Keir Starmer is under pressure over his handling of the Lord Mandelson saga (Image: Getty)
Business Secretary Peter Kyle has admitted No10 felt Peter Mandelson was "worth the risk" despite his close relationship with convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein when he was appointed US ambassador.
The Labour minister insisted the Labour grandee's "singular talents" meant they felt it was "worth the risk" at the time.
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This was despite two vetting processes showing information that was already public, Mr Kyle has said.
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He told Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips on Sky News it was not correct that Lord Mandelson was appointed ambassador to the US before security checks were completed.
“The Cabinet Office did an independent inquiry into the appointment, as they do in every public appointment of this nature, and the information, that was presented to the Prime Minister.
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“The second process was obviously a political process where there are political conversations done in No 10 about all the other aspects of an appointment of this nature.
“Now both of these things turned up information that was already public and a decision was made that based on Peter’s singular talents in this area, that the risk of appointing knowing what was already public was worth the risk.
“Now of course we have seen the emails which were not published at the time, were not public and not even known about, and that has changed the situation.”
The Labour grandee was sacked on Thursday after emails were published showing Lord Mandelson sent supportive messages even as Epstein faced jail for sex offences.
The Prime Minister is facing questions over what he knew about the peer’s friendship with the paedophile financier and the vetting process for his diplomatic posting.
Ahead of Lord Mandelson’s appointment, the Prime Minister was given a file that included information about his links to Epstein by the Cabinet Office Propriety and Ethics Team and prepared three questions based on it, the PA news agency understands.
They included why he continued contact with Epstein after he was convicted and why he was reported to have stayed in one of the paedophile financier’s homes while he was in prison.
The BBC reported it understands Lord Mandelson believes he was truthful about his association with Epstein and that he told No 10 he had not stayed at his apartment while he was in prison in 2009.
But No 10 sources said Lord Mandelson was “economical with the truth” in his answers to those questions.
Another vetting process carried out by the Foreign Office followed.
No 10 had “extracts” of emails between Lord Mandelson and Epstein on Tuesday, the Business Secretary has said.
Asked about whether Downing Street had the emails two days before Lord Mandelson was sacked and a day before Sir Keir Starmer backed him in the Commons, Peter Kyle told Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips on Sky News:
“They had what was public – which was extracts of the emails and … and immediately, upon having being alerted to extracts of emails, the Foreign Office contacted Peter Mandelson and asked for his account of the emails and asked for them to be put into context and for his response.
“That response did not come before PMQs and then after PMQs the full, the full emails were released by Bloomberg in the evening.
“By the first thing the next morning, when the Prime Minister had time to read the emails in full, having had them in full, and reading them almost immediately of having them, Peter was withdrawn as ambassador.”
He stressed that the media had the “same information that we had at the time” of the appointment.
“We only knew what the media knew at the time,” he said.
Tory Kevin Hollinrake said: "Peter Kyle’s interviews this morning on Peter Mandelson’s links to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein raise more questions than they answer.
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"It is astonishing that the new Business and Trade Secretary has openly admitted that Downing Street chose to prioritise Mandelson’s 'singular and outstanding talents' over the rights of Epstein’s victims.
"Even more damning, this cover-up appears to have continued for a further 48 hours this week as more and more revelations came to light. This is not just poor judgment, it is a shameful betrayal of the victims and a blatant attempt to protect one of Labour’s most powerful insiders.
"We will demand answers in the House of Commons tomorrow and press for the release of every relevant document. The Prime Minister cannot hide behind spin any longer. He must come clean, tell us exactly what he knew and when he knew it, and explain why the victims of a convicted paedophile were treated as collateral damage in order to save Peter Mandelson."
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