Alex Burghart has launched a blistering attack on the latest Peter Mandelson revelation, declaring it the “greatest political scandal of our time”.
Speaking to GB News, the Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster said the scandal is either “incompetence or a cover-up of the highest order”.
Breaking his silence on the reports that Lord Peter Mandelson failed his security vetting process, Sir Keir Starmer said he was “absolutely furious” that the Foreign Office had not made him aware.
He told reporters: “That I wasn’t told that Peter Mandelson had failed security vetting when he was appointed is staggering.
“That I wasn’t told that it failed security vetting when I was telling Parliament that due process had been followed is unforgivable.
“Not only was I not told, no minister was told. I’m absolutely furious about that. What I intend to do is to go to Parliament on Monday to set out all the relevant facts in true transparency, so Parliament has the full picture.”
Delivering his verdict on the scandal, Mr Burghart told GB News that it is “very hard to believe anything the Government says anymore”.
He said: “We know that the Prime Minister was told that there were very serious concerns with Peter Mandelson. We’ve seen the due diligence document that he was given that basically said don’t appoint this guy.
“You’d think in those circumstances, the Prime Minister had paid pretty close attention to what was going on with security vetting and other parts of the process.
“And ultimately, I find it very unlikely that no one in the Foreign Office would have told anybody in No10 that there were red flags about the guy they wanted to send to Washington.”
Alex Burghart has declared Peter Mandelson’s appointment the ‘greatest political scandal of our time’
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GB NEWS
Mr Burghart took aim at Sir Keir amid the scandal, arguing that even if the Prime Minister wasn’t told, he was still made aware “on Tuesday”.
He made clear: “At every turn with this story, the Government makes an assertion and then a few months later, it has to admit that that wasn’t true.
“Even if one believes everything he said, the Prime Minister was told about this on Tuesday night.
“So even if he only found out on Tuesday night, he found out on Tuesday night.
“And that means that on Tuesday night he will have realised that he misled Parliament repeatedly over the past six months repeatedly.”
Calling on Sir Keir to “apologise” publicly, the Tory MP stated: “He has a very solemn duty to come to the House in those circumstances and say I’m terribly sorry I got this wrong, I wish to correct the record, and he didn’t do that.
The Prime Minister has asked the Foreign Office to quickly ‘establish the facts’ after the Government claimed Sir Keir only found out about Lord Mandelson’s vetting failure this week | GETTY
“It wasn’t until investigative journalists broke this story yesterday afternoon that Downing Street admitted what was going on, yet the Prime Minister thinks the rules don’t apply to him.
“He doesn’t care whether he tells the truth, this goes right to the top.
“It is the great political scandal of our time, is totally unacceptable and I just don’t think these people are fit to govern.”
Mr Burghart highlighted that none of this information was present in the humble address put forward by the Tories in regard to the scandal, declaring the lack of transparency “astonishing”.
He told GB News: “I think what’s astonishing is that a few months ago myself and Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative Party, put down a motion in parliament, something called a humble address, and we won that vote, and that motion instructed the Government to publish all of the documents connected with Peter Mandelson’s appointment.
Mr Burghart told GB News that the scandal is either ‘incompetence or a cover up of the highest order’
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GB NEWS
“And a few weeks ago we had some documents published – there was nothing about this vetting process in those documents either.
“This is a cover up of the highest order or it is incompetence of the highest order, and either way I just don’t see how anyone can have any confidence in these people.”
Questioned by host Stephen Dixon on whether he believes Sir Keir’s position is “still in question” amid the scandal, Mr Burghart admitted he “doesn’t see how it gets him off the hook”.
Mr Burghart concluded: “If you’re appointing someone and then you don’t go through the proper due diligence process, you skip it, fast track it, and then it turns out that actually you’ve appointed someone who shouldn’t have been appointed, that’s your responsibility.
“If you take that risk, it’s on you, and I find it very hard to have any sympathy with what the Prime Minister and his advisers are saying this morning, simply because every time we see the evidence, it shows that they’ve done something wrong.”