Sir Keir Starmer has urged Labour MPs to reject a bid for a parliamentary sleaze inquiry into the Lord Mandelson vetting row as he faces another moment of peril for the future of his premiership.
The Commons will vote on Tuesday on whether the Privileges Committee should consider if the Prime Minister misled the House over the way the former Labour grandee’s appointment as US ambassador was handled.
A large-scale effort appeared under way by Monday evening to rally support from the back benches, with former Labour prime minister Gordon Brown also urging the party to back Sir Keir.
It is understood Labour MPs are being whipped to reject the motion to refer Sir Keir to the committee after Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle allowed a vote on the issue following requests from Tory leader Kemi Badenoch and other senior MPs.
At a packed meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party on Monday evening, the Prime Minister sought to dismiss the attempt to launch an inquiry as a “stunt” by political opponents trying to inflict damage before the May elections.
“I have responsibility for being totally transparent with you, with Parliament and the British public,” he told Labour parliamentarians.
“I take that very seriously as well. But this is not about a lack of transparency.
“This is a political stunt by our opponents who want to bring us down, obscure our message, stop us getting on with our work.
“And the timing tells you everything nine days before local elections.”
He claimed the Conservatives had put forward “totally baseless” and “absolutely ridiculous” accusations against him and insisted the motion on Tuesday was “pure politics”, adding: “We need to stand together against it.”
Sir Keir added: “When we stick together and fight together we are so much stronger.”
The committee was responsible for Boris Johnson’s exit from frontline politics after it investigated him for misleading the House over the “partygate” breaches of Covid-19 laws in Downing Street.
He quit as an MP in 2023 before the committee published a report recommending his suspension.
The Government also took the unusual step on Monday of publishing a letter from former cabinet secretary Sir Chris Wormald to the Prime Minister, in which he said he had concluded the “appropriate processes were followed” in both the appointment and sacking of the peer.
In the message dated September 16, Sir Chris, who conducted a review into Lord Mandelson’s appointment, said he would “keep this under review if any further evidence emerges”.
But Sir Keir’s insistence that “no pressure existed whatsoever in relation to this case” appeared to be contradicted by a key figure in the vetting process for the ambassadorship to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee on Monday evening.
According to a letter from the Foreign Office drafted in consultation with Ian Collard, the official said he “felt pressure to deliver a rapid outcome” to the clearance procedure.
This was in light of “regular contact from No 10 to the FCDO (permanent under-secretary’s) office,” the letter said, though Mr Collard did not personally speak to Downing Street colleagues and “does not assess that this pressure influenced professional judgment that was reached by himself or his team”.
The Prime Minister has been accused of misleading MPs by saying that “full due process” was followed in appointing Lord Mandelson, who was given developed vetting status despite failing security checks.
The Foreign Office, under then top civil servant Sir Olly Robbins cleared him despite red flags raised by experts at the UK Security Vetting agency responsible for the checks.
Mr Collard, who briefed Sir Olly on the vetting findings, also did not see the UKSV file recommending clearance be denied, according to the letter published on Monday.
Instead, he received an oral briefing from officials which led him to believe Lord Mandelson’s case was “borderline” and that “the risks could be mitigated,” the evidence said.
Tory leader Mrs Badenoch called for Labour MPs to back the referral to the Privileges Committee.
She said: “The Prime Minister misled the House of Commons repeatedly. He appointed a national security risk and friend of a convicted paedophile to be our ambassador in Washington, our most sensitive diplomatic post.
“He pretended that full due process was followed for this appointment. It was not.
“He has blamed the appointment on officials when the blame can only be placed at his own door.”
Mr Brown urged Labour to unite in focusing on putting “the needs of the country first” in a statement on Monday evening.
“Whatever the parliamentary games at Westminster, what the country expects of everyone in Labour is to focus on the priorities of the British people, which is what Keir Starmer is doing and for which he deserves all our support,” he said.
Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey said Labour MPs must be given a free vote on Tuesday.
“Even Boris Johnson didn’t block his MPs voting for scrutiny,” he said.
“If Keir Starmer has misled the House and the public, he must be held to the same standard that we should expect of any prime minister.”
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage told the Press Association: “There’s no doubt he’s misled Parliament more than once and not just on this issue, on others as well.”
He added: “Starmer’s future will be decided by the elections on May 7 and if Reform do as well as I think we can in the old Labour areas, that will be the end of him.”
Downing Street has said the Government is already committing to two parliamentary processes – questioning from the Foreign Affairs Committee about Lord Mandelson’s vetting and a Commons motion forcing the publication of documents relating to his appointment.
Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister Darren Jones said that more than 300 files would have been passed by the Cabinet Office to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee by the end of Monday as part of the second process.
These have been judged to be prejudicial to “national security or international relations,” he told MPs on Monday, and include “a number that are relevant” to the peer’s vetting for the prestigious Washington posting.
The ambassadorship ended after nine months last September when Lord Mandelson was sacked over the extent of his links to paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.
On Tuesday, the Foreign Affairs Committee is also due to hear from Sir Keir’s former chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, widely regarded as a protege of Lord Mandelson, who resigned in February.
The committee will also hear from Sir Olly’s predecessor, Sir Philip Barton.
Sir Olly, who was sacked by Sir Keir for not disclosing the security concerns to ministers, gave evidence to the cross-party group of MPs last week.
Sir Olly said he was told the security experts who carried out the vetting deemed Lord Mandelson a “borderline” case and leaned towards recommending that clearance be denied, but the official approved his developed vetting status with mitigations put in place.
Downing Street has said the findings from UK Security Vetting, the agency which carried out the checks, were more clear-cut, describing Lord Mandelson as of “high concern” and recommending that he be denied clearance.
