Starmer-Mandelson latest: Olly Robbins says No 10 put ‘pressure’ on approving Labour peer as US ambassador

Sir Olly Robbins has said he “regrets” that due diligence concerns raised about Peter Mandelson did not “colour the prime minister’s judgement” in his decision to appoint him as US ambassador.

Giving evidence to the Foreign Affairs Committee, Sir Olly said he “regrets” that the full security vetting process was not done before the government announced Mandelson’s appointment, but said he does not regret the “work of my brilliant team and the judgment that we came to”.

“I regret that this process was not done before announcement. I regret that the due diligence process, which threw up as I understand it, serious reputational risks, didn’t colour the prime minister’s judgment in making the appointment,” he said.

He added: “What I feel sad about, is that the prime minister’s nominee went ahead despite that due diligence.”

Asked whether Sir Keir Starmer is right to have expected to be provided with more information on the vetting process, Sir Olly Robbins said that is a “dangerous misunderstanding” of confidentiality around the process.

The former Foreign Office chief told the Foreign Affairs Committee: “I hope it’s clear from everything I have said so far that I believe that’s a misunderstanding and a dangerous misunderstanding of the necessity of confidentiality of the process.

“I’ve been interested, of course, over the last couple of days to read Lord Hague on this today and David Lammy even on Saturday, the former foreign secretary, deputy prime minister, where both have said in different language that they have never had vetting issues discussed with them in all their time as a minister and nor would they expect to.

“I’m afraid that’s exactly the culture I have been brought up in. It’s supported by guidance. You are not supposed to share the findings and reports of UKSV other than in the exceptional circumstances where doing so allows for the specific mitigation of risk.”

Sir Olly Robbins said it was not a “given” that Lord Mandelson would be vetted for his appointment as US ambassador.

The former senior civil servant told the Foreign Affairs Committee: “It was not a … I’m afraid I don’t think at the point of his appointment and for days thereafter it was actually a given that he would be vetted.

“If you look at the documents submitted under the humble address there is no stipulation from number 10 that he should be vetted.

“The welcome that was sent to him immediately afterwards doesn’t say welcome to the Foreign Office subject to vetting; the announcement put out on December 20 says that he will be out early in the new year, it does not say subject to vetting.”

He said the contract issued to Lord Mandelson after he was vetted said he must maintain his clearance “but nothing about his appointment actually, as far as I’ve seen in writing, stipulates it”.

Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said: “The evidence from Olly Robbins is devastating to Keir Starmer.

“It is clear that No10 not only made the appointment before vetting was completed, but that Mandelson was already acting as the ambassador before the vetting – even seeing highly-classified documents.

“With this, and the ‘constant pressure’ No10 applied to the appointment and their ‘dismissive attitude’ to vetting Mandelson, it is now absolutely clear that ‘full due process’ was not followed.

“Keir Starmer has misled the House.”

Sir Olly Robbins has said that when he began his job as the top official at the Foreign Office, he was warned by his predecessor that there were concerns there was a “creep” of career politicians being appointed.

He said he remembered a “general atmosphere” upon arrival, when it was shared that a “number of senior appointments” had been given to “outsiders” under the new Labour government, whereas they would have previously “been occupied by diplomats”.

“I think he was nervous….that this was a sort of a creep of senior diplomatic roles going to non career diplomats,” he told the Foreign Affairs Committee.

Sir Olly Robbins has told MPs that last year No 10 initiated a number of conversations with him “about potentially finding a head of mission opportunity for Matthew Doyle”, who was then the Prime Minister’s director of communications.

He added that he was under “strict instruction” not to discuss that with the then foreign secretary David Lammy, which he described as “uncomfortable”.

In February, Labour suspended the former communications chief, who the prime minister elevated to the House of Lords in December, over his links to a convicted paedophile, former councillor Sean Morton.

The former civil servant said the inquiries took place during the beginning of his time at the Foreign Office, at which point the department was facing budget cuts and redundancies.

He said: “I found it very hard to think how I would explain to the office what the credentials of Matthew were to be in an important head of mission role when I was in danger of making very senior, very experienced diplomats [redundant]”.

Sir Olly Robbins said the decision over Lord Mandelson’s security clearance was “rigorously independent” of pressure on the Foreign Office.

The former senior civil servant was asked whether the political pressure the department was facing may have filtered down to the team who was making recommendations to him over the vetting, and whether he was satisfied that the options presented to him were reached independently of this pressure.

“I am very confident in answering they will have been – they are clever people – they would have been very aware of the pressure.

“I also have complete confidence that their recommendations to me, and the discussion we had and the decision we made, was rigorously independent of that pressure.”

Former Foreign Office chief Sir Olly Robbins said it would have been better for security clearance to have been decided before Lord Mandelson’s appointment was announced.

“That’s a very, very sensible position to be in and it’s what I would have advised in this case too,” he told MPs.

He added: “It’s a particularly sensitive issue because the United States government is very hot on the clearances people hold and so it would have been a sensible precaution.”

Sir Olly said removing Lord Mandelson from the process and trying to change the person nominated for the Washington role would have caused problems because the US had already agreed the peer as an acceptable candidate – agrement in the diplomatic terminology – while Joe Biden was still in office.

Sir Olly Robbins has said it would have been “very difficult” for the Foreign Office to have refused Peter Mandelson’s appointment to Washington after it had already been announced by the government.

The former top civil servant said pressure from No 10 and the fact Mandelson’s appointment as US ambassador had already been confirmed meant it would have been a “problem” for the Foreign Office to later deny his security clearance.

“I think it would have been very difficult indeed,” he said. “The prime minister’s nominee had been put out there to the public, announced, blessed by the king, agreed by the US government, we were in receipt of formal letters from number 10 telling us to get on with it quickly.”

He added: “Against that backdrop, the Foreign Office saying ‘sorry, we can’t grant him clearance’, would have been a very, very difficult problem.”