Lord Mandelson
Debate between Chris Ward and Julian Lewis(5 days, 12 hours ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Chris Ward
As the Prime Minister has said many times, if he had known what he knows now, he would not have had Mandelson within a million miles of Government, and that is absolutely right.
Sir Julian Lewis
I will try to make the same point as my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Dr Mullan), but in a less emotional way. Today, the Prime Minister was asked directly,
“did the official security vetting that he received mention Mandelson’s ongoing relationship with the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein?”
He replied, “Yes, it did.” The Minister says that Mandelson lied to the Prime Minister, but the point is that the Prime Minister knew that the relationship was ongoing. Even if Mandelson lied about some other aspects of the relationship, can the Minister not see that the fact that there was any ongoing relationship at all with a man who had been imprisoned for paedophilia and prostitution was an impossible position to defend? No subsequent lies or revelations alter the fact that the Prime Minister appointed Mandelson when he knew that he had been in that ongoing relationship.
Chris Ward
As the Prime Minister has said, he was lied to repeatedly by Mandelson. I will come to the vetting process in a minute, but the due diligence is within scope of this Humble Address. It will be released. The House will be able to see the process for itself.
Alongside further steps that the Prime Minister has taken in the past week, he has recommended to the King that Mandelson be removed from the Privy Council. He has instructed that legislation be drawn up—this was a point that the hon. Member for North Dorset raised—to strip Mandelson of his title and to make wider reform of the House of Lords process. In answer to the question raised earlier, that legislation is imminent and it will be given Government time. It will be brought to this House as soon as possible. Frankly, I wish it was already here now, but it will come very soon.