Somewhere in the documents surrounding Peter Mandelson’s ambassadorial appointment, the Spectator's political editor Tim Shipman reveals, is a text Keir Starmer sent the night before the announcement. ‘You’ll be brilliant in challenging circumstances,’ he told the Prince of Darkness. ‘And after many years of our discussions, we get to work together side by side. I really look forward to that.’

The message was leaked after a week in which the Prime Minister’s relationship with senior civil servants has collapsed. Tim says Starmer’s ‘apparent incomprehension of the very process he advocates has led officials to conclude he is no better than the predecessor he most deplores – Boris Johnson’. Has Starmer become the very thing he sought to destroy?

Tim Shipman joins Oscar Edmondson and James Heale to discuss.

Produced by Oscar Edmondson and Patrick Gibbons.

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It will come as no surprise that Keir Starmer appears to have heard a very different evidence session from Sir Olly Robbins to the one everyone else thought the ex Foreign Office mandarin gave yesterday. The Prime Minister arrived in the Commons for questions today convinced that Robbins had in fact largely backed him up, give or take a few quibbles over whether there was a ‘dismissive’ attitude in Downing Street towards Peter Mandelson’s vetting. What planet is the PM on?

Eyes were fixed on his front bench, with journalists looking for any chinks in the armour after a couple of very unconvincing media rounds from usually loyal hummers Ed Miliband and Pat McFadden, but will anyone actually move against Starmer?

Oscar Edmondson speaks to James Heale and Isabel Hardman.

Produced by Oscar Edmondson.

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'The most gripping testimony' since Dominic Cummings which could prove 'extraordinary and quietly devastating' for Keir Starmer. That's the verdict of the Spectator's political editor Tim Shipman following sacked Foreign Office chief Sir Olly Robbins's testimony today before the Foreign Affairs Committee. Tim and former FCDO mandarin Ameer Kotecha join James Heale to explain why the hearing over the Mandelson appointment was so important, the questions the session has raised – and the holes in the story that still remain.

Produced by Megan McElroy and Patrick Gibbons.

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Westminster is braced ahead of two key interventions in the Mandelson scandal. This afternoon, the prime minister will give a statement in which we understand he will convey his ‘anger’ at being kept in the dark about Peter Mandelson’s (failed) vetting process. Then tomorrow morning, we are expecting to hear Olly Robbins’s side of the story when he appears in front of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee. Whose testimony will be the most compelling? Will it be the case – as we expect – that Mandelson’s was a political appointment which the Foreign Office was under orders to push through, despite what skeletons might be in his closet?

Tim Shipman speaks to James Heale.

Produced by Megan McElroy and Oscar Edmondson.

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Liberal Democrat peer Mark Pack and MP for Surrey Heath Al Pinkerton join James Heale to explain that it is a matter of 'when not if' the party become the second biggest in local government. Overtaking the Conservatives would be 'seismic' but they see it as inevitable, following a 'long-run of sustained wins' in the post-coalition Lib Dem era.

Faced with criticism that the Lib Dems are too focused on community and that leader Ed Davey is more interested in stunts than policy, they explain that a 'rich and varied' diet of political communication has never been more necessary, and that they will never apologise for taking up the causes that matter to their constituents. They also argue that defending international liberalism has never been more important: does an era of escalating geopolitical crises help or hinder the Liberal Democrat message?

Produced by Patrick Gibbons.

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Danny Kruger joins James Heale to set out Reform’s plan to overhaul the British state – from taking on the civil service to restoring ministerial control – and why he believes the system will resist change.

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The Peter Mandelson scandal just got more scandalous. Last night the story broke that Mandeslon actually failed his enhanced vetting before being made US Ambassador. Number 10 are pleading ignorance. Their defence sits on the suggestion that the Foreign Office’s most senior official unilaterally decided to ignore the findings and – what’s more – that he told no one. It’s a stretch and, as Tim Shipman says MPs' 'fury is overwhelming'.

There are a number of outstanding questions, including: what could possibly be in it for the FCDO to withhold this key information? Now Sir Olly Robbins has been sacked, will he go public? Did Starmer knowingly mislead parliament when he said that the vetting process was followed? And, considering he found out this information earlier this week, why didn’t he correct the record?

Tim Shipman and Isabel Hardman join Oscar Edmondson to react to the latest in what is shaping up to be one of the most challenging scandal of the Starmer era.

Produced by Oscar Edmondson and Patrick Gibbons.

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It is a hard time to be a Labour MP. The polls are flagging, the economy is stagnating and the Middle East remains in crisis. But facing electoral armageddon in three weeks’ time, one brave backbencher has taken it up on herself to raise her party’s spirits. Samantha Niblett, the Honourable Member for South Derbyshire, is launching a campaign to make 2026 the ‘summer of sex’.

On today's podcast, Tim Shipman and James Heale make sense of the story with Cindy Gallop, the sextech entrepreneur who's working with Niblett on the campaign, and Cleo Watson, former special adviser and author of novels Whips and Cleavage.

Produced by Megan McElroy.

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