Ambassador to the United States

Jeremy Corbyn Excerpts

Tuesday 16th September 2025 Commons Chamber

[David Davis]

I understand all too well the point that the hon. Gentleman is making. Many have made it in the newspapers, although generally anonymously. A double standard applies to the top of the Labour party—Labour royalty, if you like—as opposed to other people who have been punished for doing their job, representing their people and so on. He has got a point.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind)]

rose—

[David Davis]

I will give way, but then I must make some progress.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Does the right hon. Gentleman not think it slightly odd that sufficient due diligence was not done prior to the appointment of Lord Mandelson? On the day before Lord Mandelson was dismissed, apparently there were a lot of emails available to the Prime Minister that he either was not given or did not read. We find ourselves in this odd situation where the British ambassador to the USA has to be dismissed in the full glare of international publicity because of his past behaviour, which was apparently well known to a very large number of people who should not have supported his appointment in the first place.

[David Davis]

The right hon. Gentleman is exactly right. We will come to a number of circumstances in which information was available and should have been, but was not, acted upon. This was not as hard as some may try to portray it as being: after all, the appointment did not come as a surprise. Lord Mandelson himself was clearly campaigning to become the ambassador after failing to win the chancellorship of Oxford University. Indeed, someone told me that he was actually campaigning for the ambassadorship while also campaigning for the chancellorship, so he was after two jobs, not one. It was clear at an early stage that he was going to attempt to do this, and there was widespread discussion at the time about his suitability for the role, so there was plenty of time for a preliminary investigative or vetting process. There was, and is, a vast amount of data in the public domain. Most of what I will speak of today is public domain material—I will explain when it is not.

What would those conducting that vetting process be looking for? A number of us on these Benches and, I would imagine, on most Benches have been through such processes ourselves. Traditionally they would review the history and personality of the candidate, assessing risks, such as the risk of the candidate being susceptible to undue influence, or, in extreme examples, blackmail—the Russians and the Chinese collect kompromat all the time; the risk of the candidate abusing or misusing the role; the risk of the candidate doing something that would cause reputational damage; or the risk, with which some on the Labour Front Bench may have difficulties and which they may find rather old-fashioned, that the candidate is too morally flawed to be given a major role in any case and fails a simple ethical test, which is where we may arrive in a moment. I am afraid that I am old-fashioned. I view ethical tests as an absolute, which cannot be traded off against some benefit or other.

In the history that I am about to detail, we see a Peter Mandelson who is easily dazzled by wealth and glamour and is willing to use his public position to pursue those things for himself. This was visible very early in his career, even to his friends. In 1998, he was sacked as Trade and Industry Secretary for failing to declare a pretty enormous interest-free loan that he had received from Geoffrey Robinson. At that time Mr Robinson’s businesses were being investigated by Mandelson’s Department, so there was a clear clash of interests, and Mandelson did not even declare the loan. That was the first occasion on which we saw so publicly the abiding flaws in his character, which would generally disqualify any normal person for a job as important as this. Even his friends saw that. One of his flaws was described plainly by one of his friends back then, who said:

“Peter was living beyond his means, pretending to be something he’s not, and therefore he was beholden to people.”

The important bit is that last phrase: he was beholden to people. It was a characteristic that was displayed time and again as he sought to use his position to curry favour with very wealthy and very powerful people who were either current or future benefactors.

This was repeated in 2001, when Lord Mandelson was again sacked after attempting to broker a British passport for Mr Hinduja, a wealthy donor to the Millennium Dome project, with which he was involved. Mandelson attempted to influence the Home Office to give Mr Hinduja a passport when Mr Hinduja and his brother were under investigation in the Bofors weapons contract scandal—again, a dubious reason. Incidentally, it was at about that time that his association with Epstein started, and the infamous birthday book entries date from then.