can’t stop thinking how renaming the defence department as the war department has such 10-year-old boy energy

NEW ITV Wales YouGov MRP has Plaid and Reform neck and neck in Senedd vote intention

Impossible to say who would be largest party in terms of seats but neither would be close to majority

Would almost certainly result in Plaid led government as they have more potential allies in the Senedd 🧵👇

Robbins concludes:

“As a human being, I’m desperately, desperately sad about it . . . I love that job, I love that institution, I was proud to serve this government and any government that might follow it.”

Cabinet Office believed there was no need to vet Mandelson, Robbins says Evidence comes after PM blamed civil servant for keeping him in the dark over vetting failure

Cabinet Office believed there was no need to vet Lord Mandelson, Sir Olly Robbins said:

“A position taken from the Cabinet Office was that there was no need to vet Mandelson, he was a member of the House of Lords, he was a privy councillor, the risks...were well known"

www.ft.com/content/0699...

Sir Olly Robbins says there was an "atmosphere of pressure" to push through the Mandelson appointment:

"as I arrived at post..I felt a generally dismissive attitude to his vetting clearance, the focus was on getting Manadelson out to Washington quickly"

Sir Olly Robbins says that when he became FCDO permanent secretary he wasn't "walking into a vacuum":

- due diligence already done on Mandelson
- PM had taken advice on his fitness for office
- name had been given to King
- PM announced the job
- he had access to building and sensitive briefings

Keir Starmer was told to vet Peter Mandelson before appointing him Revelation comes ahead of PM addressing Commons about officials’ failure to share findings of security checks

According to one person familiar with the situation, the solution for Mandelson was to restrict access to certain classified documents on China specifically. This would have meant the then US ambassador was not put on distribution lists for Beijing-related intelligence

www.ft.com/content/9f8d...

Yes, and parents being always on their phones in the presence of their children.

great, but the bigger problem is unsupervised phone use by children at home

sorry but where’s the proof that he did know about this…if it exists I haven’t seen it

some very sharp questions from Kemi Badenoch to Keir Starmer in the Commons just now

Keir Starmer is currently in the House of Commons making a convincing case that he was totally kept in the dark over the security officials refusing vetting approval to Mandelson

Holy. Shit. This is Reid Wiseman's video he took with his iPhone while at the moon 🌙

tell me you're over 40 without telling me you're over 40

Pro-Russia ex-president claims victory in Bulgaria’s elections Rumen Radev’s projected majority could turn EU member state’s parliament away from the west

Russia-friendly former president Rumen Radev is on course to win Bulgaria’s parliamentary elections with an outright majority, a result that could stabilise the government after a long series of snap elections, but may push the EU and Nato member closer to Moscow

www.ft.com/content/0a4f...

Mike Waltz has a freudian slip and calls Operation Epic Fury "Operation Economic Fury"

Definitely some interesting re-writing going on, by people who applauded the appointment very much (Farage, Badenoch, both openly praised it) who now say "everyone" has "always" known that it was a bad idea...

Trevor Phillips didn’t ask Mandelson about his Russian and Chinese business links either

Ex-Foreign Office head takes legal advice over Mandelson vetting dismissal Friends say Olly Robbins feels aggrieved about being fired and will give full account when he appears before MPs on Tuesday

Sir Olly Robbins is taking legal advice after being sacked by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer as head of the Foreign Office, as he prepares to answer MPs’ questions over the Lord Peter Mandelson vetting scandal.

www.ft.com/content/0343...

Trevor Phillips said on Sky News this morning that "everybody in the country who could read a newspaper" knew in advance of the Mandelson appointment that he was problematic

is this the same Phillips who interviewed Mandelson on October 08 2023 and didn't ask any questions about Epstein friendship?

Links between Peter Mandelson and Jeffrey Epstein detailed in JPMorgan report Emails indicate then UK business secretary stayed at New York house while disgraced financier was in prison

his researchers should have seen this 2,000 word FT scoop:

www.ft.com/content/0723...

Links between Peter Mandelson and Jeffrey Epstein detailed in JPMorgan report Emails indicate then UK business secretary stayed at New York house while disgraced financier was in prison

our seminal FT scoop about this was literally four months before that interview

www.ft.com/content/0723...

Trevor Phillips said on Sky News this morning that "everybody in the country who could read a newspaper" knew in advance of the Mandelson appointment that he was problematic

is this the same Phillips who interviewed Mandelson on October 08 2023 and didn't ask any questions about Epstein friendship?

exclusive, Kemi Badenoch thinks Keir Starmer isn’t fit to run the country

interesting to see this resurface in the Sunday Times today

Burnham allies identify fresh path back to Westminster as Starmer battles calls to quit A shake-up of the NEC after May’s local election could remove a barrier to Greater Manchester mayor’s leadership ambitions

Allies of Andy Burnham have identified a fresh path for the Greater Manchester mayor to return to Westminster and potentially run for Labour leader, via elections to the NEC over the summer

www.ft.com/content/2310...

also worth pointing out that Mandelson took a highly laissez-faire approach to China in his business dealings

RFK Jr. once chopped off a dead raccoon’s penis to ‘study later’ while on a family road trip The bizarre account was unearthed in the new book “RFK Jr.: The Fall and Rise,” authored by The Post’s own Isabel Vincent, who drew upon a wide range of sources including private …

It's amazing that RFK is not the most insane person in the US cabinet. Perhaps not even top three.

nypost.com/2026/04/15/u...

Burnham allies identify fresh path back to Westminster as Starmer battles calls to quit A shake-up of the NEC after May’s local election could remove a barrier to Greater Manchester mayor’s leadership ambitions

Allies of Andy Burnham have identified a fresh path for the Greater Manchester mayor to return to Westminster and potentially run for Labour leader, via elections to the NEC over the summer

www.ft.com/content/2310...

Yes, prime minister, you should have known Keir Starmer’s ignorance over Peter Mandelson is what happens when Whitehall’s cynical deniability meets a culpably incurious PM

excellent column by Fraser Nelson on the Yes Minister angle to this week’s Mandelson vetting scandal

www.thetimes.com/comment/colu...