It was inevitable that Mrs Badenoch (North-West Essex, Conservative) LoTO would concentrate on the Mandelson Affair at PMQs. She did not disappoint. What transpired, however, was an astonishing demonstration of how isolated from reality the Prime Minister seems to have become,
“Sir Olly Robbins… puts to bed all the allegations levelled at me by those opposite in relation to dishonesty.”
Worryingly, this suggests that the Prime Minister is flying through a dimension that very few people in the House of Commons, or indeed wandering the streets of Britain, are familiar. As Mrs Badenoch herself put this: “I do not know what planet the Prime Minister is on.”
The agony will continue until someone decides that Starmer must be defenestrated, but with just two weeks to run until the local elections on 7th May there is no chance of anyone making a move until those results have been received if not fully digested. However, some relief will be granted by the House rising unexpectedly early next Tuesday so the Prime Minister can avoid a further round of PMQs. Bravery and directness in action.
Tuesday 21st April
After Monday’s Prime Ministerial Statement on Mandelson’s vetting, Sir Ollie Robbins appeared before the Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday morning. TWOP was agog.
In the Chamber an Emergency Debate on The Mandelson Affair got underway at 2:19pm. Mrs Badenoch (North-West Essex, Conservative) LoTO kicked off proceedings with determination and catalogued the yawning gap between the Prime Minister’s insistence that he had “just been following orders” and what others know as “reality.” The mood of the House was dour, but with the PM a no-show and poor old Darren Jones (Bristol North-West, Labour) Chief Secretary to the PM sent out to the crease with a very clearly broken bat, the three-hour debate felt a bit flat.
The new information that No 10 had asked the FC&DO to see if there was a senior ambassadorial post that Matthew, now Lord, Doyle, the Prime Minister’s Director of Communications, could be put out to grass conveniently, was a mesmerising new detail for many speakers.
Think how glorious it could have been if the des res at the 35 Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré could have been prized out of the hands of so newly appointed Sir Thomas Drew KCMG. Quelle horreur.
Monday 20th April
The much-trailed, much-discussed Prime Ministerial Statement on the dismissal of Sir Oliver Robbins came on at 3:33pm.
The Prime Minister exhibited his normal synthetic “fury” over the failure to pass on the negative outcome of Lord Mandelson’s vetting to him, but this did not seem to match up with the determination with which he had overlooked the advice from his then Cabinet Secretary, Simon Case, in November 2024 that it would be better to put any potential political appointees through the vetting process before announcing their appointments. Simples.
Sir Keir seems unable to understand the significance of this, always defaulting to the exculpation that his next Cabinet Secretary, Sir Chris Wormald had reviewed the appointment process in September 2025 and advised that it had proceeded normally.
This default defence, which we might call the “Wormald Shield”, fails in two significant regards:
- overlooking the prior advice to change the process, which was reinforced by an internal memorandum from Ailsa Terry, Starmer’s private secretary for foreign affairs and Nin Pandit, his principal private secretary, on 11th November, 2024
- contradicting itself by seeking to justify the dismissal of Sir Ollie Robbins precisely for following the procedure that the Prime Minister insists that he followed and which should be the arbiter of rectitude.
Logically you can have one, but not both.
Sadly, although in receipt of the “Case Advice” summarised and repeated to him from within his own private office, the Prime Minister went forward to announce the appointment of Lord Mandelson on 20th December 2024, before even starting the security vetting process on 23rd December. Lord Case would be well within his rights to say “Cart, meet horse.”
The key moment for the PM came as a result of an ill-judged rhetorical flourish when he said “I know many members across the House will find these facts to be incredible.” This inspired widespread hilarity, not confined to the Opposition benches. The Prime Minister is no longer a credible witness, even to his own failures of judgement and, sadly for him, process.
In reply, Mrs Badenoch took the unusual step of asking six questions that she had given the PM written notice of in advance. All were reasonable enough, but the fourth seemed to be “the nub”
“The Prime Minister says that he is furious that he was not told the recommendations of the vetting process, yet on 16th September a Foreign Office Minister (Stephen Doughty) told Parliament that “The national security vetting process is rightly independent of Ministers, who are not informed of any findings other than the final outcome.” If that was the Government’s stated process, why is the Prime Minister “furious” that it was followed?
When the Prime Minister turned to “answer” this question, however, he once again fell on The Wormald Defence, saying: “In relation to the answer about full due process, that was the information that I had and which I put before the House and it was confirmed to me by Sir Chris Wormald. In September, I asked him to conduct a review of the process to assure me that the process was correctly carried out. He did that and wrote to me on 16th September to give me his conclusions.” Hum-ho.
As before, if this was true then it also means that Sir Ollie Robins followed the vetting process correctly. If so, he should not have been dismissed. Any other conclusion is a Starmerite version of “cakeism.”
Honourable mentions to Diane Abbott (Hackney North & Stoke Newington, Independent), Simon Hoare (North Dorset, Conservative), Edward Morello (West Dorset, LibDem), David Davis (Goole & Pocklington, Conservative), Stephen Flynn (Aberdeen South, SNP). Performative expulsions for Lee Anderson (Ashfield, Reform) Zarah Sultana (Coventry South, Your Party)
Friday 17th April
The Guardian’s news that Lord Mandelson had failed his security vetting released at 6:16pm on Thursday evening, and the subsequent extraordinary news of the Prime Minister’s dismissal of Sir Oliver Robbins, made little impact on the House on Friday as it was announced that there would be a Prime Ministerial statement to the House on Monday. While MPs rushed off for their weekend jollies to connect with their constituents, the Commons blundered along pointlessly.
Thursday 16th April
Peter Kyle (Hove & Portslade, Labour) Business Secretary announced the expansion of the existing BICS (British Industrial Competitiveness Scheme) to assist about 10,000 energy-intensive manufacturing companies with their direly uncompetitive energy costs by reducing their costs by ~25%.
Although actually what Mr Kyle actually announced was HMG’s brilliant idea to widen the eligibility for this scheme sometime over Summer 2026 for compensation for their payment of Renewables Obligations, Feed-in Tariffs surcharges and Capacity Market fees. So, while welcome, this announcement seems to be compensating industries dependent on energy input prices for the various increases in energy costs HMG has stuck them with in the first place. A somewhat Pyrrhic victory, if victory it is at all. The Great Sandwich Eater will be livid.
Jesse Norman (Hereford & South Herefordshire) Shadow LoTH kindly confirmed TWOP’s impression that the Prime Minister had improperly remonstrated with the Speaker after PMQs on Wednesday 15th April and opened up the wider question of the Prime Minister’s apparent inability to answer questions.
Sir Alan Campbell (Tynemouth, Labour) LotH, predictably, did not have an answer. He said “Prime Ministers deal with PMQs in their own way. It is not unusual for any Prime Minister or any Minister not to give the answer that the Opposition want.” So that’s that then. Glad this was cleared up and the PM’s obvious discourtesy to the Speaker simply ignored.
Thank you for reading and please check out our instagram @theworldofukpolitics,
Alex
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