The Metropolitan Police is to review allegations about Lord Peter Mandelson after receiving “a number of reports relating to alleged misconduct in a public office” arising from the Jeffrey Epstein scandal.
A cache of documents in the so-called Epstein files includes revelations that Mandelson passed on confidential information from the highest levels of the UK government to the convicted sex offender while he was a cabinet minister.
This included leaking plans for a €500bn bailout of the euro to Epstein as well as a private Downing Street document discussing the government’s financial proposals while he was both business secretary and de facto deputy prime minister in 2009 and 2010.
Documents released at the weekend also showed that Mandelson had received $75,000 from the disgraced American financier when he was a backbench MP in 2003 and 2004.
As more revelations emerged, pressure mounted at Westminster for a police investigation into Mandelson, and on Monday evening the Met said it would “review” the claims arising from the release of millions of court documents relating to Epstein by the US Department of Justice.
“Following the release and subsequent media reporting, the Met has received a number of reports relating to alleged misconduct in public office,” the Met said.
“The reports will all be reviewed to determine if they meet the criminal threshold for investigation.”
Police officials said the review would determine whether an investigation was required. The government said: “It is rightly for the police to determine whether to investigate and the government stands ready to provide whatever support and assistance the police need.”
The Scottish National Party and Reform UK had both earlier called for the police to investigate the allegations about the release of sensitive government information by Mandelson to Epstein.
And former Labour prime minister Gordon Brown, who brought Mandelson into his government in 2008 as business secretary, called for an official inquiry into the “shocking new information” about the leak of “confidential and market-sensitive information”.
Labour MP Peter Prinsley said Mandelson’s conduct “looks like political insider-trading on a grand scale” and called for a criminal investigation. Mandelson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Downing Street said it would be up to the Met to consider the revelations “in the normal way” and that it would fully co-operate with any inquiry.
Earlier Sir Keir Starmer called for Mandelson to be stripped of his title and his seat in the House of Lords, but the prime minister risks suffering serious collateral damage from the Epstein scandal engulfing Mandelson.
Starmer tried to limit the fallout by promising to find a way to quickly remove Mandelson from parliament’s upper house, while announcing an official inquiry into the peer’s conduct “during his time as a government minister”.
However, Starmer’s opponents said he should have taken decisive action sooner, while renewed questions have been asked about the prime minister’s decision last February to appoint Mandelson as Britain’s ambassador to the US.
Mandelson kept a low profile as opprobrium descended on one of the founding fathers of Tony Blair’s New Labour project, although he did tell The Times he had no recollection of receiving $75,000 from Epstein. “I think I would remember such a large sum,” he said.
He also denied his criticisms of the Labour government’s policy on bankers’ bonuses in 2009 were related to any financial gifts from Epstein to either him or his husband Reinaldo Avila da Silva. He said such a notion was “risible” and he was reflecting the views of the sector.
One friend, who has known Mandelson for 30 years, said: “I just feel numb. This is a body blow for all the people who have defended him.”
Kemi Badenoch, Conservative leader, said: “Keir Starmer and his chief of staff [Morgan McSweeney] appointed Mandelson [as] ambassador despite his relationship with Epstein, and then refused to act even as the mountain of evidence against him grew.
“Given the prime minister’s appalling lack of judgment and the participation of his Downing Street operation, there must now be a full and thorough independent investigation.”
Starmer sacked Mandelson as his envoy to Washington in September last year but, until now, he had not called for the peer to be removed from the House of Lords or to lose his title.
On Sunday, Mandelson resigned from the Labour Party, to the relief of Starmer’s allies.
The party said: “It is right that Peter Mandelson is no longer a member of the Labour Party. Disciplinary action was under way prior to his resignation.”
Despite the wave of outrage, Downing Street shied away from promising to change the law to allow an individual peer to be removed from the Lords, saying such a step had “no precedent”.
Rather than pass primary legislation, Number 10 said it would be quicker to work with the Lords “to modernise disciplinary proceedings in the House to remove lords who have brought the Lords into disrepute”.
In the meantime, Labour figures hope Mandelson, who is already on a “leave of absence” from the Lords, will relinquish his title of his own accord.
Sir Chris Wormald, cabinet secretary, has been asked by both Starmer and Brown to conduct an inquiry into Mandelson’s conduct while he was a minister, including the cash payments he received and the information he passed to Epstein.
One Labour frontbencher said the revelations about Mandelson filled them with “horror”, adding: “It’s surely another nail in the coffin for Morgan [McSweeney] — because indubitably it was him pushing the appointment and then resisting sacking him.”
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