Sir Olly Robbins has admitted it would have been “very difficult” for the Foreign Office to have denied clearance to Lord Mandelson, given the “pressure” he faced from No10.
Speaking to the Foreign Affairs committee, Sir Olly said: “All I can do is agree with the premise that against that backdrop, the Foreign Office saying, ‘okay sorry, we can’t grant him clearance’ would have been a very, very difficult problem.
“And it would have been a difficult problem I would have been landing the Foreign Secretary with and the Prime Minister with. And of course, given the commentary of the last few days, I’m acutely conscious of that.”
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