The Mandelson scandal claims yet another victim. Late on Thursday night, Olly Robbins was sacked from his post as the Foreign Office’s Permanent Secretary. It came six hours after the Guardian first revealed that Peter Mandelson had failed his security vetting clearance in late 2024 to become the UK ambassador to the US, with the decision being overruled by the Foreign Office to ensure he could take up his post. The briefing from No. 10 is that the mandarin was sacked after losing the confidence of both the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary. But both the timing of the move – announced after the Friday papers had gone to press – and its speed suggest that this is a fairly cynical gambit for self-preservation. As one Tory MP predicted even before the news broke online: ‘Robbins will be lined up as the main fall guy for No. 10.’
Downing Street are prepared to argue that Starmer and his closest aides were not made aware by the Foreign Office that Mandelson failed developed vetting back in late 2024. In taking out Robbins, the gamble is twofold. First, that he does not have sufficiently damaging material to implicate No. 10 in the decision to ignore the vetting outcome and appoint him as ambassador. Second, that in pinning the blame on an official, Starmer can scrape through the latest episode in this sorry scandal. Both are bold assumptions. Robbins is – as many Brexiteers would ruefully admit – a more wily and political operator than many of his Whitehall counterparts. Emily Thornberry has already summoned him to give evidence at her Foreign Affairs Committee. Is he really likely to go gentle into that good night? Or might he prefer to follow the lead of Philip Rutnam, the Home Office Permanent Secretary, forced out in 2020, who duly held an emergency press conference in the rain?
Is Robbins really likely to go gentle into that good night?
Sacrificing Robbins will not necessarily save Starmer either. As Calum Miller, a former Senior Civil Servant turned Liberal Democrat MP, points out: ‘There is a pattern here. Both Chris Wormald and Olly Robbins appointed by this government. Both sacked by press release when Starmer under pressure. Robbins may have approved Mandelson but it’s not credible that he acted alone without instruction from No. 10.’
The Prime Minister’s seemingly ignorant and indifferent approach throughout this scandal has infuriated Labour MPs. Some are now reflecting on the high standards he has demanded of others, including being part of a frontbench that called on Amber Rudd quit for ‘inadvertently’ misleading over Windrush. It was reported on Thursday that he was first told Mandelson had failed to pass developed vetting on Tuesday this week. That raises the question of why he did not follow Erskine May, the parliamentary handbook, and correct the record in the House at the first opportunity, prior to Prime Ministers’ Questions. Another fraught week now beckons for Starmer, just at the time when postal ballots for the local elections are landing across Britain.
Within the Foreign Office, there is fury at how Robbins has been treated. He only started as Permanent Secretary in January 2025, by which time Mandelson had already been appointed. The irony is Sir Olly was not a popular mandarin, having spearheaded a major programme of restructuring – or cuts – called ‘FCDO 2030.’ But his treatment at the hands of Starmer has done what few thought possible in uniting the notoriously cliquish clans of King Charles Street behind Robbins. ‘I fucking hate Olly’, said one sworn opponent. ‘But this isn’t right.’ Having now dispensed with the head of the Foreign Office and much of his Downing Street team, will that be enough to save Keir Starmer? Given the list of enemies he has accumulated, many would argue not.
Can we trust Starmer’s ignorance? Tim Shipman discusses on the latest Coffee House Shots podcast:
