Sorry, but for almost a week now the BBC, especially #R4today has shovelled the Tory position that Starmer MUST be lying

And yet the most likely explanation (likely to be confirm by Robins) has been that the civil service did what it has form on - they just didn’t tell ministers

Oh joy - it’s Chris Mason’s turn for the funny handshake … sorry, I mean BBC political report

#R4today

And you can complain to the BBC here:

www.bbc.co.uk/contact/comp...

I’m as outraged at the outrage as you!!!

I’m so outraged I just can’t wait for #R4Today to tell us who to blame for what we would otherwise dismiss as a modestly dysfunctional oversight at the heart of this outrageously unimportant affair

Listening to Zeffman & Robinson & you’d be forgiven for thinking MPs openly laughing at a PM’s address is an extremely rare & grave affair

He seems to have forgotten the number of times May & Johnson had em rolling in the aisles.

Even Truss managed a comedy turn during her brief time #r4today

This pressure to categorise protest speech & slogans as criminal increasingly sinister

Profoundly condemn these attacks on Jewish people - they have nothing to do with Israel & the IDF’s behaviour

But people need to be able to vocalise protest, or for a few the alternative is terrorism #R4today

Yeh but the electorate doesn’t decide. That falls to Labour members.

And Labour doesn’t want the welfare cuts you think are essential.

They also think (largely) that:
1. Defence spending is overblown hysteria that won’t outlast Trump
2. Defence isn’t strongly linked to UK jobs

#R4today

Is it possible Olly Robbins just has no case?

When the claim is the civil service didn’t tell ministers.
And the senior civil servant at the FO is promptly fired

It’s possible Occam's razor might just apply here?

Nah! #R4today

True … But ‘they can do crime’ when they’re not in gaol is the point.

& the threat of getting caught is no deterrent … or there wouldn’t be any crime, would there?

I’m pretty sure that’s what people who are [ehem] ‘pro-crime’ are really on about

Green MP: Labour caricatures working-class people over greyhound racing Hannah Spencer says minister ‘continuously offends people by saying working-class people don’t care about dogs’

Hannah added: “I get offended when I hear the argument made that it is working class. Working-class people are fed up with gambling companies being able to wreak havoc in people’s lives.”

www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Keir Starmer faces ‘judgment day’ as Mandelson vetting debacle grows As revelations mount and accusations fly, prime minister prepares for MPs’ anger and Olly Robbins’ testimony early next week

Olly Robins definitely taking the blame in today’s Guardian #r4today

Civil servants claim ‘they have a duty not to disclose sensitive vetting info to ministers’

Yet it’s ‘highly unusual’ & ‘Robbins could have informed a senior minister of that fact at least’

It’s looking increasingly like Starmer might be telling the truth - that the civil service chose not to share sensitive info from Mandelson’s vetting with ministers

Will we really have to wait for the May election results for the next round of calls for Starmer to resign?

Nah! #R4Today

Keir Starmer faces ‘judgment day’ as Mandelson vetting debacle grows As revelations mount and accusations fly, prime minister prepares for MPs’ anger and Olly Robbins’ testimony early next week

Olly Robins definitely taking the blame in today’s Guardian #r4today

Civil servants claim ‘they have a duty not to disclose sensitive vetting info to ministers’

Yet it’s ‘highly unusual’ & ‘Robbins could have informed a senior minister of that fact at least’

The only practicable way to close hotels is to allow migrants to work. #Bbcaq

How’s your ‘human right’ to stand at the side of the road in peaceful support of ending the genocide in Palestine?

Any parliament can easily erode human & democratic rights of its citizens. Having a European Court to appeal to is frankly reassuring #Bbcaq

Record number of homes in Great Britain turn to green energy as fuel prices soar Iran war drives demand for solar panels, heat pumps and EVs, with energy bills expected to rise 18% from July

Heat pump orders up 2x in a month. Solar panel inquiries up 250%. EV leases up 85%.

The Iran crisis has made energy security feel personal.
I understand why: I have solar panels, a heat pump & EV on a flexible tariff. When gas prices spike, my bills barely move.

www.theguardian.com/business/202...

Tories have peaked outrage already … & doesn’t it sound authentic?!!

The most likely explanation is Starmer, in no small part on advice from McSweeney, had already chosen Mandelson, & the vetting was a foregone conclusion

Doubt it shows anything more than already known at the time #Bbcaq

Perhaps that’s true: it would be a bold statement to give otherwise, and Sir Olly Robbins, the most senior officer in the Foreign Office, was forced out on Thursday night. (It has always struck me as strange that it still counts as a resignation when you’re told you’re doing it.) Even if we take that line on face value, though, it hardly puts the PM in the clear. The most plausible reason a government department would take the near unprecedented step of overruling security vetting is because it was known to be the outcome Number 10 wanted. That, given everything we know, raises questions about Starmer’s judgement. The best one can say is that they were questions that were being asked already. The more damning corollary of that latest Downing Street statement is that the Prime Minister was simply not doing yet another part of his job. It was obvious to any casual reader of Peter Mandelson’s Wikipedia page that his appointment presented significant potential risks. Given all that, the fact Starmer was nonetheless unaware he had failed his security vetting suggests either he was unaware of those risks; or that he never bothered to ask the outcome of vetting. Either explanation casts enough doubt on his competence as to make a strong case for resignation in and of itself. Next month’s local and devolved election results seem all but certain to see

www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk-...

Starmer’s screwed up for sure.

But it is worth also remembering the civil service has a very long & deep history of withholding,

It’s also conceivable No10 created an atmosphere of ‘not wanting to know’ the sensitive stuff about Mandelson #wato

Anyone know just how many bus routes there are running past Downing Street?

At this rate Starmer’s gonna run out of busses to throw junior staff under

#wato

Hang on Chris Mason,

The ‘chased by a bear’ anecdote was Emily Thornberry’s comments about sir Olly Robbins potentially misleading her select committee,
NOT about Starmer

#R4today

Oh agree

But Starmer just doesn’t seem to have the political dexterity to sidestep these relatively simple issues

- The premature announcement
- No plan to ditch Madelson after the vetting failed
- Reactionary sackings/resignations

He’s inadvertently making himself the story #R4today

Yep - And Tories cut armed forces funding DURING UK operational commitment in Afghanistan - disgusting!!

Brown Blair criticised for budget equipment failures but at least met the demand for replacement kit, especially to the woeful snatch land rover #R4today

Well yes … but there’s a growing pile of Whitehall bodies thrown under the the number 24 bus to protect a PM who takes ‘full responsibility’ for the affair

I’m personally far more interested in WHY Mandelson failed not who knew about it:

e.g. Hows that Met Police investigation going? #R4today

Scrutiny committee ‘messed around’ over Mandelson evidence Emily Thornberry says We speak to the chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee Emily Thornberry.

St Kemi Badenoch sounding all “preposterous” about all of Starmer’s problems on #r4today skating carefully around her own preposterous Iranian warlike ambitions of late

Emily Thornbury on Channel Four news however, has a far more interesting take on the FO
www.channel4.com/news/scrutin...

Badenoch’s right of course: Starmer knows more than conceding, & he or his (McSweeney) lobby screwed up announcing Mandelson’s appointment

But it’s hardly the stuff that brings down governments #R4today

Another opportunity to listen to the Conservative leader pontificating about the impoverished state of UK’s the armed forces after 14years of Conservative austerity cuts to defence spending

Valiant effort from Foster to shovel past the manure on #R4today

Is it just me but whenever I hear Badenoch’s petulant blame games I’m just waiting for Lord Sugar to butt-in & end the misery

“Yeh, I’ve heard enough now. You’re fired!

“Thank you for the opportunity SuurAllluun”

#R4today

Quite!

Starmer shouldn’t have jumped the gun

But it surely wasn’t ‘withheld’ to protect Starmer’s: No10 could easily have switched to a fresh candidate

It was sensitivity to the reputational damage it would’ve done to Mandelson.

The failed vetting is the bigger story
#R4today

Foreign Office’s top civil servant Olly Robbins forced out over Mandelson vetting row Keir Starmer understood to have lost confidence in official over decision to override security vetting failure

Hard to understand why Yvette Cooper has lashed herself to the mast of this obviously sinking ship
#R4today