LONDON — The British government agreed Wednesday to release emails and other documents casting light on the decision to appoint Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the United States despite his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein as it tries to stem mounting anger over the revelations.
The move came after the opposition Conservative Party said it would force a vote in Parliament calling for the release of emails and other messages related to Mandelson’s appointment in 2024.
A trove of documents about Epstein released last week by the U.S. Department of Justice has finished off Mandelson’s long political career – and left Prime Minister Keir Starmer facing angry questions about his judgment in making him the U.K.’s most important ambassador. Critics say Mandelson should never have been given the job because his relationship with Epstein - though not its extent - was known at the time.
At a question-and-answer session in the House of Commons dominated by the Epstein revelations, Starmer said “I intend to make sure that all of the material” that underpinned the decision to appoint Mandelson is published. He said the exceptions would be documents that compromise Britain’s national security, international relations or the police investigation into Mandelson’s activities.
Starmer said Mandelson had “lied repeatedly” to officials about his relationship with Epstein, and had “betrayed our country, our Parliament and my party.”
“I regret appointing him,” Starmer said in the House of Commons. “If I knew then what I know now, he would never have been anywhere near government.”
Opposition lawmakers - and some from Starmer’s own Labour Party - said they worried the government would use national security as an excuse to keep embarrassing documents secret.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said the government should publish all relevant files, “not just the ones the prime minister wants us to see.”
“The prime minister is talking about national security. The national security issue was appointing Mandelson in the first place,” she said.
Starmer fired Mandelson, 72, in September after emails were published showing he maintained a friendship with Epstein following the late financier’s 2008 conviction for sex offenses involving a minor. Epstein died by suicide in a jail cell in 2019, while awaiting trial on U.S. federal charges accusing him of sexually abusing dozens of girls.
Documents released last week by the U.S. government suggest Mandelson may have shared sensitive information with Epstein when he was government minister a decade and a half ago.
In 2009 he appears to have told Epstein he would lobby other members of the government to reduce a tax on bankers’ bonuses, and passed on an internal government report discussing a potential sale of U.K. government assets. The following year he appears to have tipped off Epstein about an imminent bailout of the European single currency.
The newly released files also suggest that in 2003-2004, Epstein sent three payments totaling $75,000 to accounts linked to Mandelson or his partner Reinaldo Avila da Silva.
Since those disclosures, Mandelson has resigned from the House of Lords and faces a police investigation for alleged misconduct in public office, which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison. Opening an investigation does not mean Mandelson will be arrested, charged or convicted.
Starmer said the government was working on legislation to remove the noble title, Lord Mandelson, that the ex-ambassador still holds. He will also be removed from the Privy Council, a committee of senior officials that advises King Charles III, for bringing “the reputation of the Privy Council into disrepute,” Starmer said.
An email requesting comment on the documents was sent to Mandelson through the House of Lords.
The European Union is also investigating potential wrongdoing by Mandelson when he was the bloc’s trade commissioner between 2004 and 2008. The U.K. was an EU member until 2020.
“We will be assessing if, in light of these newly available documents, there might be a breaches of the respective rules with regard to Peter Mandelson,” European Commission spokesperson Balazs Ujvari said. “We have rules in place, emanating from the treaty and the code of conduct that commissioners, including former commissioners, have to follow.”
Please read our comment policy before commenting.