The Prime Minister “shortcut the process” of appointing Peter Mandelson and he should take responsibility for that, according to Shadow Housing Secretary Sir James Cleverly.
He told GB News: “The simple fact is, when a government makes a political appointment as an ambassador, the risk sits with the politicians, with the ministers.
“And as a former Foreign Secretary, I know that if I was appointing anybody to a role as sensitive as the ambassador to Washington, but particularly if I were appointing Peter Mandelson, who has a history of scandal, I would have asked.
“I would have said, what’s happened to the vetting? Is everything okay? Has he got the green light? I need to know, particularly as there was media speculation, there was press reporting that he had failed vetting. And if I’d seen those reports, I would have demanded to know what had happened.
“So to claim that neither the Foreign Secretary, nor, indeed the Prime Minister even bothered to ask is absolutely unbelievable.”
He added: “The Prime Minister keeps trying to blame other people, keeps trying to blame the system. Blames everybody but himself. The simple fact is, when you make a political appointment, the risk sits with the politicians. This is a very well established principle.
“The Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary would have been told this. They chose to risk appointing Peter Mandelson. The fault is exclusively with them. And the simple truth is, the simple truth is that Sir Olly was appointed after Peter Mandelson was announced as the Prime Minister’s pick for ambassador.
“I strongly suspect, I’ve not spoken with Sir Olly, I don’t know this to be a fact, but I strongly suspect that he was appointed with an implicit instruction to just get it sorted.
“Mandelson had already been announced, and it was his job to tidy up the loose ends. He did his job, and now he’s been fired, and that is totally unacceptable.
“The reason we called this emergency debate, Kemi did so after the Prime Minister’s statement, because despite spending two and a half hours at the dispatch box, he spectacularly failed to answer the important questions that we put to him.
“So we’re going to go again, and he should understand that, until he is honest, until he is open, until he gives the transparency that the British people demand, we are going to keep asking these questions, because it was his decision.
“He chose Peter Mandelson, despite Peter Mandelson’s history, he overrode the advice of a number of officials. He shortcut the process. He is responsible, and he has got to take responsibility, and so far,he has failed to do so.”
