Lord Peter Mandelson is still receiving a six-figure salary for being Britain’s ambassador to the US despite being sacked, it is claimed. The Labour peer was axed from the role last month after his close ties to paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein were revealed.
Emails emerged in September in which Lord Mandelson told Epstein to “fight for early release” shortly before he was sentenced to 18 months in prison. He is also reported to have told Epstein “I think the world of you” the day before the sex offender began his sentence for soliciting prostitution from a minor in June 2008. Lord Mandelson has now returned to the UK and has been pictured in Wiltshire for the first time since coming back, stepping out of a black Land Rover.
According to The Telegraph, he remains on the Foreign Office payroll despite leaving his official residence in Washington on September 11.
Ambassadors can earn up to £174,000 a year and as he did not resign from the role, Lord Mandelson could be compensated for the fixed-term contract that he signed, it is reported.
He is on a four-year, fixed-term contract, The Telegraph understands.
Sir Keir Starmer last week suggested Lord Mandelson will never get a Government job again. The peer has previously said he continued his association with Epstein “for too long”.
Sir Keir had defended Lord Mandelson until the emergence of the emails, insisting he had gone through a proper vetting process and had helped build a successful relationship with Donald Trump’s White House.
Lord Mandelson’s friendship with Epstein had been known about, but Bloomberg and The Sun published emails showing that the relationship continued after the crimes committed by the financier had emerged.
Foreign Office minister Stephen Doughty told MPs last month that information had not been known when Lord Mandelson was appointed.
He said the emails showed “the depth and extent of Lord Mandelson’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein is materially different from that known at the time of his appointment”.
In a letter to embassy staff after his sacking, Lord Mandelson said: “I continue to feel utterly awful about my association with Epstein 20 years ago and the plight of his victims.”
