Sir Philip Barton, the civil servant in charge at the Foreign Office when Peter Mandelson was vetted, has said he was under constant “pressure” to get the approval through and failure would have been a “crisis”. The Telegraph has the details.
Sir Philip told the Foreign Affairs Committee: “Firstly it’s just worth repeating at no point did anyone consult me, ask me. I was presented with a decision and told to get on with it. There was no space, you know that.” …
Barton was asked about Sir Olly Robbins, his successor, claiming No. 10 took a “dismissive” attitude towards the vetting process.
Sir Philip told the Foreign Affairs Committee: “I wouldn’t use the word dismissive, the word I would use is uninterested. I think people wanted to know that all the practical steps required for Mandelson to arrive in Washington by or around inauguration date needed to be completed, you know, at pace as it were. And that was the interest.
“To be honest with you no one said to me ‘look Philip, the Prime Minister knows there’s some risks around this, can you really, really make sure the vetting’s done rigorously?’
“I mean, it’s always rigorous anyway, but that’s not the sort of thing communicated. It was: ‘Fine, he needs vetting, let’s make sure it’s done in time.’”
When asked about the reservations he expressed to Jonathan Powell, Sir Keir Starmer’s national security adviser, Sir Philip said: “I think it was very much along the lines of what I’ve just said around the possibility of his known connection to Epstein causing an issue subsequently.” …
The former permanent under-secretary at the Foreign Office said he had received a letter on December 18th 2024 from the Prime Minister’s principal private secretary about the Prime Minister’s choice for the UK ambassador to the US.
Sir Philip told the Foreign Affairs Committee: “I didn’t receive letters from the principal private secretary to the Prime Minister very often, most of my dealings was with the foreign affairs team in No. 10 as you’d expect. …
“That in effect is the top of the Government saying the Prime Minister has decided he wants Mandelson as ambassador and he wants it done in that timescale.
“So that is what creates the pressure, there were conversations around progress. But I think no one in the FCDO working on this could have been in any doubt of the urgency of the issue and the importance that No. 10 and the Prime Minister attached to Mandelson being in DC in very short order.”
Barton said there was “pressure” on the Foreign Office from Downing Street to secure developed vetting for Lord Mandelson “by a particular timescale”.
The former civil servant told the Foreign Office that the pressure did not affect decisions made on the “substance” of the case, saying: “During my tenure, I was not aware of any pressure on the substance of the Mandelson DV case.”
However, he continued: “Question two, was there pressure? Absolutely and I’ve described it, and I’ve also seen what the Foreign Office said to you last night and recognise what is said in that letter about the pressure to get it done, i.e., DV clearance, by a particular timescale.
“Because, as I said to you earlier, I don’t think anyone could have been in any doubt in the department working on this that there was pressure to get everything done as quickly as possible.”
Pressure on the Foreign Office was “set at the beginning and just carried on”, Barton said. …
When asked about Lord Case, the then cabinet secretary, suggesting vetting should be carried out before the appointment was announced, Sir Philip told the Foreign Affairs Committee: “The normal order is vetting then announcement.”
Challenged on whether he knew why No. 10 carried out the appointment the other way round, he responded: “No, the timing of the announcement was driven and decided by No. 10.”
He continued: “There was discussion around the exact timetable that went on and so there was keen interest from No. 10. … In a sense the pressure was kind of set at the beginning and just carried on. It wasn’t a matter of did someone phone every day at 10 o’clock, it was more ‘this ambitious timetable had been set’.” …
Barton said there was no “contingency plan” for if Lord Mandelson had not been given security clearance.
Dame Emily Thornberry, the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, said that the disgraced peer had been given access to some buildings and briefings before passing all security checks.
Sir Philip replied: “He had access to the building but parts of the building where people without DV also have access. He did not have access to the parts of the building where you absolutely do require DV.
“He had access under the rules as a ‘fit and proper’ person as a member of the House of Lords. … He didn’t have general access, he wasn’t able to roam free if you like in terms of access to information across the department.
“So I can understand why it looks odd. I actually think it was the right thing to do to ensure at the time that in the short timescale we had been given, he could arrive in Washington properly prepared.”
However, when asked if there was a contingency plan for what might happen if Lord Mandelson was not granted security clearance, Sir Philip said: “No.” …
It would have been a “crisis” if Lord Mandelson had not received vetting clearance before starting his role as UK ambassador to the US, Barton said.
The former Whitehall mandarin told MPs that “there has to be a possibility” at the end of the vetting process that “someone is deemed not to meet the standards to have developed national security vetting”.
He said: “It would have been a crisis if we got to the point where he had no vetting clearance, that would have been a crisis.”
Sir Philip continued: “A publicly announced political appointment as the next ambassador to Washington, not being able to go, that would have been a big problem.”
Despite the “pressure”, Barton claimed it was “right” to allow Lord Mandelson access to secret briefings before he underwent developed vetting.
He told the Foreign Affairs Committee: “As reflected in what the Foreign Office said to you in the note last night, the decision was taken in line with the guidance that he should be given access to the building and access to the paperwork, in particular for example on the UK Government’s preparations and policies towards an incoming administration.
“I was given that advice and I endorsed it and I signed off on it and I think it was the right thing to do to make sure that the Prime Minister’s choice for ambassador was properly prepared when he started his job. I think it would have been very odd not to do that.”
Sir Philip was then asked by Dame Emily Thornberry about why Lord Mandelson had a green security pass before his appointment.
He responded: “It was very clear to everybody that he didn’t have DV and there were limits to what he could see and be told. … I do think there was a process in place to tell people who were going to brief him that there was a certain level of classification they could go up to when talking to him and they couldn’t go beyond that because he didn’t have DV clearance.”
Barton refused to be drawn on whether “due process” was followed in the appointment of Lord Mandelson.
The Conservatives have claimed that Sir Keir Starmer misled MPs when he said in September that “full due process was followed” when Lord Mandelson was hired as the British ambassador to the US.
This accusation is at the centre of a vote on whether to refer Sir Keir to the privileges committee later on Tuesday.
Appearing before the foreign affairs committee, Sir Philip was asked: “Do you think that the Prime Minister’s statement that full due process was followed is a fair description of what happened in Mandelson’s case?”
He responded: “I’m going to dodge. I’m really sorry but I actually don’t think it’s for me to sit here… It’s not for me, it’s for others including all of you as Members of Parliament to come to a view on that.”
Conservative Leader Kemi Badenoch said Sir Philip Barton’s evidence proves Downing Street was “not interested” in Lord Mandelson’s security vetting.
The Conservative Party Leader told LBC: “They were not interested in the vetting at all. The due diligence had already shown that Peter Mandelson was a security risk. There was nothing in the vetting that they hadn’t been told and they didn’t care.”
Asked whether Sir Philip’s evidence points to pressure to appoint Lord Mandelson, Badenoch said: “Of course it does. There is no doubt in my mind that the Prime Minister has lied, and has repeatedly misled the House.
“That is why I’m asking a committee to look at this. I’m not asking Labour MPs to remove the Prime Minister. I’m not asking this certain moment, at this particular moment, to resign. This is all about the committee, but that evidence proves what I have been saying.
“If we cannot trust our Prime Minister to tell us the truth about a simple matter, how can we trust him on anything?”
The Telegraph‘s Tony Diver explains why Barton’s testimony is very difficult for Sir Keir Starmer:
Later today, the Prime Minister faces a vote on whether he misled the Commons when he said there was “no pressure whatsoever” on civil servants over Lord Mandelson.
But Sir Philip has just spent the past hour claiming, repeatedly, that he was indeed under pressure and that Downing Street was “dismissive” of the crucial vetting process before he took office.
Kemi Badenoch, the Tory leader, will seize on this evidence as part of the growing chorus of officials who are happy to contradict the Prime Minister.
I am most intrigued by Sir Philip’s claim that he was told to “get on with it” by No 10. He denies that Morgan McSweeney ever said he should “f—ing get on with it”, as has been claimed. But the truth, it turns out, was not far off the reports. …
A key part of this debate is what constitutes “pressure” on an official to make a decision.
Is it political influence on a security decision, as the Conservatives claim? Or is it just part of the daily rhythm of working in high office?
Downing Street sources are pointing to Sir Keir Starmer’s words in The Sunday Times this week, when he said there were “different types of pressure”.
He said: “There’s pressure, ‘Can we get this done quickly’, which is not an unusual pressure. That is the everyday pressure of government. There is a separate pressure which is: was there a pressure on him, essentially, to disregard the security vetting element and give clearance?”
That distinction will probably form the substance of Sir Keir’s argument to MPs in the debate about his conduct later today. Suffice to say, this lengthy semantic discussion is not helpful for a PM already in political hot water.
Appearing before MPs after Barton, Morgan McSweeney has fallen on his sword, saying he made a “serious error of judgement” in recommending Lord Mandelson as UK ambassador to the US. But he added that he never implied vetting should be cleared “at all costs”.
Sir Keir Starmer’s former chief of staff told the Foreign Affairs Committee: “The appointment of Mandelson as ambassador was a serious error of judgement. I advised the Prime Minister in support of that appointment and I was wrong to do so. …
“I resigned because I believe responsibility should rest with those who make serious mistakes. Accountability in public life cannot apply only when it is convenient. The Prime Minister relied on my advice and I got it wrong. It is also important, however, to distinguish between what I did do and what I did not do.
“What I did do was make a recommendation based on my judgement that Mandelson’s experience, relationships and political skills could serve the national interest in Washington at an important moment. That judgement was a mistake. What I did not do was oversee national security vetting, ask officials to ignore procedures, request that steps should be skipped or communicate, implicitly or explicitly, that checks should be cleared at all costs. I would never have considered that acceptable.”
Follow the Telegraph‘s live coverage here.
The civil servants’ line is that they were put under “pressure” to get it done, with a failure to get Mandelson approved under this “unusual” process triggering a potential “crisis”, but even so they did not succumb to the pressure and did everything by the book. This argument doesn’t really stack up – if they did everything by the book, despite the pressure, then there is no scandal. The scandal is that the pressure from Downing Street resulted in Mandelson being approved in a rushed manner and despite his failing vetting. The book may have been technically followed in that no hard and fast rules were broken. But that just means the scope for discretion was misused somewhere along the line – particularly by Robbins, who made the call on the failed vetting – to force the appointment through.
The mandarins can’t try to pass the blame onto the politicians by saying they were putting them under pressure, but then say they didn’t succumb to the pressure and did everything right. The scandal is precisely that they did succumb to the pressure, failing to use the powers they had to stop the appointment in a misguided bid to keep Downing Street happy. Of course, it’s Starmer and his team who are ultimately responsible for deciding to appoint Mandelson and putting pressure on the officials in the first place. But it’s a convenient fiction that then also tries to maintain the officials did nothing wrong. Of course they did: if they didn’t then there is no scandal. It’s understandable to want to put all the blame on Starmer and his team and exculpate the civil servants who were just trying to keep their political bosses cool. But in the end, the power to pass or fail Mandelson lay with the Foreign Office officials, so if Starmer and friends are to be blamed for forcing this through (and they are) then it’s unavoidable that some blame must also lie with the officials who enabled it.
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“I resigned because I believe responsibility should rest with those who make serious mistakes. Accountability in public life cannot apply only when it is convenient. The Prime Minister relied on my advice and I got it wrong.”
Fair enough. But there is a parallel. When Amber Rudd made a statement about the Windrush affair on the basis of advice she was given by officials it was she who fell on her sword, not the officials. By the same token it should be Starmer who resigned, not McSweeney. The Provileges committee should assess the situation and it is sheep-like of Labour MPs to vote to block a referral and abandon any pretence that they have any morals.
Another member of the Worshipful Company of Slithy Toves.
Robbins said that the security clearance was not concerned about Epstein. He must have read the document. But he claimed that the FO believed that the advice was marginal and could be cleared. When the FO Committee viewed the SC document they immediately spotted that the traffic light boxes were ticked on red ie no clearance. Why is Robbins allowed to get away with ignoring the red light? He confirmed that the SC is there for a purpose which is important. Was he asked not to inform anyone that he had override the SC document?
He resigned, therefore his character is expunged of any and all blame or accountability!
His gold plated pension will likewise be untarnished!
Because Robbins was not allowed to see the document. As we have learnt, until the head of the civil service referenced it, no one knew of this document in the vetting process outside of the vetting team. All Robbins knew was that there was a leaning against approval not a series of red boxes. This whole process shows the farcical Chinese whispers way that the civil service works to. A relatively junior assessor tells his boss that x has had red flags, but he can’t reveal why, the boss tells the commissioning office that there are issues but cannot reveal red boxes and doesn’t know why – the whole thing is a mockery.
I find it hard to spend my time following the ins and outs of this tale, but here’s a thought that came to me. What could have possibly caused such a blatant and forceful, determined decision by Starmer to push this through?
Starmer seems to have been under a lot of pressure from somewhere, and what stronger pressure could there be than blackmail? Starmer was being blackmailed.
It’s almost as if the Civil Servants are thoroughly left wing and utterly beholden to the Labour Party.
Nah, can’t be true. Impossible.
Quote: When asked about the reservations he expressed to Jonathan Powell, Sir Keir Starmer’s national security adviser, Sir Philip said: “I think it was very much along the lines of what I’ve just said around the possibility of his known connection to Epstein causing an issue subsequently.”
Do they not have internal emails or written correspondence within the senior civil service. On a matter as important as vetting generally and for a man with known problems in his past, and a political appoiuntment, the whole thing should have been evidenced in writing.
Who said what to whom and when and what terms and pressures were applied should be a matter of record.
The state likes to impose rigorous standards on the private sector of busiuness and on individuals which it will not follow itself. Can you imagine the outcry there would bve, not least from back benchers in the HoC, if an FCA investigation had found that a stockmarket floatation or a seriously large banking transaction or a large reinsurance contract wich had gone wrong had been concluded in the way Whitehall deals with business.
But that might lead to transparency, accountability and a need for some integrity!