After Keir Starmer’s woeful performance in parliament yesterday, it seemed that the prime minister was just one explosive revelation away from the exit door. Perhaps the evidence presented by former head of the FCDO, Olly Robbins, might be enough to push him out. We can but hope…
It will come as no shock that Starmer has not been forthcoming with the truth regarding the appointment of Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the US. Robbins’ testimony before the Foreign Affairs Committee exposed that facts around procedure and protocol have been distorted to minimise damage and pass the buck. Robbins did not phrase it like that, of course, he was measured and polite, despite the fact Starmer sacked him, but the implications were clear.
Starmer’s line has been that the FCDO overruled advice to deny Developed Vetting to Mandelson—and the prime minister was kept in the dark. The reality is that when Robbins took the job in January 2025, he was walking into a pre-announced appointment. No. 10 had already committed to giving Mandelson the ambassadorial role, the King’s approval had been granted, and US agreement had been secured. In other words, the appointment was a done deal before the vetting process had taken place and against official advice to wait until after clearance had been granted.
The prime minister is now feigning indignation and insisting he would never have appointed Mandelson if he had known about the red flags, but Robbins painted a rather different picture. He described “constant pressure” and “non-stop chasing” from the prime minister’s office and a “dismissive approach” to vetting. He explained the focus was never on whether clearance should be granted to Mandelson, only when. “There was already a very, very strong expectation... the focus was on getting Mandelson out to Washington quickly.”
Robbins explained that the Cabinet Office suggested Mandelson might not need full clearance at all, and that his predecessor, Philip Barton, had to be “very firm” to ensure the process proceeded. Starmer has told us every step of the way that the correct process was followed, but clearly he had zero interest in that process.
Robbins admitted that the vetting revealed high concerns, but that he had not seen the report where those concerns were highlighted. Instead, he received a briefing in which he was told those concerns could be mitigated. It seems likely that he buckled to pressure, but obviously he can’t admit to that. Absurdly, Robbins claimed he could not notify the prime minister of the vetting issues due to confidentiality.
To recap: we have a prime minister determined to push through the best friend of Jeffrey Epstein as ambassador to the US, who announced the appointment and sought Royal and American approval before vetting had been done (and before Robbins had taken the job), and who then could not be told of major concerns around his guy who was given clearance anyway. The story is a convoluted mess and is about the fifth or sixth version of events I’ve seen in the past few days.
Just look at the contradictions: Starmer says he was deliberately kept in the dark, but Robbins suggests that was normal. Starmer says clearance was denied and secretly overruled, but Robbins says he was told that concerns could be mitigated. Starmer says there was no political pressure, but Robbins says the pressure was constant. Starmer says correct process was followed, but Robbins says the appointment was already a done deal.
We know that the so-called “mitigations” around security concerns involved Mandelson not being left alone with key officials, suggesting he could not be trusted. We also know that prior to the vetting process, Mandelson was allowed into the FCDO building and trusted with low-classification IT access and even higher-classification briefings. We also know that Mandelson is now being investigated by the police for his links to Epstein. Shitshow isn’t the word…
If you thought these Mandelson revelations were bad enough, Robbins had even more to share: the prime minister asked him to find an ambassadorial role for Matthew Doyle, his former communications chief. Damningly, it was revealed that Starmer asked Robbins not to tell the foreign secretary, presumably because he would have disapproved.
It just so happens that Doyle was given a peerage by the prime minister and is now a legislator for life, even though he lost the Labour whip, due to his association with Sean Morton, a former Scottish Labour councillor who was convicted of possessing indecent images of children. You couldn’t make it up!
Everyone seems to be overlooking the most damning point of all, one that exposes Starmer’s hypocrisy and lays bare his lack of interest in process: The prime minister, who is attacking the Foreign Office for failing to follow the correct process, was deliberately not following the correct process with Doyle.
That, as much as anything else, should be a resignation offence, but Starmer will cling on for as long as he can. I seriously doubt he is even allowed to walk away without permission. If it wasn’t abundantly clear to you before, it should be now: the Epstein class is calling the shots and they want their people in as many positions of power as possible.
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Every time there's a new revelation, no matter how unsurprising, it reopens the wound that was inflicted by the zionist lobby's defamation of Corbyn / hijacking of British democracy.
I am just SO ANGRY.
It's all part of the puppet show, all directed by parts of the Epstein class to make it LOOK like something is being done and that the proper checks and balances are working as they should. Once this is all out of the way it'll be business as normal, go back to sleep...