. We know that he had concerning links with Russia and China, links that had already raised red flags.

16:35We know that the Prime Minister announced the appointment before vetting was complete, an extraordinary and unprecedented step for the role of US ambassador. The Prime Minister says that it was usual for this because it was a political appointment. So I will remind him and the rest of the Labour front bench who were heckling that Peter Mandelson was a politician who had been sacked twice from government for lying. That meant he should have gone through the full security process.

17:07Camilla: Kemi Badenot was later echoed by Diane Abbott, but she made the same point. We all knew, basically, what Peter Mandelson was like. How on earth can you claim ignorance? She's also trying to sow this web that it's not just a cock-up, it's a conspiracy and maybe even a cover-up with suggesting that everything is becoming murkier by the minute. We still do not know exactly why Peter Mandelson failed that vetting. We do not know what risks our country was exposed to and we do not know how it is possible that the Prime Minister said repeatedly that this was a failure of vetting, went on television and said things that were blatantly incorrect and not a single advisor or a single official told him that what he was saying wasn't true.

17:53At every turn, with every explanation, the government story has become murkier and more contradictory. It is time for the truth. And her sixth question is in relation to Peter Mandelson's business affairs, pointing out that Systema, a Russian defence company reportedly linked to the Kremlin and to Vladimir Putin, is something that Peter Mandelson was a director of and that he remained a director of that company long after Russia's invasion of Crimea.

18:26Camilla: The other thing that Badenok was good at pointing out is using Starmer's best characteristics against him. She made the point, you were a former director of public prosecution You've shown a grotesque lack of curiosity about all this. You're meant to be a prosecutor, an investigator, somebody who wants to get to the facts and find the evidence, which I think was effective. The other slight discrepancy, which has actually been pointed out by Nick Timothy, the Shadow Justice Secretary, who, again, is a bit of a legal eagle, is there does seem to be a contradiction at play here when on February the 4th at that now famous PMQ, the day before the Hastings press conference, which is where the sort of smoking gun was discovered about what the Prime Minister did know about the vetting.

19:11Camilla: He was asked, did the security vetting mention Peter Mandelson's relationship with Jeffrey Epstein? To which he replied, yes. And yet today he's saying, I didn't see the vetting. Which is it? She's made the point quite rightly in her rebuttal There are so many questions left unanswered here. Yes, we get the point that the gory details of exactly why red flags were raised and which concerns the vetting people actually had about Mandelson came to light, which put a block on his appointment. OK, maybe that information is somewhat sensitive and we do need to be cognizant of the fact that the police are carrying out an investigation into this man for alleged misconduct in public office.

19:51Camilla: So I understand that. But again, unfortunately, in this inability to sort of clear up some of these inconsistencies, it then seems as if there is some kind of conspiracy or cover up at play. Also, we were briefed that the prime minister was probably going to admit that he had misled the House because he plainly has. Inadvertently, he was going to say. Inadvertently, yeah, but he didn't really do that, or at least I didn't catch him doing it. No, he basically didn't admit to misleading the House either knowingly or unknowingly. Even though, as we have discussed, and as Kemi Badenock and others have pointed out, it's pretty obvious that the House was misled because the Prime Minister himself was misled.

20:33Camilla: How can you argue in both breaths, well, I was misled, but I didn't mislead the House when I received misleading information? doesn't stack up that. Yes. So why has he been advised that if he did mislead the house on purpose or inadvertently, then that would be a resignation offence and he's had to fall short of admitting that because the sequence of events is you admit to misleading, you correct the record, people then rightfully call for your scalp. Maybe the lawyer in him is saying that's going to incriminate him if he admits misleading and therefore he can't. But then you stay in office anyway.

21:13You get away with it.

21:13Camilla: Do you? Yes. And we'll discuss next what's likely to happen.

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23:10Camilla, the Prime Minister now faces a series of hurdles that he's got to get over. One is tomorrow, when Ollie Robbins is going to speak before a committee in the Commons. We'll come on to discuss that. Then another is Prime Minister's questions on Wednesday, when he'll be up against Kemi and get a good grilling then. And then you have the May local elections. and it is widely anticipated that if Labour does very badly there, then the party will revisit the question of whether or not he can stay on as leader. So tricky week ahead. Interesting question is how is he going to try to rationalise his way through it?

23:51Well, we saw some of that in what he said at the dispatch box. He's angry about this. He's going to fix things, etc. Also interesting to see the party rallying around at the weekend.

24:02Camilla: Yes, the broadcast round was a very intriguing thing on Sunday. So just to give you some background, we had hoped to have Liz Kendall, who is the Science, Innovation and Technology Minister on my GB News show. Downing Street said no. I said, why not? I did not receive a response. Instead, I was told that I was going to be getting the Labour MP for Bournemouth East, a man called Tom Hayes. Rising star. Shall we just conclude by saying it didn't go well for him? Because when I started to ask him questions about whether or not the prime minister had knowingly or unknowingly misled parliament, he decided that he thought that was an opportunity for me to start investigating Richard Tice's tax affairs.

24:46I don't know if you saw the breaking news today. Really important breaking news I don't think GB news has covered, which is that people are going to work every single day. They're working hard. They're paying taxes. They're probably rightly unhappy in some respects about the level of tax they're paying. That tax could come down if people elsewhere pay their taxes. And Richard Tice dodged£100 ,000 of tax payment. He put that as a consequence of his investment company into reform.

25:13Camilla: It's extraordinary whataboutery, Mr Hayes, honestly. It's not. If you think it's whataboutery to dodge tax and not cover it... No, this is absolutely ridiculous. We're talking about the Prime Minister... Isn't it? He should be paying his tax. No, I'm not talking about Richard Tice right now. I'm talking about the Prime Minister. No, you're not. That's the problem. GB News aren't talking about Richard Tice or his non-payment of tax. Part that right now. Part that right now, because I believe that Mr Tice denies that story and is potentially issuing legal warnings about it. But why aren't you covering it?

25:42Camilla: It's extraordinary. I want to talk about the Prime Minister. First of all, you're wrong. Of course you do. You don't want to talk about Richard Tice not paying his tax. Why don't you want to talk about Richard Tice not paying his tax? Are you for real? It then all blew up on X as these things do. And I just don't think it was a good day at the office for Tom Hayes. And I did reply to Dowding Street saying, well, that went well. But I think, troublingly, he thinks it was a good day. He thinks it's a good day. and that I had tried to cancel him simply by asking him questions on the broadcast round that he had been put up for to defend the Prime Minister for his defence of the Prime Minister.

26:17Camilla: His defence of the Prime Minister was an attack on Richard Tice. He let out his inner 19-year-old women's studies grad there. He's got a persona, didn't he, with you're trying to cancel me. Yes, I don't think I was. No, you're on the show discussing it. Cancellation is when we don't have you on. It's not when we have you on and invite you to push back. But that strategy number one is what about a re? Deflect, deflect, deflect. Maybe not just blame Richard Tice, but also 14 years of Tory failure. Yeah. Strategy number two is the one that Liz Kendall did deploy when she did go on a show, which was Sky News with Trevor Phillips.

26:52And there she said the prime minister is a man of integrity. And this is about shifting the blame away from him onto a failed state.

27:01Camilla: The one thing I know about Keir Starmer is that if, even at the last minute, the day before the President's inauguration, he had been told that he had not been passed the UK security vetting, he wouldn't have appointed him. So, to be clear, having announced that Mandelson was getting a job... He would have taken... If he had then discovered... Yes, he would have stopped that. Yeah, he would. There was not a clean bill of... He would have rescinded this. Yes, he would, yeah. You know what I think the problem here is... I'll tell you why, because he is a man of integrity and there is no way that he would have proceeded with that.

27:39Camilla: Whatever the so-called embarrassment, he would have thought that was wrong and he would not have done it. Yes, he's a victim of his circumstances because he's a thoroughly upstanding human being and did you know he's the son of a toolmaker and therefore can do no wrong? Well, she argued that if he had known, if he'd been told the day before Mandelson's appointment this man has failed the vetting, then he definitely would have pulled. Yes. The curious answer to that, by the way, is still the smoking gun that is him being told on Tuesday and not correcting the record. Right. And not appearing before Parliament to admit that what he has been saying for the last six months doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

28:17Right. So we don't buy it.

28:19Camilla: He had any opportunity to do it at PMQs or on Thursday before the House rose for the weekend. Yeah. And he didn't. Well, we don't buy it. But isn't it interesting that much of Westminster and the people who are paid to be in the know do seem to be of the opinion that the Prime Minister didn't know. Yes. I think everybody who we have spoken to in the Telegraph newsroom since the news broke on Thursday afternoon has said, no, he doesn't know. Yes. And therefore you then get into the kind of naval fall. We're now leaning towards fall because I don't think he's knowingly misled Parliament, but he does look as if he has completely lost his grip.

28:55Right. Which reflects badly upon him, but he is going to try and shift this into this is an example of state failure. Yes. Isn't that interesting? Because if he's blaming the process, I've always regarded Keir Starmer as Mr. Process. Isn't the whole thing about Keir Starmer that he always follows and defers to the process?

29:15Camilla: Well, that was a question I asked Tom Hayes when he insisted that the process had let the Prime Minister down. I said, you can't have it both ways. You can't be an adherent to the process and have the process defend you the whole time and then attack the very process that you have constantly been reliant on. Well, this is also a Labour Party that said, do not blame civil servants for everything. Yes. And which signed off on massive pay increases for the public sector. Yes. In other words, they ran on, we love the state. Labour's view of the last election was the problem is the Tories have talked down the state.

29:50Liz Truss going on about the blob. How dare she? And now, having discovered, so let's say he's right and he didn't know, having discovered that the state is so inept that it didn't inform a prime minister that an appointment had failed vetting, he's turning into Dominic Cummings. Yes.

30:10Camilla: But let's also analyse the strange situation we now found ourselves in. And isn't Westminster so curious? So Ollie Robbins, back in the Brexit wars, was an extremely divisive figure. He is the civil servant who is blamed for changing Theresa May's quite staunch rhetoric on Brexit and how it was going to be executed into the Chequers deal that David Davis, the then Brexit secretary, said he was hoodwinked with and then resigned after Chequers. because basically Olly Robbins had taken the deal that he had put together, torn it up and replaced it with his own Romaniac deal. So at one point, Robbins was the bete noire of the Brexiteer right of the Tory party.

30:54Camilla: Conversely, fast forward 10 years, and it is the Brexiteer right of the Conservative Party and others, including Nigel Farage, who is coming in support of Olly Robbins in a bid to make the point to the Prime Minister, no, I'm sorry, you can't blame the staff. So isn't that a curious turn of events? And that Robbins has been at the centre of two prime ministerial controversies? I'm not blaming him for that, but clearly he is an extremely influential civil servant. He's going to go before the Foreign Affairs Select Committee tomorrow, and I am told by insiders that he is going to mount the following defence.

31:31Camilla: It didn't matter what the vetting said, because by the time this came across my desk, you'd already appointed Peter Mandelson. Second of all, I was not in a position legally to disclose extremely private, sensitive vetting information. That was above my pay grade. He will apparently argue. I think the second argument about privacy is a strong one because picking up on a good column by Charles Moore, he noted that if people thought that when they undergo vetting that what they say might then be reported to the Prime Minister, such as, I'm sorry, Prime Minister, but the person you want to appoint broke the bank at Monte Carlo or shot Kennedy or has Elvis hidden in his basement, then they'd be less likely to engage in that process.

32:20So it does hinge upon privacy and not sharing information.

32:24Camilla: Also, it might not be the case that Robbins will argue there was no point in me giving you these results because you'd already appointed him. there could also be an argument that Robbins will make which will be red flags had already been raised. Now let me just read out a message from somebody extremely well placed. I'm sorry, we do sometimes have to use anonymous sourcing. So I'm not going to name this person but they know what they're talking about and they've sent me this. It is worth going back to the documents that HMG, the government, published in response to the humble address. Look at the notes submitted to Starmer by Propriety and Ethics spelling out the risks.

33:01Camilla: It obviously talked about Epstein, but it also talked about Global Council, that's the lobbying firm that Peter Mandelson was at the helm of, and it talked about him advocating for closer UK-China relations. I have no idea what issues were flagged by UKSV, that's the security vetting agency, but I doubt it was anything that wasn't already flagged by propriety and ethics. This is, I think, the main problem for Starmer. Yes. Whether Robbins flagged it or not, the reality is that Starmer had already been warned about the major risks and he had waved them away. That's the most important thing. That is why we're discussing whether or not Starmer will survive this.

33:44Because he is trying to frame it as if this were another appointment where the problem was the process. No, it was a political choice to give the job to Peter Mandelson. Yes. And people at the time, including yourself, said here is his record and here are the risks.

34:05Camilla: Yes. On Sky News, Trevor Phillips replayed to Liz Kendall a clip of Peter Karl admitting, we knew the risks. Yes. So the point is not what was discovered in some other branch of vetting. The point is that he was appointed in the first place by this prime minister. Yes. And that is why we are not talking about can he survive? We're now in the realm of thinking about when does he go? Yes. Well, let's look at the mechanisms that could see the Prime Minister leave office. This is based on an excellent article by Don Penner. I know. And Genevieve Holl-Allen. Right. Two Telegraph colleagues that work in the lobby team.

34:48Camilla: So this is about the six different ways Starmer could end up not being PM, basically. Let's go through, I'll do one, you do two and so on, Tim. Let's do it like that. The Commons Privileges Committee has been urged to investigate whether Starmer committed contempt of Parliament, a resignation matter, over his remarks in the Commons. So the Liberal Democrats have called for an inquiry by that very powerful committee, and remember that it proved very problematic for Boris Johnson when he was at the centre of party gate. It was actually responsible really for his resignation along with Rishi Sunak's resignation and the cabinet falling to pieces and Chris Pinscher remarks.

35:27Camilla: But anyway, it kind of put the nail in the coffin. That was in June 2023. And this is critical because this is going to seek to provide an answer to the question of whether it makes a difference that you have knowingly or unknowingly misled Parliament. Two observations there. First of all, in the law, recklessness is not a defence if you have to take vicarious responsibility for other people's actions, i.e. you can't say, well, I was ignorant and therefore I did this without really knowing. And what's the latest test case for that? It's Amber Rudd, the former Home Secretary, who admitted she had misled the House even though she herself had been misled by her own civil servants.

36:07Camilla: But she said, look, I'm in charge, I'm the boss, so I'm going to have to carry the can. And I think from a moral point of view, not least when you have previously said you should never blame the staff. It's all very well talking about inadvertently misleading the House, But if a committee finds that it doesn't matter whether you knew or you didn't know, I think the prime ministers are then in trouble. On this point, he has my sympathy, which is that government should be free to get things wrong. The emphasis should be less upon, do you say something inaccurate out of a genuine error? And we then just get rid of you.

36:40You've done. You've faltered your job. You're straight out. If we did that, I think governments would collapse weakly. The emphasis shouldn't be upon that. It should be upon, are you being as honest to the House as you can be? And so long as once you have done that, you immediately apologise, I think that's in a different order. And I'd remind you that the problem with Boris was we knew he had lied about the parties and had consistently lied about the parties. He had wittingly misled the House.

37:08Camilla: Fair enough. But in the Prime Minister's case, the problem is he's put himself on a pedestal. so during the whole Boris Johnson you've misled parliament thing it wasn't just about the technicality of that but the morality yes kept on saying to Johnson that's true what point are you going to take responsibility for other people's actions and I think that the electorate will increasingly look to Starmer and say well I'm sorry you've got to put your own money where your mouth is the second way that he could be got rid of of course is through a confidence vote which the Tories and Lib Dems might support.

37:41Now, if that happened, he's going to win it because of the size of Labour's majority. And it's not clear if any Labour MPs would be bold enough, brave enough to risk party suspension and support the Tories and Lib Dems.

37:56Camilla: Jacob made a good point about this last week. Because these constituency MPs have been out on the doorstep over the weekend ahead of the locals, how they vote in any confidence motion may well depend on what voters have said to them. Yes. Has this been the straw that breaks the camel's back? Are they sitting on tiny majorities thinking, hang on a minute, I can't stick with this guy? Is it abstentions that might be Starmer's undoing? Yes. OK, I can't commit either way because I'm trying to protect my seat. Right. I'm trying to be loyal to Labour. But those people are going to be heavily whipped.

38:30I think part of this calculation depends on what Burnham and Angela Rayner are saying to them privately.

38:35Camilla: Who hung out together on Friday night, according to The Sun on Sunday. Burnham pictured as if he was wearing some kind of rain bonnet, but apparently it was a long lens shot. OK, I thought he looked like Hilda Ogden. Yes, he did a little bit. You know, you get it in a cracker. Was it raining in Greater Manchester that night? We just don't know. So Angie and Andy have come together for presumably a bottle of Lambrini and a curry and discussed what? Some kind of like, I mean, neither of them can do this right now. They're not ready. She's being investigated for taxes. He's not got a seat. For those who have forgotten, Andy Burnham is the man who loves Manchester so much he wanted to leave the mayoralty to be an MP.

39:14And Angela is the woman who loves the North so much that she wanted to move to Hove near Brighton.

39:22Camilla: Yeah, OK, well, let's just consider that in the back of my eyes. But the point is that will also influence Labour MPs. They'll be thinking to themselves, no one's ready to take over apart from Ed Miliband because streeting's not quite at the races I don't think he's got that much parliamentary support and he's on a very slim majority himself so he might be one of those Prime Ministers that ends up losing his seat which is like hashtag cringe Tim so I don't know whether Labour MPs are going to be thinking to themselves we can't nobody wants this job now ahead of a bloodbath on May the 7th so we've got to stick with this guy therefore I'm not sure any opposition motion of confidence actually works It could conversely help to galvanise the Labour Party behind Keir.

40:05It could do, yeah.

40:07Camilla: Option three, the PM is likely to face a leadership election after the local election is OK. Well, we know that, but again, we revert back to who's ready to run. And you need the backing of ATMPs to do it. By the way, I tell you who is ready to run and has delayed that trans guidance to keep the left happy. My bestie. The rise of the ice maiden. Can you imagine? It's going to be like Frozen part three. Option four, Starmer could be investigated by Parliament's standards watchdog over his potential breach of the rules. It is up to Daniel Greenberg, the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner, to assess complaints over any possible infringement of the rules.

40:45And he can refer a more serious case to the Common Standards Committee, a panel that can recommend tougher sanctions, including suspension.

40:52Camilla: Oh my God, Starmer investigated by standards. This is like, that would be his worst outcome ever. Option five, the PM could also face an investigation by Sir Laurie Magnus. He's the independent advisor on ministerial interests. Any MP can write to call for an investigation where there is thought to have been a breach of the ministerial code. The decision on whether to investigate would then be up to Sir Laurie. His findings are advisory, but did previously force the resignations of the aforementioned Angela Rayner and, of course, Tulip Sadiq. Finally, the Prime Minister could just resign. Yes.

41:29Which I think is the least likely option.

41:32Camilla: Me too. Because he believes we need him. Yes. He is serving in a government of national interest. Yes. He is a public servant. Yes. He is not at all self-interested and absolutely not trying to save his own skin, just the skin of this great nation. And actually, is there anyone better? He doesn't think so. He's a hero. He's a hero. He's everyone's hero. Also, I mean, even people with superiority complexes do sometimes hit a brick wall. Sometimes we saw this with Rishi Sunak. Decent, upstanding people who do want to do something for public service, notwithstanding people's suspicions that actually Sunak might have done it just to improve his UCAS application, so to speak.

42:22Camilla: but upstanding people that want to do things right by the country are usually the type of people who sail through life on a sea of success. They're very good at their GCSEs and A-levels. They get into their top choice of university. They go and study degrees and graduate as the top student of the year. Everything goes well. They stand for seats and they get them immediately. They're climbing a ladder and they never miss a rung. Never miss a rung and they're never in slippery wellies. OK, they're usually an extremely well-polished brogues. Then they get the top job. And oh, no, for the first time in their lives, they fail spectacularly.

43:00Camilla: Yes. They're not good politicians. They don't understand that there's only one job you have to do very well when you're prime minister. And that is politics. And it looks easy, but it's actually very difficult. Yes. And then you get so much flack, you start detesting this idea that you're failing at everything to such a great extent that you just say, as Sunak did that spring, I've had enough of this. Now, that might not happen this year if he survives, but next year, how much more of this can the Prime Minister take? That's the question. The big difference between him and Sunak is Starmer believes that the alternative, i.e.

43:42Camilla: the Tories or reform, is morally repugnant, which is ironic given that he's now in an ethics scandal. But I don't think he'll ever change that image of himself. No. That he is holding some kind of line against an Orc army of fascists and thieves. I know, but this is the man who propped up Jeremy Corbyn for four years. I'm not sure he's got a leg to stand on when it comes to trying to see off moral repugnance. There's also a similarity between Sunak and Starmer, which is they both had relatively little time in Parliament before they became leader. Yes. And that journey up the ladder that you've described happened in part because someone was pulling them up.

44:24Because someone thought they were really bright and should have a go at it as soon as possible. And I think that's part of the problem here.

44:31Camilla: Do you know what? there's a seventh option that let's just mention and that is the cabinet collapses this is the the boris johnson option i know we've attributed that to him being investigated by the privileges committee but what really did it for johnson was the resignation of sunak and this idea you can't govern because your entire cabinet has now turned against you that's that's the kind of seventh hell for starmer heaven for others which will be suddenly rachel reeves turns bridget philipson She's got ambitions. She starts speaking, as Morris Glassman has in the last 24 hours, the Labour Pier.

45:05Camilla: You can't go any longer. We've already heard it from Anna Sarwa in Scotland. Suddenly you get Miliband expressing concern and the whole thing falls like a kind of deck of cards. Yes. Watch this space. We'll be all over it, won't we, Tim? We will. What a week it's going to be for the Daily Tea. And next week we're going on the road with all of this in the background. It's so exciting. Don't forget to get your tickets. London on Monday the 27th. On Tuesday the 28th we're in Cardiff. Wednesday the 29th we're in Warwick. Thursday the 30th we are in Worthing. But we'll be back tomorrow with reaction to Ali Robbins' Select Committee appearance at 5pm.

45:58Thank you.

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