The political futures of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and his chief of staff Morgan McSweeney are secure, a Labour MP has insisted despite growing pressure from party members who are furious about the Peter Mandelson scandal.
Housing Secretary Steve Reed said Mr Starmer was not “at fault” because Mr Mandelson “was taken at his word” about his links to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein before his appointment as UK ambassador to the US.
“You’re only as good as the information you receive,” Mr Reed said as he blamed the vetting process for failing to disprove Mr Mandelson’s claims his relationship with Epstein “was next to nothing”.
Mr Reed said the PM and his right-hand man Mr McSweeney are safe in their jobs, despite backbenchers calling their political judgement into question and demanding Mr McSweeney’s sacking.
Many blame Mr McSweeney, who is from Co Cork, for handing Mr Mandelson the top diplomatic job in Washington despite knowing about his dealings to Epstein continued after his conviction for child sex offences.
One Labour MP, speaking to PA anonymously, said Mr McSweeney “needs to go, he’s a total liability and like Mandelson is only interested in himself”.
The MP added: “I think the PM doesn’t have much time left and sadly, he has nobody but himself to blame.”
In the face of a mutiny from Labour MPs – led by former deputy prime minister Angela Rayner – the government yesterday backed down and ceded control to the British parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee to decide what could be released into the public domain.
Another Labour MP told the Press Association: “Morgan is in charge of strategy.
“I think that is what failed yesterday. It’s not a one off.
“The Prime Minister was elected by the public and we should focus on making him better.”
Paula Barker, Labour deputy chairwoman of the Standards Committee and Privileges Committee, criticised Mr Starmer’s “questionable” judgement over the saga but stopped short of calling for him to quit.
On Mr McSweeney, she told the BBC’s Today programme: “There are serious questions to be answered by his (Mr Starmer’s) team.
“And certainly, as we know only too well…, when your chief of staff becomes the story, then often it’s time for them to go.”
Mr Reed defended the Prime Minister arguing he was lied to by Mr Mandelson, who he said “conned everybody”.
The minister added: “What Mandelson did was he made out that his relationship with Epstein was not only over, but had barely existed in the first place.
“He was taken at his word. There was a vetting process to be gone through that threw up nothing that added further concern to what Mandelson was saying, and so the appointment was made on the basis of his experience as the former EU trade commissioner and former UK business secretary.”
Mr Reed also said: “The person at fault here is not the Prime Minister or his team.
“It is Peter Mandelson, who lied, manipulated and deceived everybody.”
He also pointed the finger at the vetting procedure which he said “will be looked at”.
Mr Reed added: “The fault is with a long-established process that was gone through in the same way that it would have been for any other appointment of this kind, and it predates the arrival of this government.”
The government wants to publish the documents that show “what the Prime Minister saw when Peter Mandelson lied to him” before his appointment as US ambassador “as quickly as possible”, Mr Reed said.
The release could be delayed because the Metropolitan Police has asked the government not to publish documents that would “undermine” the investigation into Mr Mandelson’s passing of confidential government information to Epstein.