Starmer survives PMQs but faces ongoing pressure over Mandelson appointment controversy

It wasn't much of a win, but as Keir Starmer has heads back to Downing Street he will probably count that as a sort of success. Labour MPs did not turn on him; there was no one on his side calling for his resignation, and those who did speak out were mostly from the Corbynite left (whose views are discounted by No 10 anyway), and who were more keen to aim their fire at Morgan McSweeney and Peter Mandelson. If Kemi Badenoch thought there was more mileage in this, she could have tabled a no confidence motion on this which would have to be debated tomorrow, but she didn't. She can be brutal in the Commons, but her speech today did not cause the PM any difficulties. Last week she was saying he was clearly lying. If he is, then he is doing it quite well, because neither she, nor any other MP, made a convincing job this afternoon of establishing that he has not been telling the truth about what he was told about by the Foreign Office about the Mandelson vetting process. On the narrow process point – it is really plausible that No 10 did not know, and could not find out, that Peter Mandelson failed his security vetting interview?– Starmer may even have won some people around this afternoon. He sounded believable. But, in other respects, the process point (as well the issue about whether he inadvertently misled parliament) is irrelevant. Starmer's problem is that he decided to approve the appointment of Mandelson in the first place, when it was already clear that there was ample evidence that his business record and his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein made him suspect. That, presumably, is why Olly Robbins decided to facilitate the appointment by using his discretion over overrule the vetting recommendation. It seems the argument of some in Downing Street might have been the Mandelson should get the job not despite being the sleazy former best friend of a paedophile, but precisely because he was this sort of character. They weren't appointing him ambassador to the Vatican. There seems to have been the assumption that this was the sort of interlocutor Donald Trump (another ex-Epstein best friend) might like. You can understand why Starmer won't put it like that in public. Whatever the reason, it turned out to be a colossal misjudgment. Starmer may have seen off Kemi Badenoch, Ed Davey and all the others this afternoon, but this controversy has only added to the long list of reasons Labour MPs have for wanting him out before the next election and nothing he said this afternoon changes that.

That is all from me now. Aneesa Ahmed is taking over.

Starmer declines invitation to accept he inadvertently misled MPs with previous Mandelson vetting comments

Starmer told MPs that he did not mislead the Commons when he said that due process was followed. At the No 10 lobby briefing this morning the PM's spokesperson implied that Starmer would accept he inadvertently misled MPs. (See 1.01pm.) On Friday morning last week Darren Jones, the chief secretary to the PM, said he did not think the PM had misled MPs on this issue. Later, at the morning lobby briefing on Friday, No 10 was not willing to repeat this line. On Friday night Downing Street released minutes of a meeting saying officials discussed "whether ministers, having been provided (incorrectly) with assurances about the process, had inadvertently misled parliament when commenting on the process which had been followed". But today, when the Tory John Lamont asked Starmer if he accepted he had "inadvertently misled the House of Commons", Starmer replied: double quotation markI did not mislead the House of Commons. I accept that information that I should have had, and information that the house should have had, should have been before the House. But I did not mislead the House, and that's why I've set out the account in full.