It reflects the links between Peter Mandelson and a range of right-wing Labour figures.
Many of these links are well known and it does not follow that those mentioned were aware (at least in any detail) of Mandelson’s links to Epstein.
It does reflect how a network of right-wing Labour politics of a certain kind. Not the old right, social democratic, Fabian, union focused (these are different strands btw but could overlap). Rather as Robert Shrimsley correctly notes in the Financial Times, it reflects the ‘shallowness of the Starmer project. Devoid of people and ideas’..relying on a ‘job lot of Old Blairites’
Indeed the Starmer project, as authored by Mandelson and Morgan McSweeney, was to defeat and banish the left from the Labour Party. What came next was a political void, a nothingness.
Of course things have been done, modest improvements in some cases, but the vote of July 2024 after many years of Tory chaos was looking for real change and the current Government has little idea what that might be or how to bring it about
On Monday Nigel Farage and Lee Anderson held yet another press conference on this occasion to unveil a ‘plan’ to save pubs.
Farage announced Reform would reinstate the two child benefit cap (they had recently opposed) threatening large numbers of children with a lack of welfare and said this would help to pay for a 5p reduction in the price of pint.
Challenged to justify the costings behind this on the Today programme on Tuesday 30p Lee Anderson of course could not.
However a dose of reality was injected into matters by Wetherspoons Tim Martin. Alcohol duty rose at the beginning of February with the stated impact of increasing prices by 2p a pint.
Of course the reality is invariably different. Wetherspoons did not increase all prices but put 10p on a pint of cask beer and 15p on some other keg beers (although far from all). Spoons are noted for their keen pricing policy so they will remain highly competitive in the market. The increase reflected not just the duty increase but rising costs across the board.
However Farage’s 5p a pint reduction would hardly make an impact. However since he drinks red wine and gin and tonic perhaps its not surprising he is out of touch with the price of a pint.
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has paid tribute to the veteran snooker player and commentator John Virgo who has died at 79.
In a sport which remains predominantly clean shaven, Virgo stood out has someone who brought power both to the snooker table and to his commentaries.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, the Daily Telegraph described John Virgo as a ‘dour northern socialist’ which was just their way of saying he had a beard.
Jeremy Corbyn (Independent, Islington North). Hansard 4th February 2026
This debate is crucial and seminal, but first and foremost it must be about the victims of the horrible web that Epstein created—the abuse, abduction, raping and secret imprisonment of women, who were apparently flown in and out of major cities around the world for the convenience of rich and powerful men. It is utterly disgusting, depraved and abominable behaviour on every single level, and every Member who has called it out is absolutely right to do so.
Epstein was not revealed yesterday; he was not convicted last week; he was not convicted last year. He was first convicted 18 years ago. It is not as if his record was not extremely well known. It seems that we are debating it now only because of the inclusion of Peter Mandelson in the ghastly, nasty, vile, horrible web that they created.
We have a duty to do something important today, and I for one support the Opposition motion. I hope that we vote on it, rather than coming to some crabby deal between the Government and the Opposition through a manuscript amendment that would kick the whole thing into the long grass, a long way away, on the pretence that we cannot discuss these issues because that might affect security or international relations. Almost anything can affect international relations. It sounds to me like the Government simply trying to get out of things.
The question is fundamentally one for the Prime Minister, and it is a bit odd that he is not here for the debate. It is a bit odd that he has not spoken in the debate and that all he has done is say what he did today at Prime Minister’s Question Time. I cannot believe that, when he was about to appoint Peter Mandelson as the ambassador to Washington, he was not made fully aware of all of Peter Mandelson’s record. The Prime Minister would have known about the number of times that Peter Mandelson was forced to resign, even from the Tony Blair Government, because of his behaviour. He would have known Mandelson’s record as an EU Commissioner, and of his interesting relationship with global dealers in minerals and many other things. He would have known all of that, yet he still went ahead and appointed Mandelson as ambassador to Washington, apparently despite advice from the Foreign Office and others. What a shame, what a disgrace and what an appalling appointment to make. We do not even know whether Mandelson is still being paid by the Foreign Office.
Today, we have to be very stern and clear that there needs to be the fullest possible inquiry into all of this. Parliament is not competent to undertake this inquiry. The Cabinet Secretary and the civil service machine are not competent to do so. They have all been ensnared in this gilded, friendly web of Mandelson and his business, political and social contacts, where favours were done and contracts were apparently awarded. That ghastly company Palantir was trying to get hold of our national health service, apparently at the behest of Mandelson and others.
None of us here are competent to undertake that inquiry, which is why I intervened earlier—I thank the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Lisa Smart) for giving way—on how it should be conducted. I think it has to be judicially led, independent and, for the most part, in the public eye—rather like when the Government were eventually forced to undertake the Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq war; that is the nearest parallel I can find—because it needs to expose the whole web that Mandelson created, and the power play that he operated within the civil service, the political establishment, the media and so much else.
The hon. Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon) made a wonderful and very powerful speech. I thank him for his reference to what Mandelson said and did about me when I was Leader of the Opposition and leader of the Labour party. I can confirm to the House that under my leadership, Mandelson had no role, no influence and no part to play, because I do not trust the man or believe him. We need to make that very clear, because his role in British politics has been basically malign, undermining, and a very corrupting influence altogether.
When we look at our politics, we need to look at the role that big money, patronage, and turning a blind eye to crime play in it, because what we end up with is the national embarrassment of Mandelson being the ambassador to Washington, apparently on the basis that it was a risk worth taking in order to please Donald Trump. I do not know whether it succeeded in pleasing Donald Trump, but I did notice that at one of his endless press conferences, he could not remember who Mandelson was, so I am not sure how big the impact on the President was. Today is a day of shame for our politics—shame that we have got into the situation that has now been exposed.
Epstein was very, very powerful and very, very wealthy. Obviously, there needs to be more examination of that. More files have been uncovered than even Julian Assange managed to uncover through Wikileaks, and those files are going to be read and studied for a long time to come. There are lots of people all around the world who were dragged into this ghastly web based on dishonesty, lies, corruption and patronage. It is up to us as MPs to ’fess up to what has happened and to make sure there is a genuinely open, independent inquiry. When it comes to the standards of democracy we have in our society, and the levels of patronage that continue within it, we need to look at ourselves in the mirror.
Starmer says Mandelson betrayed his country and his party by leaking secrets. He lied before the appointment process. The government has referred him to the police. He says he has asked officials to draft legislation to stop Mandelson of his title.
Prime Ministers Questions 4th February 2026 (Guardian)
Monday 16th February 1987. Today we had a meeting of the NEC and the Shadow Cabinet, the first since Neil Kinnock became leader, Kinnock introduced the meeting and spoke for about twenty minutes.. We went on to Peter Mandelson who said a few words. I find Mandelson a threatening figure for the future of the Party. He came in from the media eighteen months ago and has taken over
Peter Mandelson the former UK Ambassador to the US unveiled in June 2025 an Ambassador’s Sofa at Butterworths a favourite Washington restaurant and bar of the Trump MAGA faithful.
Presiding was Raheem Kassam, co-owner of the restaurant and far right figure who has been an advisor to Farage and is an ally of MAGA fascist Steve Bannon.
The Times reported that the occasion was marked by glasses of Hambledon English sparkling wine but the restaurant serves British gastro pub type food and Guinness
Mandelson’s speech was reported as below
“I feel that over centuries now, British diplomats here in United States have been creating coalitions that support the special relationship,” he said. “I have my own classic New Labour experience of fishing for votes across the political spectrum and forging unlikely coalitions, so good luck to you.
“I just think what you have created here at Butterworth’s is fairly remarkable. You’ve brought the best of British gastro pub food and planted it down here on Capitol Hill. I feel you’ve brought the special relationship up to a new higher level.”
*Tony Benn recorded this assessment, which was made in a comment to the then Labour MP for Bishop Auckland, Derek Foster, in his Diary on 6th December 1996 just months before Labour won a landslide victory in the May 1997 Election.
It underlines again that Benn and others on the left had the measure of Mandelson 30 years ago, while Blair and later Starmer did not.
As Soon As This Pub Closes: Farage’s plan to ‘save’ pubs
Nigel Farage held one of his very regular press conferences on Tuesday, in a bar. He was putting forward Reform’s plans to save British pubs.
Numbers are closing, and have been for some years. It’s also the case that new pubs open, Wetherspoons is quite busy on this at the moment, but like all the best profit and loss accounts the two are never quite tied up.
Farage’s plan had a few key points.
Business rates on pubs will be scrapped gradually over a five year Parliament. This will be paid for by reintroducing the two child benefit cap. Whether the figures actually add up who knows but it doesn’t matter because Farage is unlikely to be PM in the near future. As often with Reform a bit more thought suggests issues. Restoring the benefit cap will take money away from a considerable number, money that might on occasion have paid for an occasional pub visit. There is also a wider historical issue which sits oddly. Temperance had it that drunkards were feckless who also therefore had lots of children which they couldn’t afford. Hmmm. More importantly the politics of leaving children to go hungry is not popular and certainly not populist politics
The VAT rate for pubs will be cut to bring it more into line with supermarkets (that don’t pay VAT on food). A good idea although one wonders if the supermarkets think so. Governments which are usually keen to ‘bash’ pubs financially are much less keen to take on the huge profits of the big supermarkets.
Where tenanted pubs can buy beer etc from will be liberalised so that they don’t have to pay the often sky high rates pub companies charge them but can get supplies cheaper on the open market. What the pub companies such as Marstons, M&B, Fullers, Youngs etc will think about this is how shall we say uncertain
Lastly Farage says Reform will cut 5p off the price of a pint. So what? With many pints these days costing more than a fiver that amounts to less than a 1% cut.
It was I suppose surprising that Farage didn’t say his plan to save pubs was to visit as many of the 794 Wetherspoons currently open before Easter.
It might also be argued that this was one of Reform’s less wild pressers. Reality was engaged with just a little bit and as above reality was found to be quite difficult to grapple with.
In my view pubs, and they do need saving, are best saved not from above but by communities, those that use them and drink in them, from below. Absolutely nothing from Farage on that of course, the ‘people’s party’ in name only.
I’ll gloss over the political figure who most often uses ‘it’s official’ and also note that the title of this post is not a summary of the weather for January 2026 which was wet, wet, wet.
Rather we’re talking or rather drinking Dry January here. Its about abstaining from alcohol for a month to recover physically and materially from the excesses of the festive season.
Figures from Waitrose show that while in January 2022 sales of alcohol were 42% lower than other months of the year in January 2026 this figure had dropped to 25%.The increase in imbibement was reportedly most notable on the red wine shelves (Waitrose for the unfamiliar is distinctly up market on wine). Sales of Argentinian red were up 25% and Chilean red up 27%.
Waitrose says 12th January was the date when shoppers felt it was safe to visit the beer, wine and spirits aisles again with sales up 11% on the previous week.
The Times (2nd February) which managed an Editorial on the subject suggests that while people drank less in January instead of complete abstinence there was a mixture of lo and no drinking together with alcoholic beverages
