OT This rotten Govt.Yet more scandal.

[animallittle3]

Starmer says that he was not aware that Mandelson had 'failed' his security clearance and I have seen no clear evidence to demonstrate that he was. Government is a big thing and it is unreasonable to expect every decision to be made by one person or for every piece of paper to cross that person's desk. It is reasonable for him to expect other people to do their jobs properly. By analogy, the CEO of a company cannot be expected to have intimate knowledge of the circumstances of every decision made within it.

For me, the real issue for Starmer is touched upon in howdy's post, which is that he said that Mandelson had been security cleared after the Epstein stuff had kicked off. Even if he had been not been told about the 'failure' before then, he should have made absolutely sure that statement was correct before he made it. If he didn't then that shows a very disturbing lack of political nouse, if nothing else.

Maybe his failure is that he is not a career politician.

NB. It is because my understanding of DV clearance is that it does not deliver a 'pass' or 'fail'. It simply gives a warts and all picture of the subject and that the potential employer then decides whether to give them clearance. If that is correct then it might be technically correct to say that Mandelson passed if the Foreign Office decided that they could live with his warts.

I'm far from convinced your explanation actually works Kerr , what landed on Starmer's desk and what didn't misses a huge point .

I think you'll at least agree that Starmer didn't find out from The Guardian that Mandelson had been appointed to the role in Washington and would have had some input at worst and more likely gave him a ringing endorsement given the role is a bit more than representing us on some Pacific Island that nobody has ever heard of .

The consensus from Starmer and his advisors since this scandal initially broke is to put as much distance as they can between the PM and Mandelson .

That alone tells you Starmer has his fingerprints all over this whole debacle and knew more than he's ever likely to admit whether he stays on as PM or he doesn't .

This is probably the worst example of political judgement from a Labour PM since Tony Blair told us that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and we'd better kill millions of Iraqis on the strength of it .

The thing is up until that point Tony Blair was actually popular but he never did recover from that debacle .

Starmer has never been popular and can hardly afford such calamitous acts of poor political judgement .

Meanwhile Farage can hardly believe his luck .

[Spuddy Speight]

And so, Starmer has just nipped over to a safe haven in Paris bigging himself up as a self proclaimed statesman.
Starmer is meeting up with Macron and a few others to look at opening up the Strait of Hormuz. Too late.
This had already been done by the Iranian regime with a little nudge from POTUS, Donald Trump.

"Donald Trump has told ?useless? NATO to stay away from the Strait of Hormuz after the UK and France announced they would work to protect shipping ?as soon as conditions allow?.

"In another explosive rant, the US president, who has been heavily critical of the key alliance, once again accused it of being ?useless when needed? and dubbed it a ?paper tiger?.

In a scathing attack on Starmer and Co
"the US president hit back soon after the announcement, writing on Truth Social: ?Now that the Hormuz Strait situation is over, I received a call from NATO asking if we would need some help. I TOLD THEM TO STAY AWAY, UNLESS THEY JUST WANT TO LOAD UP THEIR SHIPS WITH OIL. They were useless when needed, a Paper Tiger! President DJT?

Embarrassing or what?

[UlleyMiller]

I'm far from convinced your explanation actually works Kerr , what landed on Starmer's desk and what didn't misses a huge point .

I think you'll at least agree that Starmer didn't find out from The Guardian that Mandelson had been appointed to the role in Washington and would have had some input at worst and more likely gave him a ringing endorsement given the role is a bit more than representing us on some Pacific Island that nobody has ever heard of .

The consensus from Starmer and his advisors since this scandal initially broke is to put as much distance as they can between the PM and Mandelson .

That alone tells you Starmer has his fingerprints all over this whole debacle and knew more than he's ever likely to admit whether he stays on as PM or he doesn't .

This is probably the worst example of political judgement from a Labour PM since Tony Blair told us that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and we'd better kill millions of Iraqis on the strength of it .

The thing is up until that point Tony Blair was actually popular but he never did recover from that debacle .

Starmer has never been popular and can hardly afford such calamitous acts of poor political judgement .

Meanwhile Farage can hardly believe his luck .

I think it's a reach to suggest the Mandy appointment is the worst judgment call since WMDgate. Cameron bowing down on the referendum, Clegg giving students up, and Boris (take your pick!) happened between those.

[KerrAvon]

Appreciate that Kerr. It’s was a kind of lighthearted comment and it’s just opinions. Nothing too deep really. I’d buy stansmate a pint and discuss life is too short to fall out over it. I’d buy you one too but I’m guessing you are a glass of champagne kind of guy. 😃

Guilty. I do like a glass or two of champagne. I also appreciate a big malbec or a chilled pinot grigio. Above all, I am loving the current trend for pale ales with a big citrus burst.

[KerrAvon]

When you get a govt.that treats the tax paying population with contempt there will be a reaction.

Agreed, but I am more interested in the perception of how the government has treated the tax paying population with contempt.

Small businesses are being penalised through extremely high energy bills{Milliband's stupid net zero idiotic policy}

I'm happy to be corrected, but weren't the current net zero policies put in place by the May government, adopted by Johnson and Sunak and voted for the Tories who are now in Reform? They are undoubtedly going to cost money, but oil and gas are finite resources, so maybe we need to address that now rather than leave it to our kids and grandkids? And there is climate change. I get that it is comforting and can be politically expedient to simply dismiss that out of hand, but doing so has no effect on reality.

Small businesses are being penalised through ? extra taxes plus employment obstructions and are consequently going bust. These small businesses would provide employment for youngsters with their first jobs.For example hospitality openings that are no longer available because of govt.measures.The last govt,failed but this present uniparty is disastrous.

I assume that you are referring to employee NI contributions and employment rights? On the former, I get that nobody likes to pay tax and that taxation can have negative effects, but isn?t taxation merely the cost of living in a society (to paraphrase someone cleverer than me)? Amongst a myriad of other things, we all want our bins emptied, an ambulance to turn up when we need one, for potholes to be fixed, for a copper to turn up if we are burgled and for the armed forces to be able to respond to threats to the country, but that costs money.

We have a welfare bill now that excedes revenue brought in by the downtrodden tax paying workers.

This is not true. Income tax and NI bring in about ?400bn p.a. The Welfare budget comes to around ?323bn p.a. The big ticket in the Welfare is the state pension (about ?178 billion p.a.), but no political party appears to be willing to address that. Indeed, a recent Reform Party political broadcast that I had the misfortune to watch featuring the failed Tory, Robert Jenrick, focusing entirely upon their commitment to preserve the 'triple lock' notwithstanding that it cannot be not an issue in the forthcoming local elections.

It seems very unpopular to say it on here, but my understanding is that about one in eight people in empoyment in the UK is on Universal Credit. Perhaps we should be asking how that can be a fair and equitable position?

Growth was promised by this incoming govt. but there's no sign of that.

Growth has been promised by the last four governments. The last government were able to point to Covid and the Russian invasion of the Ukraine as obstacles to the same. The current government can point to Trump's tariffs and nonsensical attack upon Iran. All of them are valid, but the bigger issues are self-inflicted:

1. The 2008 crash hit the UK hard because of our over dependence upon financial services, which can be traced back to Thatcher, but with Major and Blair having some input.

2. Brexit was inflicted upon the UK by the electorate with the help of chancers like Johnson and Farage. If the 2008 crash flatlined the UK economy then the Brexit vote stopped the resuscitation attempts by killing off inward investment. Who would want to invest in the UK when we have chosen to impose economic sanctions upon ourselves?

Illegal migrants would be stopped but after a flood of gimmicks which have failed miserably,we see more coming over.Thousands are waiting in Calais to take advantage of the huge benefits they get.Bad weather is the only deterrent .Now the weather is getting better,no doubt new records will be broken coming over.The govt.have been boasting about emptying the migrant hotels but they are not telling us where they're all going.A good guess is labour/lib controlled councils will be the first to volunteer to accommodate these huge numbers.How many we have got in South Yorkshire?Sod the local population waiting to be housed.So yes Kerr this shocking govt.have made a bloody mess of people's lives !!!!!!!!!!!!

Irregular immigration has always been a thing in the UK. One of my favourite ever clients was a bloke from Mongolia who had flown from Ulan Bator to Moscow and then been stashed in lorries to Germany and then onto to the UK. That was back in 2004, or thereabouts. He then worked in factory whilst 'hot bunking', with the sole intention of being reasonably well off when he was eventually returned back to his home country. Can I be angry with him? No. I might have done the same in his position.

Entering the country in the back of a lorry was made much harder by the money invested in security at Calais and Dover so migrants now cross the channel in small boats. That visibility, coupled with the Tories slashing the budgets available to deal with the assessment of asylum claims and for the removal of failed applicants and the consequential backlogs have allowed the issue to become a political football. It's so much easier to blame people who want to come to the UK for a better life for our woes than, say, the people who promoted the lunacy of putting up trade barriers with our closest trading partners.

Why was he one of my favourite clients I don't hear you ask? Because he was one of the most scrupulously polite and honest people that I have ever met and because the Mongolian language is wonderful to listen to (we had an interpreter).

P.s. the A, E and S keys tend to wear out on my keyboards. I'm guessing that it is the exclamation mark for you?

[KerrAvon]

I think it's a reach to suggest the Mandy appointment is the worst judgment call since WMDgate. Cameron bowing down on the referendum, Clegg giving students up, and Boris (take your pick!) happened between those.

Quite.

[animallittle3]

I think it's a reach to suggest the Mandy appointment is the worst judgment call since WMDgate. Cameron bowing down on the referendum, Clegg giving students up, and Boris (take your pick!) happened between those.

I did say a Labour PM , your other examples were not Labour PM's .

[Spuddy Speight]

So, PM Sir Keir Starmer says he's "furious" about Mandelson being appointed as British Ambassador to the United States, without his knowledge, by someone else.
Mandelson failed vetting process and Starmer didn't know.
Really?


"Prime Minister Keir Starmer appointed Peter Mandelson as the British Ambassador to the United States in December 2024, with the appointment taking effect on February 10, 2025. The appointment was approved by King Charles III on the recommendation of Starmer and the Foreign Secretary. "
BBC
BBC
+2
Then ..
"In April 2026, The Guardian reported that, in January 2025, during the process of his appointment as ambassador to the United States, Mandelson failed his developed vetting (DV) conducted by United Kingdom Security Vetting (UKSV). A formal decision to deny him security clearance was issued on 28 January 2025."
So, Mandelson appointment made before he had been properly vetted in spite of his shocking track record in government.


Starmer says he's going to make a statement in Parliament on Monday 20th April 2026. Starmer wants "transparency".
Oh, really?

"The Foreign Affairs Committee has written to Sir Olly Robbins, former Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs of the United Kingdom, to request he give evidence next Tuesday (21 April) on the vetting of Lord Mandelson."

"Sir Olly and Sir Chris Wormald, then-Cabinet Secretary and Head of the Civil Service, previously appeared in front of the Committee to give evidence on the vetting and clearance of Lord Mandelson."

Sir Olly is another civil servant thrown under the bus.

[animallittle3]

Playing for time and the government going in to managing the crisis mode and damage limitation are the only show in town right now .

This might be a different thing altogether if Starmer had a natural successor and some political head wind could be gained out of this scandal , the Tories are very good at replacing their leader and getting rid of the problems of the day with it even if only in the short term .

No such successor to Starmer exists as far as I can see and no rebellion is likely to emerge to oust Starmer unless it's almost a certainty to be successful and nobody in the PLP is going to risk that with the chance their own political career goes down with it .

Starmer may see this one out yet unless something massively damaging emerges that can't be managed , not beyond the realms of possibility given The Guardian are on a bit of a roll right now .

I suspect they may well be bullets left in The Guardian gun .

[Spuddy Speight]

Playing for time and the government going in to managing the crisis mode and damage limitation are the only show in town right now .

This might be a different thing altogether if Starmer had a natural successor and some political head wind could be gained out of this scandal , the Tories are very good at replacing their leader and getting rid of the problems of the day with it even if only in the short term .

No such successor to Starmer exists as far as I can see and no rebellion is likely to emerge to oust Starmer unless it's almost a certainty to be successful and nobody in the PLP is going to risk that with the chance their own political career goes down with it .

Starmer may see this one out yet unless something massively damaging emerges that can't be managed , not beyond the realms of possibility given The Guardian are on a bit of a roll right now .

I suspect they may well be bullets left in The Guardian gun .

Lots of ammo left.

David Maddox, Political Editor from the Independent newspaper did send a WhatsApp message/request, dated 11th September 2025, to Tim Allan, former Director of Communications under Sir Keir Starmer.

"Hi, Tim I've been told by two sources now that Mandelson in fact did not clear vetting with MI6 but the PM pushed his appointment anyway. The problem was China not Epstein though. Is there any comment on this? David" Maddox. 14:06

Reply from Tim Allan
"Vetting done by FCDO'' 14:54 ( Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office )

Then "👍" from David Maddox