Harry Farley
Political correspondent

Image source, House of Commons/UK Parliament/PA

Let's return now to an earlier hearing in Parliament - Morgan McSweeney, the prime minister's former chief of staff, giving evidence to the Foreign Affairs Committee (there's a recap here - or see our clips at the top of the page).

McSweeney was asked why he - as a friend - was the person to ask questions of Mandelson about his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.

This refers to an email McSweeney sent to Mandelson in the wake of concerns raised by an initial due diligence check.

McSweeney said in hindsight it would have been "much better" for the Cabinet Office’s propriety and ethics team (PET) to ask those questions.

"When I look back on it, I certainly think it would have been much, much better if I’d asked PET to ask those follow-up questions."

But he insisted the key issue was Mandelson's truthfulness in response about his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.

The BBC understands Lord Mandelson's view is that he answered questions about his relationship with Epstein accurately.

Image source, UK Parliament

The SNP's Westminster leader Stephen Flynn is next. He says Keir Starmer should have gone when he told the Commons he knew Peter Mandelson had maintained a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, before appointing him ambassador.

"That should have been curtains for him [Keir Starmer]," Flynn says, adding that Starmer "was not fit because his judgment was flawed, and it was wrong".

Flynn accuses Labour MPs of choosing at the time to "proactively ignore that and to defend him".

The SNP politician says Labour MPs "cannot outrun Peter Mandelson, they cannot outrun their own prime minister and his record".

"A confident Labour Party, a confident government would believe their prime minister, would have courage in their conviction and go to that [Privileges] committee post-haste to clear his name," Flynn adds - but Labour MPs won't do that because "they're acting from a position of profound weakness".

Image source, UK Parliament

Some more now from some of the Labour MPs who have been speaking in the Commons, where a vote is set to be held as to whether Starmer should be referred to the Privileges Committee.

• Nadia Whittome, the Labour MP for Nottingham East, suggests she will vote for the motion - telling the House she is "disappointed" that Labour MPs are being whipped to oppose it. She explains she is "yet to be convinced" the prime minister has definitively not misled the House "even if inadvertently"
• Tim Roca, the Labour MP for Macclesfield, alternatively criticises the motion and its timing shortly before the upcoming elections. He argues that there are mechanisms "already in train" - citing the humble address and the Foreign Affairs Select Committee inquiry. The motion today "speaks the language of contempt", he says, but it reveals the "contempt" the opposition hold for the British public

Labour MP Gurinder Singh Josan says the motion calling for Starmer to be referred to the Privileges Committee is "premature".

He says allegations and concerns should be addressed, but "that's why we have the humble address, why we've got ongoing inquiries by the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, and even an ongoing police investigation".

"While that is all ongoing, I would suggest this privilege motion is premature," Josan adds.

The Privileges Committee is a cross-party board of MPs that investigates matters which may prevent or hinder the work of Parliament - including cases where MPs are accused of breaking rules - find out more in our earlier post.

Image source, UK Parliament

We've also been hearing from former Labour MP Karl Turner, who now sits as an independent in the Commons. Turner says he does not believe the prime minister "deliberately" misled the House of Commons.

However, Turner adds, there was a "significant difference" between what Starmer said about the vetting process and the evidence Olly Robbins gave to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee in relation to suggestions of pressure from Downing Street to appoint Peter Mandelson.

Turner, who has been a frequent critic of Starmer's government and was suspended from the parliamentary party in March, says Starmer should have referred himself to the Privileges Committee. He adds it would have saved "us all this messing around".

Image source, HOUSE OF COMMONS

Liberal Democrats leader Ed Davey has just been speaking in the Commons.

He rejects accusations that today's motion is a "stunt", as Labour has described it.

Davey asks if the prime minister "really expects us to believe that" he would have cancelled Mandelson's appointment if former senior official Olly Robbins had informed him about the result of the vetting assessment.

After "ignoring everything we already knew" about Mandelson, and announcing his appointment before vetting had been done, Davey says it isn't credible.

That claim is Starmer's "only defence", Davey says, adding that it "just doesn't stand up". He also says "honesty, integrity and truth matter" in politics - quoting Starmer's former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner.

Emma Lewell, Labour MP for South Shields, is up in the Commons now.

She says she has watched this "whole sorry saga" play out for weeks now, like the public" - and that she feels "let down, disappointed and I am angry".

Lewell goes on:

"Peter Mandelson should never have been appointed, this was a fundamental failure of judgment. Matthew Doyle should never have been given a peerage, this was also a failure of judgment. I feel the way that today’s vote has been handled by the Government smacks, once again, of being out of touch and disconnected from the public mood.

"The fact that MPs like me are being whipped into voting against this motion is, in my view, wrong. It has played into the terrible narrative that there is something to hide and good, decent colleagues will be accused of being complicit in a cover up."

Lewell adds that she won't be voting against the motion - and says she "can’t understand why the prime minister doesn’t refer himself to the committee with a clear statement that he is doing so to clear his name".

Elliot Burrin
Live reporter

Image source, PA Media

It's been a busy morning at the Foreign Affairs Committee, with two key political figures giving evidence about the appointment of Lord Mandelson as the UK's ambassador to the US.

We've been hearing from the prime minister's former chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, and a former top civil servant at the Foreign Office, Sir Philip Barton.

Philip Barton

• First up, ex-Foreign Office chief Barton told MPs he was “worried” that Mandelson’s links to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein“could be a problem” - but said No 10 was “uninterested” in his concerns
• Barton said he wasn’t consulted on the appointment
• And he said he found it “odd and insufficient” that the Cabinet Office initially suggested not vetting the former US ambassador - more from Barton here

Morgan McSweeney

• The PM's former top aide McSweeney said he made a "serious mistake" in advising the PM to appoint Mandelson, that he did not request steps to be skipped in vetting, or that he be cleared "at all costs"
• Discovering the extent of Mandelson's relationship with Epstein was "like a knife through my soul", McSweeney told the committee
• Mandelson's experience as EU trade commissioner was the key reason he was selected as the lead candidate over George Osborne, he said - but McSweeney now believes Mandelson "wasn't open enough" before the appointment
• McSweeney stopped short of taking full responsibility, saying the final decision was Starmer's, our political correspondent Harry Farley writes

Meanwhile, in the Commons

• MPs are currently debating on whether to launch an inquiry into whether Starmer has misled Parliament - we'll continue to bring you all the latest on that

Badenoch ends her statement by asking Labour MPs if they'd like to be on the side of Peter Mandelson, Jeffrey Epstein, Morgan McSweeney, Matthew Doyle and Keir Starmer.

Every MP voting on today's motion "will need to examine their conscience", the Tory leader says, as she tells Labour MPs they're being asked to defend a man who "has let the country down, has let Parliament down, and let's be honest he has the Labour Party down".

The Tory leader concludes by telling Labour MPs this is an opportunity for them to show the public that "Parliament matters".

• For context: Starmer denies misleading Parliament and says that when he told MPs due process in appointing Mandelson had been followed, he believed that was the case. He and the government are arguing that today’s debate in the Commons is a political stunt from the Conservatives.

Back in the House of Commons, where MPs are debating if Keir Starmer should face an inquiry into whether he misled them over the appointment of Lord Mandelson as US ambassador, Kemi Badenoch says this is a "matter of trust" for the public.

She adds it is "no longer" just about Mandelson's appointment, or about Epstein, and it is not about a judgement on the PM, but about whether there is a case to answer for contempt of parliament.

Ed Davey, leader of the Liberal Democrats, interjects to make the point that when then-PM Boris Johnson faced a similar motion during his leadership, Tory MPs were not told how to vote.

Badenoch picks up the point, saying the Conservatives trusted the House to "do the right thing". Why, she asks, is Labour whipping MPs for Starmer to avoid scrutiny?

She further says that the truth about Mandelson's appointment is "being covered up" - and if Labour MPs vote against that investigation by the Privileges Committee "they are in this together".

An uncomfortable experience for Starmer's former top aide, who largely kept his coolpublished at 13:32 BST

13:32 BST

Brian Wheeler
At the Foreign Affairs Select Committee

Morgan McSweeney has just reached the end of his evidence session.

It’s been an uncomfortable experience for him and not just because of the sweltering temperature in the room.

He largely kept his cool under persistent and detailed questioning from MPs and committee chair Emily Thornberry, who is clearly not buying some of his answers.

But the former spin doctor showed flashes of irritation at times and got particularly animated when denying he had personally put pressure on officials to get on with Mandelson’s appointment.

He also seemed particularly keen to knock down claims he swore at civil servants.

Back at the Foreign Affairs Committee, Morgan McSweeney is asked about his government phone, which he says was stolen last October.

He says he phoned No 10 and then the police, adding he was "quite surprised" by how "limited" the security was around the telephone of the PM's chief of staff.

Tory MP John Whittingdale asks McSweeney why he gave the wrong directions to an emergency responder, to which the former aide says he wasn't "clear and coherent" at the time.

He says any messages from before September concerning Mandelson had already been shared with the government. His phone has not yet been recovered by police, he adds.

But he also says he had disappearing messages on WhatsApp with "most people", and "probably did" with Mandelson.

Henry Zeffman
Chief political correspondent

Image source, Getty Images

The precise privileges committee motion - being debated now in the Commons - was published overnight.

It's spearheaded by Kemi Badenoch and the Conservatives, but the motion is also signed by Ed Davey of the Liberal Democrats as well as SNP, DUP and independent MPs.

The motion identifies three possible areas where the prime minister may have misled the House of Commons.

The first is in saying on various occasions that “full due process” was followed in Lord Mandelson’s appointment as ambassador to the US.

The second area of the motion is on the question of pressure, and whether it was applied to the Foreign Office to approve the appointment. Keir Starmer said at PMQs last week that “no pressure existed whatsoever in relation to this case”.

The third area concerns the PM’s claim in the Commons last week that Mandelson’s position was “subject to developed vetting” - that presumably will be an area where the Conservatives make arguments about the sequencing of vetting, coming as it did after the public announcement that Mandelson would be appointed.

The government’s defence overall is that this is a "political stunt". But on the specifics, it is likely to be that:

• Chris Wormald, the former cabinet secretary, said in September that "appropriate processes" had been followed
• The prime minister was talking about pressure for a specific outcome, which he denies, rather than pressure for a decision to be made quickly, which he does not
• Even though the vetting outcome is now controversial, it was carried out before Mandelson went out to the US as ambassador

Image source, UK Parliament

Back at the Foreign Affairs Committee, where Keir Starmer's ex-chief of staff Morgan McSweeney is continuing to give evidence, Labour MP Fleur Anderson asks about dinners Mandelson reportedly held, both at his house and in restaurants.

McSweeney says he attended two dinners at Mandelson's house in 2024 and had two further dinners with him at restaurants.

McSweeney says Mandelson did lobby him for the job, but not at any of these events.

Anderson follows up by asking whether Epstein's known violence against women and girls was downplayed during this time.

In response, McSweeney says he thinks this should have been brought "a lot more to the fore" and that the prime minister "takes this issue very, very seriously".

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch kicks off the Commons debate by recounting Keir Starmer's appearance at Prime Minister's Questions last week, accusing him of saying Olly Robbins's evidence had "exonerated him".

Badenoch says the question today is whether the Commons and Labour MPs believe in "full, due process" - and whether Labour MPs have the "integrity" to refer Starmer to the Privileges Committee "knowing what we all know".

She goes on to quote the ministerial code, accusing Starmer of not following full due process.

"What kind of people are they [Labour MPs]? Are they people who'll live up to the promises they made about standards, and the rules mattering, or are they people who abandon their promises to be complicit in a cover-up?," she asks rhetorically.

Badenoch says calling the vote a "stunt", as the PM has described it, is "disrespecting this House and disrespecting the Speaker".

Image source, House of Commons

We’ve been bringing you updates from the Foreign Affairs Committee, where the prime minister's former chief of staff Morgan McSweeney is giving evidence on Mandelson's appointment.

Meanwhile, over in the House of Commons, MPs are beginning a debate on whether to launch an inquiry into whether Starmer has misled Parliament.

The specific question MPs are debating is whether to refer Starmer to the Privileges Committee over statements he has made about Mandelson's appointment.

The Conservatives have put forward the motion for an investigation, which is backed by the Lib Dems and some other opposition parties. The prime minister denies misleading Parliament, and has called this a "stunt".

Labour has a big majority in the Commons, so it would take a large number of Starmer's own MPs voting with the opposition for the result to go against him. We'll bring you updates from the debate in this page, and continue to bring you highlights from McSweeney's appearance at the Foreign Affairs Committee, too.

• Here's a bit more on what the Privileges Committee is

McSweeney says there is pressure in government every day and that conversations on Lord Mandelson's vetting were taken at pace, but nothing improper was done.

He tells the committee: "There is a real difference between asking people to act at pace and asking people to lower standards and we never did that."

The former chief of staff says there could have been two occasions when he spoke to Philip Barton on a wider Zoom call, but the start date of Mandelson as ambassador was not regularly on the agenda.

McSweeney adds that he did not see anyone in No 10 acting dismissive about vetting or national security at any point.

It wasn't until September that McSweeney realised he "didn't get the truth" from Mandelson, he says.

This happened when Bloomberg surfaced files detailing his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.

He says he thought Mandelson had been telling the truth throughout the process.

Liberal Democrat MP Edward Morello then asks McSweeney if there were any all-out advocates for Peter Mandelson to get the ambassador role.

McSweeney answers no, saying that that is the same for a lot of appointments.

Returning to the topic of Lord Matthew Doyle's mooted appointment, McSweeney is asked whether he has heard of the phrase "jobs for the boys".

McSweeney reiterates that the conversations had were around a "duty of care" for someone who was leaving their role. He adds that the same would be true if it was a woman leaving a senior role.

Doyle "wasn't promised a job", McSweeney continues, and if he had applied, his application would be considered in the same way as anyone else.

• For context: Lord Doyle, Starmer's former director of communications, was suspended from the parliamentary Labour Party in February after it was revealed he campaigned for Sean Morton in 2017, after Morton was charged with child sex offences. Doyle apologised, saying it was an "error of judgement". There were subsequent claims that No 10 had considered an ambassadorial job for Doyle, but he said in a statement that he had "never sought" such a role

The conversation briefly switches to a discussion of former communications chief Lord Matthew Doyle's mooted appointment as a diplomat in the Foreign Office as he left No 10.

Why did the prime minister want to keep conversations around this private from then Foreign Secretary David Lammy, McSweeney is asked.

He replies saying there were "difficult conversations" to be had with Doyle as his time in No 10 came to an end, and he wanted to keep the circle small around possible future opportunities for Doyle "because there was a HR issue".

"Somebody is leaving their job, you don't want a lot of people knowing it," he explains.

And if Doyle wanted to work in any of the advertised roles, he'd have had to apply like anybody else anyway, McSweeney adds.

McSweeney then says he wasn't aware of other conversations between the Foreign Office and No 10 where the foreign secretary had not been informed.

Image source, House of Lords

The Foreign Affairs Committee is continuing to question Morgan McSweeney, Starmer's former chief of staff, about the appointment of Lord Mandelson as US ambassador.

Tory MP Aphra Brandreth pushes McSweeney on something ex-Foreign Office chief Philip Barton told the committee earlier - that there was no plan in place for if Mandelson failed his vetting.

"I didn't have a contingency plan in place but was always aware that somebody could fail security vetting," McSweeney now says.

He adds it would have been a "political embarrassment" if Mandelson failed - and the government would probably have asked Karen Pierce (who was doing the job in Washington before Mandelson) to stay on and then "thought of next steps".

Brandreth then asks whether the PM was in "full knowledge" of all the information when making the appointment, to which McSweeney says "he had all the knowledge that I had" - before insisting Starmer "wasn't aware of enough" because "Mandelson himself wasn't open enough with him".