Starmer's darkest day: PM admits he knew the truth about Mandelson and Epstein
The Daily T
The Telegraph
4.1 • 705 Ratings
🗓️ 4 February 2026
⏱️ 35 minutes
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Summary
Keir Starmer was given a grilling at Prime Minister’s Questions this lunchtime, with Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch forcing the Prime Minister into admitting that he was aware of Peter Mandelson’s ongoing relationship with Jeffrey Epstein at the time of his appointment as US ambassador, but decided to press ahead with the move anyway.
Starmer, for his part, threw the one-time party grandee to the wolves, saying Mandelson had “lied repeatedly to his team, had “betrayed” his country with the apparent leaking of sensitive financial documents and “regretted appointing him”.
On today’s Daily T, Camilla and Tim reflect on whether, with his own MPs turning on him again, and his self-ascribed reputation of being a squeaky clean man of integrity lying in tatters, Keir Starmer himself is now finished.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Telegraph. |
| 0:09.9 | Kemi has finally nailed him. |
| 0:12.1 | The Prime Minister admits that he did know Peter Mandelson was friends with Geoffrey Epstein when he appointed him as US ambassador. |
| 0:18.6 | We unpick the worst day of Kirstama's premiership, including a humiliating PMQs. |
| 0:25.5 | Welcome to The Daily Tea with me, Tim Stanley. |
| 0:27.4 | And me, Camilla Tomone. |
| 0:41.5 | Tim, another huge day in news. |
| 0:43.9 | Guess what we're now calling this at The Telegraph? |
| 0:44.3 | Go on. |
| 0:46.4 | The Peter Scandelson saga. |
| 0:47.1 | Very good. |
| 0:50.8 | The Tories tried to get muckstorm going, which just made me think of Thames water. |
| 0:51.8 | Yes, indeed. |
| 0:53.1 | That's not the right look, is it? No, it's not. |
| 0:53.4 | It's not. |
| 0:54.1 | Shall we summarise? Because we are speaking towards the end of the day, but we're waiting for these documents, these Starmer documents referencing Mandelson to be released. |
| 1:04.0 | These are the documents that will explain what went on when he was appointed US ambassador. |
| 1:08.0 | And we'll get into the row about how they should have been released and to whom. |
| 1:12.7 | But let's just summarise before we also get cracking on speaking about what was a box office PMQs today. |
| 1:19.6 | The police are now officially investigating Peter Mandelson. |
| 1:23.5 | They have confirmed that they're investigating a 72-year-old man. |
| 1:27.3 | Isn't it horrible when the police do that? |
... |
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