Keir Starmer suffered a humiliating retreat on Wednesday as a backbench rebellion forced the Prime Minister to hand files on Peter Mandelson's relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein to Parliament's Intelligence and Security Committee.
The climbdown came after Labour MPs openly revolted against a government amendment that would have allowed ministers to review the documents themselves before any parliamentary scrutiny. Paula Barker, MP for Liverpool Wavertree, told colleagues she was "ashamed" of the proposal, whilst Matt Bishop refused to support what he termed a "cover-up" designed to allow the government to "mark its own homework."
At Prime Minister's Questions, Kemi Badenoch extracted a damaging admission from Starmer: that he had known at the time of Mandelson's appointment as US ambassador that the former Business Secretary had remained friends with Epstein even after his conviction for child sex offences. That confession, according to The Spectator, transformed the story from a procedural dispute into a question of the Prime Minister's judgment.
As they say in Westminster, "the constitution is what happens"—precedent matters more than law. The government's initial attempt to control the document release drew immediate comparisons to the Owen Paterson standards scandal of 2021, when Conservative MPs voted to overturn a parliamentary suspension and sparked a political firestorm. Labour backbenchers, many of whom cut their political teeth attacking that Tory overreach, found themselves facing an identical choice.
By late afternoon, Downing Street had capitulated. Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, who had privately urged the Prime Minister to refer the matter to the Intelligence and Security Committee, emerged as the architect of the U-turn. The decision to defer to the ISC—a body that operates with security clearance and can review sensitive intelligence material—represented the minimum viable concession to angry Labour MPs.
The episode reveals dangerous fractures in Starmer's authority just months into his premiership. Anonymous Labour MPs told reporters the situation was "bad," with suggestions that the scandal could threaten the Prime Minister's position ahead of May local elections. The comparison to previous weak governments is inescapable: John Major struggling with Maastricht rebels in the 1990s, Theresa May losing control over Brexit votes, and now Starmer unable to command loyalty on a matter touching both security vetting and political propriety.
The Mandelson appointment has become politically toxic not merely because of the Epstein connection, but because it crystallises broader Labour anxieties about the government's direction. Backbenchers already uneasy about the administration's cautious approach to public services now face constituents demanding to know why the Prime Minister elevated someone with such compromising associations to represent Britain in Washington.
Scotland Yard has separately warned Number 10 that the release of specific documents could undermine its ongoing investigation, adding a further layer of complexity to an already fraught situation. The police intervention gives Starmer some cover for delay, but it also ensures the story will continue to generate headlines as the investigation proceeds.
For a Prime Minister who built his political reputation on forensic cross-examination and institutional propriety, Wednesday's defeat carried particular sting. The former Director of Public Prosecutions found himself outmanoeuvred by his own backbenchers and forced into a retreat that acknowledged he had misjudged both the politics and the parliamentary arithmetic.
The ISC will now review the files, but the political damage has already been done. Starmer has demonstrated that he lacks either the authority or the political instinct to manage a crisis within his own party. Whether that proves a temporary embarrassment or a fundamental challenge to his premiership will depend on what the ISC discovers—and whether Labour MPs decide their leader's judgment can still be trusted.
