Standards in Public Life

Ben Obese-Jecty Excerpts

Monday 9th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Darren Jones]

Where the Government have jurisdiction over documents and in compliance with the Humble Address, we will publish them, as I said to the House earlier today.

[Ben Obese-Jecty (Huntingdon) (Con)]

The Chief Secretary keeps making reference to, “If we had known then what we know now,” with regard to Peter Mandelson’s appointment. The key fact is that we already knew of Peter Mandelson’s ongoing relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, as the Prime Minister spoke about at PMQs last week, just as the Government knew about Matthew Doyle’s relationship with Sean Morton and still gave him a peerage after the internal investigation. Let me come back to the resignation statement of the chief of staff yesterday. He stated that he

“did not oversee the due diligence and vetting process”.

Can the Chief Secretary explain who did oversee the due diligence and vetting process?

[Darren Jones]

Those processes are administered by the propriety and ethics team in the Cabinet Office, by the Foreign Office and by all the normal, appropriate authorities.