Did Keir Starmer “lie, lie and lie again" over Mandelson?

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0:35It felt to me like deep faux outrage.

0:37Jon Sopel:It's hard to believe that everything falls into place as currently explained to us. It either makes him look once again like a gullible fool who is deeply incurious about his own government or he's lying. You may be able to thread the needle and say, OK, yeah, this all makes sense. I'm as pissed off as you, mate. God, God, yeah, I know, God, we're all in this together, aren't we? That I wasn't told that Peter Mandelson had failed security vetting when he's appointed is staggering. That I wasn't told that he'd failed security vetting when I was telling Parliament that due process had been followed is unforgivable.

1:18Jon Sopel:That is the Prime Minister once again sounding furious, once again saying that he was blindsided. He's either telling the truth or he's in a deep spot of bother right now. But how much longer can he go on when there's this pervasive sense of helplessness, hopelessness and haplessness? Welcome to the News Agents.

1:49Jon Sopel:It's John in the studio. And it's Lewis in Colombo. A very humid Columbus. Not the detective, I hasten to add, the city in Sri Lanka. What are you doing there? President Disanayaka expecting a call in from you? There are some very important municipal elections that I need to keep an eye on, John. I'm actually voxing people to see what they think about Ollie Robbins, so I'll report that back in on Monday's episode. The perfect place for it to do this story, I think. Perfect. Yeah, absolutely. Always in the right place at the right time. That's Lewis Goodall. Look, it is once again the curse of Peter Mandelson seems to have struck again.

2:26Jon Sopel:This time, the permanent undersecretary, the most senior person in the Foreign Office, Sir Ollie Robbins, has gone as a result of his behaviour or alleged behaviour over not telling anyone in Downing Street that Peter Mandelson had failed his developed vetting but went ahead with the appointment anyone And we are led to believe or we're asked to believe that Ollie Robbins sought no approval for this, did it entirely unilaterally. And Downing Street, the whole of Downing Street was kept entirely in the dark. And that is why we have heard from Keir Starmer today sounding, I don't know, ever more shrill and angry and furious that yet again something has happened that has totally blindsided him.

3:21Jon Sopel:That I wasn't told that Peter Mandelson had failed security vetting when he's appointed is staggering. That I wasn't told that he'd failed security vetting when I was telling Parliament that due process had been followed is unforgivable. Not only was I not told, no minister was told. And I'm absolutely furious about that. What I intend to do is to go to Parliament on Monday to set out all the relevant facts in true transparency so Parliament has the full picture. Prime Minister, why do you always end up sounding like the passenger in this government rather than the driver? Are you really expecting us to believe that a senior civil servant, off his own back, without any sort of direction about the importance of Peter Mandelson being ambassador, unilaterally overruled security vetting to approve a political appointment?

4:16Jon Sopel:And they made clear it was political. I was not told that he had failed security vetting. No minister was told that he had failed security vetting. Number 10 wasn't told that he had failed security vetting. That is completely unacceptable. That is why I intend to go to Parliament and set out all of the relevant facts so Parliament has full transparency and full accountability. It is totally unacceptable that the Prime Minister making an appointment is not told that security vetting has been failed. Totally unacceptable. You've got almost two years in post. Doesn't this just sound like you don't have a grip on your government?

4:55Jon Sopel:I was not told that security vetting had failed. That is shocking. It is unacceptable. I intend to set out the full facts to Parliament on Monday. And you can be absolutely sure that it is going to be the bumpiest of rides for Keir Starmer. Because whilst if you squint your eyes and really try and look, you may be able to thread the needle and say, OK, yeah, this all makes sense. But if your eyes are wide open and you're looking at this in broad daylight, it's hard to believe that everything falls into place as currently explained to us. Well I think there are two scenarios here aren't there John?

5:39Neither of them good for Keir Starmer because it either makes him look once again like a gullible fool who is deeply incurious about his own government or he's lying and he's misleading the public and has misled parliament. Let's remind ourselves what Keir Starmer said in February. He said that Peter Mandelson had gone through security vetting, carried out independently by the security services, which is an intensive exercise that gave Mandelson clearance for the role of ambassador. You have to go through that before you take up the post. I suppose it is credible that Keir Starmer, despite the fact that Peter Manelson was a very high profile, clearly very risky appointment.

6:22It is possible that Keir Starmer didn't see or didn't ask to see the full vetting and he was just told that this had happened and that everything was as proper as it should be. Let's remind ourselves, of course, that he announced the appointment before this full vetting went through. I suppose that is just possible. But is it possible? Is it credible? Is it certainly desirable behaviour for a Prime Minister to go to Parliament, which is what he did when the Mandelson affair broke out, and the scandal broke out, and when Peter Mandelson was forced to step down or was sacked effectively because of what was in the Epstein files?

6:58Keir Starmer at that point goes to Parliament and he says that there had been a full vetting process. Now, before he said that, might it not have been a good idea for this man, who we are consistently told is forensic and across all of the detail, to make sure exactly what the particulars of the vetting process was. I think Keir Starmer's problem now, John, is that that trick, that excuse that I was misled, which he has been saying repeatedly about pretty much everyone and in every circumstance since the start of this crisis, it kind of works once. It works once and people give you the benefit of the doubt there is a law of political diminishing returns every time you invoke it again and i think the labour mps and the problem he's going to experience on monday is that he is pushing the

7:49Jon Sopel:credulity of that rather far absolutely and i've heard from a number of senior foreign office sources today who kind of just a straining to understand how this could happen i've i've kind There have been a number of text messages exchanged and I'll just read out what some of them said. My gut feel is that Ollie Robbins is too clever slash diligent to consciously make himself the risk owner for any such decision. Another one says, I do not believe Ollie Robbins would carry such huge personal risk for an appointment he didn't even want. A small number of senior people, officials and or ministers must, simply must have known.

8:33Jon Sopel:And another, Ollie thought he was the cleverest person in the room. So I can believe he would take it upon himself. But he was only three weeks into the job. Would he really take all that risk without telling a soul? And so it goes on. The idea that nobody knew anywhere and nobody has known for months about this, just kind of beggars belief that Ollie Robbins unilaterally takes this decision and no one anywhere is aware of it. Now, there are flaws. I've been, you know, with this developed vetting, you know, someone who has gone through the vetting process themselves had a certain amount of sympathy when he said to me, look, this isn't the Bourne identity.

9:19Jon Sopel:It's not Mission Impossible. It's more like Dixon of Doc Green, where you get an old copper who has retired, who says, hello, hello, hello, what's going on here then? And, you know, so it's not that sophisticated. and they look for three things they look could you be financially compromised are your business interests compromising and is your personal life compromising and what this person pointed out to me was if they thought that mandelson had you know because of his business interests in global council that was a problem then why didn't ollie robbins say to him well you can be ambassador but you've got to get rid of your shares in this company and he never said that well it's nice to get um we've got colombo you now you've got brought in dixon of dot green john so we've gone from what the 80s 70s back down to the 50s nice to see if we can get any older referencing before the end of the show look i think the government line today and we've seen ministers i mean the chief secretary is the prime minister darren jones the shortest of shorts draws having to come out this morning to defend this um adopting that same air of of sort of incredulity i have to say i found starmers kind of well i i felt to be i mean maybe i'm being ungenerous at this point i I don't know, but I felt it.

10:26It felt to me like deep faux outrage. Doing that thing that people do sometimes, you know when you screw it up at work? I mean, obviously you never have. But if, you know, when you screw up at work, or you screw up, and you do that thing where you sort of turn to your co-workers, go, oh, I'm as pissed off as you, mate. God, God, yeah, I know. God, we're all in this together, aren't we? And it's like, no, no, no, no, no, no. Like, you're the one in charge of this process. The government line today has been, they cannot believe how bad their own vetting process is, a vetting process that they themselves repeatedly pointed to during the Mandelson affair, a process they are now saying they were ignorant about the particulars of.

11:01They didn't understand it, nor crucially at any point, as far as I can see, nor did they seek to understand it. Compounding again, the other remarkable revelation, which I still think probably has not received enough attention since this whole thing blew up, which is that at no point did Starmer even seek to consult or talk with Mandelson about what he knew or about the nature of his relationship. Look, when this all broke out, I think the three of us, and I certainly remember doing this vehemently, I defended Starmer about the appointment itself, not because I necessarily thought that it was, you know, necessarily a great idea, but what I objected to was there was so much hypocrisy around the place, including on the floor of the House of Commons.

11:43This idea that somehow Keir Starmer should never have appointed Peter Manilson because of his relationship with Epstein and that he uniquely knew that. That wasn't true. Everybody knew that. And the fact that not a single MP brought it up at the time in the House of Commons tells you something about how that was received at the time. It was generally received as being a good idea. Obviously, something happened after that, which is the release of the Epstein files showed the nature of that relationship to be something else. I think what actually happened here, John, And I think Keir Starmer has dug himself into a hole and is continuing to dig.

12:15Because I think the truth is, is that as a result of his saying that he was misled about Mandelson, that was the original sin, because that was his initial excuse. And every bit of everything that he's done since has followed from that. And the truth is, I don't think he was misled. I think the truth is, is that Keir Starmer did the thing that we talked about at the time, which is that he was making a gamble and a political calculation that he didn't much like Mandelson personally. He didn't like Mandelson's past associations. He knew that he was risky, but that he thought that he would work in the court of Trump.

12:54Now, I think if Keir Starmer, when the Epstein files blew up as a story, I think if he turned around to the country and been honest about that and said that, he would be in a far better position today. But instead, what he did was start to talk about the vetting process and being misled, which has created the problem that he is now in. Because if he hadn't talked about the vetting process and made a big thing about being misled to begin with, then this story would not be nearly so big. I think Keir Starmer has created this problem for himself, a political problem that he did not need to have.

13:33Jon Sopel:And the thing that really needs underlining, because I'm sure an awful lot of people listening must assume, and it's a fair assumption, that there was this really close bond between Keir Starmer and Peter Mandelson. And that is why Keir Starmer appointed him, took the risk again to appoint someone who'd already been forced to resign twice when he was in government during the Blair years. And that's just not the case. There is precious little relationship and was precious little relationship between Peter Mandelson and Keir Starmer. Morgan McSweeney, the chief of staff, was very keen to appoint Peter Mandelson as our ambassador.

14:11Jon Sopel:there was next to no relationship. I think the other thing that, again, and this goes back to Keir Starmer's previous life, which he vaunts the whole time about him having been director of public prosecutions. So when he told us that he had been misled months ago, wouldn't you think that that was the moment where you would say and bang your fists on the table and say, I want to see everything related to the decision making that took place over all of this. And I want it now. And I want to go through this because I want to understand what has happened. And here we are three months later being asked to believe that he's discovered something new only on Tuesday evening about Mandelson having failed the vetting process.

14:59Jon Sopel:I mean, either he did pursue it or he didn't pursue it. And it looks to me like he didn't pursue it when he was originally misled, if we are to believe what Keir Starmer says to us. And, you know, I think that you say the law of diminishing returns, Lewis. I mean, you know, how many lives has a cat got? I mean, how many lives, how many opportunities has Keir Starmer got to pull something off like this and remain as prime minister? Because it looks to me that, yeah, he might survive the immediate kind of, you know, dumpster fire of all of this right now. But surely this can't go on like this. Well, I mean, he has certainly run out of not only potentially lives, his own political lives, but he's certainly run out of human shields.

15:44Because if you think about the number of people, very senior people at the top of the British government, at the heart of British government, who have now had to fall on their swords or been sacked or whatever it is as a result of this. We've obviously got Peter Mandelson himself, our ambassador to the United States. We've had the Prime Minister's Chief of Staff. We've had the Prime Minister's Comms Chief going out around the same time. Now we have the most senior official and sort of star of the civil service, Ollie Robbins. And ironic in particular, and I think much now does rest on what Ollie Robbins now does.

16:16Because as you say, John, the ultimate irony of this is if there was anyone who was especially sceptical of the idea of Mandelson becoming our ambassador, it was Robbins himself. Why? Because much of the civil service machine, guess what? They wanted a civil servant. They didn't want to have a political appointment. They don't like those plum diplomatic jobs going to political appointees. We had an ambassador in post at the time, but there were other people as well who very much would have fancied themselves for that job. So what Robbins himself does now, he knows exactly what has happened. He knows exactly the series of events.

16:52He knows exactly, presumably he also has documentation to accord with it. What he chooses to do now is of utmost importance. Because let's just suppose for a moment, let's just suppose for a moment that the account that Downing Street has presented is not entirely flawless, not entirely blemish free, that there are some complications with it. Robbins will know. And if he is therefore, if that is the case, he is now in an ultimately powerful position to potentially end the prime minister's career. Because if the prime minister has misled about any of the particulars on this and it can be proven that he has and it can be reasonably suggested that he has knowingly done so, then it is game over.

17:34Jon Sopel:I mean, what's so fascinating about that is I was I was kind of reflecting over the demise of Boris Johnson and whether this equates to party gate. And, you know, was Boris Johnson knave or was he a knave? and we kind of all got the impression that he was a knave. What brought Boris Johnson down? A former permanent undersecretary at the Foreign Office saying, no, no, you're not telling the truth. And Simon MacDonald came out and said, actually, Boris Johnson had been warned about this certain minister, Pinscher, and we had alerted him. So when Boris Johnson says no one knew anything, that wasn't true.

18:14Jon Sopel:And we now have Ollie Robbins in a position, another now former permanent undersecretary at the foreign office also with dynamite potentially that he could just like the blue touch paper on um blow kia starmer out of the water and so when starmer goes to the commons on monday you know that question and you put it kind of crude brilliantly at the top of the podcast lewis when you said you know look he's either a liar or he's hopeless. And I think that Keir Starmer's only avenue is to go down the hopeless route. And what does that say about him as prime minister? And there's, I mean, I said it was a binary.

18:57I suppose there is a third option. And this is the thing that I suspect, I mean, it's also not quite either or. I mean, Starmer could also be a bit of both of those things. But the sort of third option is, I think, what actually happened, particularly talking to a few people. And it's the thing that makes the most sense, which is that and i've already said it mandelson was a political appointment it is not something that the machine wanted the government machine wanted it's something that downing street wanted it's something that once the prime minister had made it known that he wanted the politics was clear and in that situation in that situation let's imagine for a moment because i think one of the things you've already alluded to it john about the vetting is that it's a kind of binary pass, binary fail.

19:39It's not quite like that. It's more a question of kind of, there are particular circumstances here that needs to be taken into account of, more questions need to be asked about, maybe more evidence needs to be sought about, blah, blah, blah, etc, etc. Let's imagine that that is basically what comes back, a whole list of questions for Peter Mandelson to the Olly Robbins desk, the head of the Foreign Office. And let's imagine that this comes back as we know it did after Keir Starmer has said that this is the guy I want. There's a very clear incentive, isn't there, for a senior civil servant in that regard, which is to make it clear, make it clear that ultimately this is what the Prime Minister wants and I'm not going to do something to put the Prime Minister in a position where he doesn't get what he wants, i.e.

20:23the civil service was doing what the civil service does. It accommodates itself around the political imperatives and desires of the Prime Prime Minister of the day. So the truth is, and this is something that we see again and again with Keir Starmer, whether it's, and this whole affair, whether it's not talking to Mandelson himself, not looking at particular documents at those particular moments, or now asking many questions about the vetting and the nature of the vetting and what happened. Let's be honest, Keir Starmer wanted to make a political appointment. And once you've done that, with all of the potential pitfalls that come from that, basically he adopted, number 10 adopted, it feels to me, a hear-see-no-evil, hear-no-evil strategy.

21:02And that is what the civil service does a great deal. So it isn't the case so much when Keir Starmer says, I wasn't informed, in a very real sense, and this happens with prime ministers a lot, they don't want to be informed. They don't want to know. And I think, honestly, that is most likely the scenario that has happened here. And it happens a lot about all sorts of different things. But in this case, it's become so politically toxic that it is blown up in everyone's face.

21:28Jon Sopel:Well, we'll be back in a minute where we'll discuss whether plausible deniability just becomes implausible.

21:39Jon Sopel:From a range of trusted voices and award winning journalists. Good morning, I'm Nick Ferrari. It's time to get to your call. Find out the latest news and hear every side of the story. Our focus in the last few weeks has been on getting the Strait of Hormuz open because all the time it's not open for free navigation. That is impacting our economy and our energy bills. If you're Donald Trump and you have failed to convince an enemy to unblock a strait, the best thing you can do is announce that you're, it says here, blocking the strait. The fallout of the Iran war. Follow it live on LBC. Listen on our free global player app or the LBC app.

22:42Jon Sopel:fewer calories than regular products. Calorie content has been reduced on average from 162 to 92 calories per serving. Data accurate as of 2-20-26.

22:52The News Agents. Well, you've already said it, John. Monday is going to be a very, very big day for the Keir Starmer government because I saw someone make a reference, and I think it's probably quite a good point of comparison, actually. It'll be a bit like Starmer's Westland affair. You know, the Westland affair, this is almost brought down, forgotten largely now, but almost brought down Margaret Thatcher's government. Margaret Thatcher had basically misled the House, you know, pretty much, more or less anyway, on a question, quite obscure question about basically the fate of a helicopter company or defence company in the UK.

23:33And it looked that day like she might resign if her answers weren't good enough. Now, in the end, Neil Kinnock kind of blew it, asked bad questions, sort of bloviated a little bit too much. But if Kemi Badenock and other MPs are able to use the substantial source material which exists, they may be able to do what one Keir Starmer basically did to one Boris Johnson, which is tie him up by his own words and his own actions on the floor of the commons and of course we you know this isn't a recondite bit sometimes i've seen this a bit online today from some people saying oh aren't there bigger things going on in the world look with iran blah blah blah no no for two reasons first of all most of those same people were exactly those people including keir starmer rightly who you know went for boris johnson over misleading the public and the house over party So there's hypocrisy there.

24:27But secondly, as well, this question about what Prime Ministers say to MPs and to Parliament is utterly central for our Constitution. If MPs cannot believe what the Prime Minister of the day is saying, then British politics in so many ways is lost. And just bear in mind, again, let's just go back to what the Prime Minister said back in February about Peter Manilson and the vetting that he had experienced.

24:49Jon Sopel:There was a due diligence exercise that culminated in questions being asked because I wanted to know the answer to certain issues. That's why those questions were asked. The answer to those questions were not truthful. There was then, I should add, security vetting carried out independently by the security services, which is an intensive exercise that gave him clearance for the role. You have to go through that before you take up the post. clearly both the due diligence and the security vetting need to be looked at again. I've already strengthened the due process. I think we need to look at the security vetting because it now transpires that what was being said was not true.

25:32Jon Sopel:And had I known then what I know now, I'd never have appointed him in the first place. So there's the Prime Minister speaking with complete authority and apparent clarity about the vetting process that he now claims on a fundamental level not to have truly understood. How can he be speaking about it in such terms, talking about the questions that he was asked, the ways that he was misled, if it actually turns out now that on the fundamentals, he was ignorant about the process? Likewise, how could it have been that officials, including Ollie Robbins himself, who had heard the Prime Minister say things like that at the time, including on the floor of the house of commons never thought to alert anyone and say the prime minister's wrong there i don't know if he knows that he's wrong but he's misleading mps in a substantial and fundamental way and it isn't just what starmer has said either john back in september yvette cooper and ollie robbins sent a letter to the house of commons foreign affairs committee that claimed the vetting process had been carried out to the usual standard the pair of them said the process had concluded with developed vetting clearance being granted by the Foreign Office in advance of Lord Mandelson taking up the post in February.