Ambassador to the United States

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the appointment process and the circumstances leading to the dismissal of the former United Kingdom Ambassador to the United States, Lord Mandelson.

Sometimes exquisite coincidences happen in this place. We have just seen a Bill presented on the topic of public office accountability by the immediate past Foreign Secretary, the now Justice Secretary. I will just read to the House the first line of its description:

“a Bill to impose a duty on public authorities and public officials to act with candour, transparency and frankness”.

I think I might return to those issues in the course of what I have to say.

As I have said, this is a matter of utmost concern across the House. It is an issue that does not just concern the Conservative party, the Scottish National party or the DUP; Members from all parts of the House are worried about it, as we have seen in the newspapers. The Government have key questions to answer, and as I said yesterday, the central question is: who knew what, and when? Let us be clear, though. There are many questions on many levels in this matter, and the Government must answer them all; so far, they have singularly failed to do so.

The questions fall naturally into four categories. First, was Peter Mandelson ever an appropriate character to appoint as our ambassador? [Hon. Members: “No.”] Well, we will get to that later. Secondly, what was the procedure for vetting, was it properly followed, and why has it gone so horribly wrong? Thirdly, what has happened in the last couple of weeks to lead to the demise of the former ambassador—who made the critical decisions and why? Fourthly, what do we do now? How do we make this Government tell the House and the nation the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth—which in itself would be a novelty for Lord Mandelson?

Let us begin with whether Lord Mandelson was ever an appropriate selection. As I said yesterday, our ambassador in Washington stands at the nexus of our most important bilateral relationship. For those who have not served in government, it is the one bilateral relationship run by No. 10, not the Foreign Office. That is because it is so important, and it is a role of exceptional sensitivity. More classified information crosses the ambassador’s desk than gets to most Cabinet Ministers. Indeed, in British embassies, the agencies report to the ambassador. It is not the same in American embassies, where the CIA does what it wants. Our agencies report to the ambassador, so it is a sensitive post.

Today, Peter Kyle—I have forgotten his new post—said that global circumstances dictate that the position of this particular ambassador is more important than it has ever been, and it could easily go terribly wrong. The failure to appoint the right person has already had a serious and deleterious impact on the national interest.

The Prime Minister staked his special relationship with the US President on the diplomatic skills of an ambassador who had a special relationship with the world’s most notorious child sex offender. I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman agrees that the Prime Minister’s judgment and the UK’s presence on the world stage have been diminished by this affair.

There is no doubt that the right hon. Lady is correct. Frankly, I am going to try not to make this ad hominem about the Ministers who made decisions; we need to make that decision later, as it were. She is right that it has diminished the standing of our Prime Minister, and I regret that. Although we are the Opposition, I want this Government to succeed in the national interest, and this is doing the opposite of that. The ambassador’s conduct, both prior to appointment and during, must reflect the highest standards of integrity—that is fundamental, and it is true for any ambassador.

I commend the right hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. It unites the House with its purpose. It is clear within the rules that MPs are accountable for their staff and their conduct and that there will be repercussions. Does he agree that the Prime Minister is accountable for his appointment of the UK ambassador to the United States of America, and the same rules should apply?

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. When we look at the mechanisms engaged, as I hope we will in the course of this debate, we will see why the Prime Minister made the wrong decision. There is no doubt in my mind that he did.

The right hon. Gentleman talks about decisions by the Prime Minister. He talks about the duty on Members of this place and of the other place to conduct themselves appropriately. Does it surprise him, as it surprises me, that we have a situation where my hon. Friend the Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) has been unfairly suspended from the Labour Whip, along with others, for opposing disability benefit cuts and the Mother of the House, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott), remains suspended from the Labour party, yet Lord Mandelson retains the Labour Whip in the House of Lords? Are all of those things not decisions by the Prime Minister? People outside here, including Labour members, think it is completely unfair.

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.

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

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.

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:

Does the right hon. Gentleman share my concern about the possibility that the Prime Minister will discuss this issue with President Trump later in the week? The Prime Minister has to have influence over President Trump for very good reasons, but if the issue of Lord Mandelson’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein comes up—we understand that President Trump also contributed to that birthday book, with an infamous poem—what is the Prime Minister going to say?

I am very glad to say that I am not the Prime Minister’s speechwriter, but all I can say to the hon. Gentleman is that I hope the issue does not come up, because it would undoubtedly be embarrassing and diplomatically problematic for the Prime Minister.

Astonishingly, after being sacked twice for misdemeanours, in 2004 Lord Mandelson was appointed by Tony Blair to be the European trade commissioner. He was, as it were, given a third chance. As the trade commissioner, he was criticised on numerous occasions for accepting lavish hospitality from companies on whose commercial interests he was in the process of ruling—whether the company concerned was Microsoft, an Italian shoe producer or whatever—which, for some reason, often involved free luxury cruises. He saw nothing wrong with such apparently compromising behaviour, and in that category, indeed rather at the top of it, was his association with the Russian oligarch and gangster capitalist Oleg Deripaska.

Let us be clear who we are talking about here, because most Members probably do not know much about him. Mr Deripaska was the winner of the battle for control of the Russian aluminium industry, a battle in which roughly 100 people were murdered. In court reports, Interpol documents and American Government publications, Deripaska has faced serious allegations of murder, bribery, extortion, and involvement in organised crime. This is a truly bad man.

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for giving way and for the case that he is making. I wonder whether, while he is dealing with the influence of Russian oligarchs in British politics, he will opine on the suitability of British political parties accepting donations from Russians, and the impact that that might have on their policies and their positions.

Had the hon. Gentleman been here before the last election, he would have sat in this Chamber, I hope, and heard me opine on all those subjects and raise prospective laws to deal with those oligarchs, laws that, sadly, this Government have failed to carry through.

That, then, is the backdrop. Mr Deripaska’s visa was revoked by the Americans in 2006, so Mandelson had no excuse for not knowing about his activities, yet as European trade commissioner he saw fit to accept hospitality from Deripaska on multiple occasions over several years, which included visiting him in Moscow and being flown by his private jet to stay at his dacha in Siberia and on his private yacht in the Mediterranean—all while considering whether to give Russian aluminium access to the European market. Deripaska’s activities were known to the British security services, and briefings were available to Mandelson, so, again, there is no excuse. He did this in the full knowledge of who he was dealing with. It was in this position that Mandelson promoted and signed off concessions to Russian aluminium companies, which ultimately benefited Mr Deripaska, or his companies, to the tune of $200 million a year. Although it did not actually happen, one company was due to be the subject of an initial public offering—due to be floated—shortly thereafter. A $200 million change in profits tends to mean a multibillion-dollar change in value, and that will have gone into the pocket of Mr Deripaska. As we all know, Deripaska is a nominee of Putin, so we can assume that a large chunk of it went to Putin as well.

In 2008 Mandelson was, very controversially, raised to the peerage by Gordon Brown and appointed Business Secretary. His contact with Epstein did not end. As Epstein was pleading guilty to child sex offences, Mandelson emailed him:

“I think the world of you and I feel hopeless and furious about what has happened... Your friends stay with you and love you.”

I appreciate some of the points the right hon. Member is making, but I would just note that one of the Conservative candidates running in a Milton Keynes constituency at the last general election worked for Global Counsel. It is interesting that the Conservatives have such complaints about this organisation when they were willing to support a candidate who worked for it.

I am going to be very gentle. Let me just say that we are talking about a very serious issue, in which the national interest is engaged, and about somebody who in my view has used his public position to his own advantage and to the disadvantage of the state. That is not true of some candidate working in a junior role for the company, but it is true of the man who created that company and used it to promote his own interests.

To come back to the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, from my point of view—and this is personal rather than political—even more worrying were the attitudes struck by Mandelson in February 2021 when, during a lobbying meeting on behalf of his rich clients, he told Chinese Premier Li Keqiang that the critics of Beijing’s human rights record would be “proved wrong”. That astonishing statement was followed later in 2021 by Mandelson being the only Labour peer to vote—against a three-line Whip—against a genocide amendment that would have meant this country had to reconsider any trade deal with a country found by the High Court to be committing genocide, and most specifically China was in the crosshairs. Frankly, it would appear that Lord Mandelson has subcontracted his conscience for money.