London (AFP) – Embattled British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s chief of staff resigned on Sunday over the appointment of Peter Mandelson as ambassador to Washington despite his links to US convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“After careful reflection, I have decided to resign from the government,” Morgan McSweeney, Downing Street’s chief of staff, said in a statement. “The decision to appoint Peter Mandelson was wrong. He has damaged our party, our country and trust in politics itself,” he added. “I advised the Prime Minister to make that appointment and I take full responsibility for that advice.”
The 48-year-old Irishman always maintained a low profile but was dubbed by some as the “most powerful man in politics” having played a key role in Starmer’s emphatic election victory in July 2024. He is credited with helping to move the Labour Party towards a more centrist policy agenda following leftist ex-leader Jeremy Corbyn’s ill-fated tenure. He was also said to have been close to Mandelson, who previously helped ex-prime minister Tony Blair transform the party and its fortunes in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
The resignation came as the foreign ministry said it was reviewing an exit payment to Mandelson, who was sacked by Starmer last September over his friendship with the late Epstein. Mandelson, a pivotal figure in British politics and the Labour Party for decades, received an estimated pay-out of between £38,750 and £55,000 ($52,000 to $74,000) after only seven months in the job, according to a report in the Sunday Times. Documents released on January 30 by the US Justice Department appear to show that Mandelson leaked confidential UK government information to financier Epstein when he was a British minister, including during the 2008 financial crisis.
The revelation has placed intense pressure on Starmer and triggered a police investigation into Mandelson, 72, for alleged misconduct in a public office. The Foreign Office said in a statement it had launched a review into Mandelson’s severance payment “in light of further information that has now been revealed and the ongoing police investigation”. Cabinet minister Pat McFadden earlier insisted Starmer should remain in office despite his “terrible mistake” in appointing Mandelson. He said the real blame lay “squarely” with Mandelson for putting himself forward for the job despite knowing the extent of his relationship with Epstein.
Despite McSweeney’s departure, opposition leaders kept their focus on the prime minister. “Keir Starmer has to take responsibility for his own terrible decisions,” opposition leader Kemi Badenoch of the Conservative Party posted on X. “But he never does.” “The Prime Minister can change his advisers all he likes, but the buck stops with him,” said Daisy Cooper, leader of the Liberal Democrats, the third party in parliament. Noting that McSweeney had gone, Nigel Farage, leader of the hard-right Reform UK party said: “My money says Starmer won’t be far behind after Labour’s disaster in the elections this coming May.”
Starmer’s deputy, David Lammy, became the first cabinet minister to appear to distance himself from the premier, according to a report in the Sunday Telegraph. The deputy prime minister had not been in favour of appointing Mandelson due to his known links to Epstein, the report quoted friends of Lammy as saying. Starmer’s Labour Party took power just over 18 months ago in a landslide election victory. But it has been trailing Farage’s anti-immigrant Reform UK as the government comes under fire over immigration, economic growth and the cost of living crisis. Reform UK has led by double-digit figures in the polls for the past year.
Mandelson, also a former European Union trade commissioner, stood down from parliament’s unelected upper chamber, the House of Lords, earlier this week. He is one of numerous prominent figures embarrassed by the latest release of documents in the Epstein files by the US Justice Department. The financier died in jail in 2019 while facing charges of alleged sex trafficking. US officials ruled Epstein’s death a suicide. Law firm Mishcon de Reya, representing Mandelson, said he “regrets, and will regret until to his dying day, that he believed Epstein’s lies about his criminality”.
“Lord Mandelson did not discover the truth about Epstein until after his death in 2019,” said the statement. “He is profoundly sorry that powerless and vulnerable women and girls were not given the protection they deserved.”
© 2024 AFP
