Sacked civil servant tells select committee of ‘pressure’ to give clearance and ‘dismissive’ attitude to vetting
The civil servant sacked by Keir Starmer has given a devastating account of his government, saying Downing Street put huge pressure on the civil service to approve the appointment of Peter Mandelson as Washington ambassador despite the concerns of vetting officials.
Olly Robbins, the former top official at the Foreign Office, said No 10 took a “dismissive” attitude to vetting, and Mandelson was given access to the Foreign Office building and to “higher-classification briefings” before he was granted security clearance.
In more than two hours of precisely worded and detailed testimony to the foreign affairs select committee (FAC), Robbins said No 10 had created an “atmosphere of pressure” which made it almost impossible to deny clearance for Mandelson – who had already been announced for the senior diplomatic posting.
He also confirmed that senior government officials – including within the Cabinet Office – had been in dispute last week, as revealed by the Guardian, over whether to release documents relating to Mandelson’s vetting through the humble address process.
