British police are reviewing reports of alleged misconduct in public office after former Labour Party Cabinet Minister, Peter Mandelson, was accused of passing on sensitive government information to notorious sex offender and paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
A furore has erupted around Mandelson, who was widely credited as one of the key architects of Tony Blair’s New Labour, after the latest dump of Epstein files showed that he passed highly sensitive government information to Epstein around the financial crisis of 2008, and also told the financier that he was “trying hard” to change government policy on bankers’ bonuses.
The latest dump of Epstein papers by the US Department of Justice showed that he made payments of £65,000 to Mandelson and his partner between 2003 and 2009. Three payments of $25,000 were made to Mandelson between 2003 and 2004, with a payment of £10,000 to Reinaldo Avila da Silva, now Mandelson’s husband, for an osteopathy course in 2009.
Many of the email exchanges were made after Epstein’s conviction in 2008, after he pleaded guilty in a Florida state court of procuring a child for prostitution. Other high profile figures who have been criticised for also remaining in touch with the sex offender after the 2008 conviction include Bill Gates, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, and Sarah Ferguson.
Public anger erupted since the vast cache of documents were released after it was found that, in addition to the payments to the peer:
- Mandelson gave advance notice to Epstein of a €500bn bailout to save the Euro while he was business secretary under Gordon Brown in 2009 – information that critics say would have been enormously sensitive and valuable.
- Mandelson acted on requests from Epstein seeking to change government policy on taxing bankers’ bonuses, emailing that he was “trying hard to amend,” and assuring the convicted sex offender in 2009 that, while “Treasury digging in”, he was “on [the] case”. He also advised Epstein that the investment bank JPMorgan could call the then chancellor, Alistair Darling, and “mildly threaten” him on the issue. Mandelson told the BBC at the weekend that his argument against taxing the bonuses was being widely made at the time.
- An email to the British Prime Minister from special adviser Nick Butler in June 2009 on the impact of the global financial crisis that suggested the government had saleable assets was forwarded by Mandelson to Epstein with the comment: “Interesting note that’s gone to the PM”. When asked by the disgraced financier what saleable assets were refereed to a reply said: “Land, property I guess.”
Last September, The Telegraph reported that “Jeffrey Epstein brokered a deal with Lord Mandelson over the sale of a UK taxpayer-owned banking business after he had been convicted of child sex offences, emails have revealed.”
The £1bn deal was negotiated while Lord Mandelson was Business Secretary and only months after Epstein had been released from prison.
Sempra Commodities, a joint venture between the taxpayer-owned Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and Sempra Energy, was sold to JP Morgan in a deal on which Epstein gave advice to both Lord Mandelson and to Jes Staley, a senior executive with JP Morgan who has since been banned from the City over his relationship with the disgraced financier.
Yesterday, Reform UK and the Scottish National Party (SNP) said they had reported Mandelson – who was made a peer by Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown – to the police, while the Liberal Democrats, Plaid Cymru and some Labour MPs have also called for the police to investigate.
Metropolitan Police commander Ella Marriott said yesterday that they had received “a number of reports relating to alleged misconduct in a public office” after the latest batch of Epstein files were released.
“We are aware of the further release of millions of court documents in relation to Jeffrey Epstein by the United States Department of Justice,” she said.
Mandelson, who was sacked as US ambassador last year because of his past connections to Epstein, has now also resigned from the British Labour party where he served as advisor, member of Parliament and Cabinet Minister.
Former British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, has demanded an investigation into the “disclosure of confidential and market-sensitive information from the then business department during the global financial crisis”.
He said in a statement: “Given the shocking new information that has come to light in the latest tranche of Epstein papers, including information about the transfer to Mr Epstein of at least one highly sensitive government document as well as other highly confidential information, I have now written to ask for a wider and more intensive inquiry to take place into the wholly unacceptable disclosure of government papers and information during the period when the country was battling the global financial crisis.”
Meanwhile, Sky News says its analysis shows that photos of Peter Mandelson in his underwear were taken in the paedophile financier’s Paris flat. The photos and their inclusion in the files are not indicative of any wrongdoing. A photos of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor crouching over a woman was taken in Epstein’s New York City mansion, the analysis also found.
