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Hello and welcome to this edition of The Westminster Hour with me, Ben Wright, and my guests.

Coming up, drama in the commons as the Prime Minister responds to the latest furorre

over Peter Mandelson's appointment as ambassador to Washington.

Kirstama's furious, he wasn't told about the outcome of Mandelson's vetting.

Opposition parties are furious, believing they were misled about the process.

The sacked head of the Foreign Office will have his say in front of a parliamentary committee too.

We'll consider the key questions MPs want answered.

I've been to Scotland to sample the mood there ahead of May's elections. We'll talk about that too.

And the row over banning under 16s from social media platforms deemed harmful continues. How and

how soon should the government act? First, let's meet my panel.

Laura Kirk Smith is the Labour MP for Aylesbury. When she was elected in 2024, it was the first

time Labour had won that seat. Laura previously worked in international development and as a foreign

policy analyst. She's now a parliamentary aid at the Department for

Housing Communities and Local Government. Does that leave much time for scrolling through your

phone, Laura? Speaking to Laura Coonsbeau this morning, the technology secretary, Liz Kendall,

confessed to an average of five hours a day. Do you think you're higher or lower?

Well, do you know what? I didn't have that setting turned on my phone until your producer

texted me about an hour and a half ago and I have racked up already about an hour and 28

minutes of screen time. So what does that tell you? It tells us that you're going to give Liz

Kendall a run for her money. Sir Bernard Jenkins is, I think it's fair to say, a veteran of the Conservative

benches, first elected in 1992. He now represents Harwich and North Essex, a procedural expert

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