Best Of

Friday afternoon

The Times is told that both the Foreign Office and Number 10 were aware of the Bloomberg front up message on Tuesday morning

Government sources say that Starmer was not **aware** of the messages when he spoke at PMQs. This has yet to be confirmed on the record by No 10

This is the best timetable we've been able to pull together from multiple sources in government

I'm told that there are several different timelines circulating in government which are still being worked on

Number 10 and the foreign office will now come under mounting pressure to disclose exactly what it knew, and more importantly who knew, about the emails

It comes down to Mandelson should not have been appointed in the first place

With his shady background and history of fibbing, Mandy could be considered Labour's Boris; strange then that Sir Keir, who made piety, honesty, character and so on the cornerstone of his sanctimonious assaults on Johnson, employed Mandelson. Well, it would be strange if you hadn't noticed Starmer has always been a hypocritical snide, the political equivalent of a bent copper.

“Our employers told us it was ok… I will never visit 🇺🇸 again. It feels good to be free.”

Hundreds of South Korean workers detained in shackles landed home, met by family who tearfully hugged them.

Arrested building a factory to employ thousands.
https://x.com/TheTNHoller/status/1966663752348033408

This is a great thread.

People need to understand why many South Koreans view what happened in Georgia as a betrayal.

In the past, South Korea hedged between the U.S. and China (U.S. for security, China for economy). But at a certain point, Seoul stopped hedging, and it chose a side. It chose the U.S...
https://x.com/koreanforeigner/status/1966730198805614868

I recommend reading the whole thing.

If the US continues with its policy of shitting on its allies, some of them may eventually decide that China is the lesser of two evils.

“Trump has switched the United States’ role from global insurer to extractor of profit,” writes
@AdamPosen. China will likely be the least affected by this shift, “while Washington’s closest allies will be the most damaged.”
https://x.com/ForeignAffairs/status/1959245743861957032

Sky

Met Police estimate around 110,000 attending the Unite the Kingdom rally

That is a very big amti-Starmer rally.

It was led by Tommy Robinson and addressed by Bannon, it was a nationalist right rally not just an anti Starmer rally

Did you go along - sounds right up your street ?

No I did not, I do not even vote Reform left alone for Robinson and Advance but it does show he has a following

All decent conservatives should distance themselves from all thing's Robinson and Reform

So on current polls that is a third of the voters gone then

Wednesday, 08.10

Mandelson's interview with The Sun is broadcast. At this point Number 10 is aware of the emails, their contents and the fact that Mandelson is verifying their existence on the record in a broadcast interview

Bloomberg messages Mandelson on WhatsApp on both his US and UK mobiles, asking him to respond to the questions he had been sent. 'I don't know what these emails are or where they come from,' he replied

He asked Bloomberg how it had obtained them

Wednesday, 12.05

Keir Starmer is pressed by Kemi Badenoch over Lord Mandelson's links to Jeffrey Epstein

Starmer gives a forthright defence of Mandelson, expressing his full confidence

'The ambassador has repeatedly expressed his deep regret for his association with Epstein, and he is right to do so. I have confidence in him, and he is playing an important role in the UK-US relationship'

Wednesday, 3.49pm

Bloomberg messages Mandelson about the emails again. 'I am taking advice on legalities and will revert'

Wednesday, 4.50pm

The Sun publishes details of some of the emails that were originally obtained by Bloomberg News. It says they were circulating around Washington DC. They include three of the most damaging emails

Lord Mandelson does not dispute the veracity of the messages

Wednesday, 8.45pm

Bloomberg publishes the full emails. They are part of a wider cache of 18,000 emails from Epstein. Epstein messaged Mandelson on a now defunct BT Internet email address

'I think the world of you and I feel hopeless and furious about what has happened,' Mandelson says in one. 'I can barely understand it. It just could not happen in Britain'

Thursday, 10am

Starmer has a meeting in Downing Street with Yvette Cooper, the foreign secretary, and Johnny Reynolds, the chief whip, with one item on the agenda - Lord Mandelson's future

Reynolds says he has been inundated with messages from concerned backbenchers - more than 50 have been in contact. 'The PLP won't wear it,' he says

Starmer decides to sack him, but there are two problems

First, it is early in the morning in Washington and Mandelson is asleep. There is a delay while Olly Robbins calls the US residence and aides wake Mandelson. It means that the announcement in the Commons is also delayed, with ministers also having to stall for time

Second, Mandelson may no longer be ambassador but he has not been sacked. He remains a government employee

By choosing not to resign he has forced the government to find legal grounds to sack him or pay him compensation for losing his job. He could be in line for a six figure settlement

Number 10 says that Starmer first read the emails that evening and found them 'reprehensible'. It says the information in the emails is 'materially different' from what was known at the time of Mandelson's appointment and that the emails 'only emerged in the last 24 hours or so'

How the flying feck do Capita/ TV Licencing get away with this?
I get at least one dodgy letter a month from them, but this is pure bollocks.

Which part of it is bullshit?

I just went to the /notv link and haven't had a letter since.

In my experience they'll start messaging you again about 11 months after your declaration of notv. Maybe less. They need to make sure (and keep making sure) you're really really not watching anything they can tax you for.

I assume at that point I can go to the link again.

If anyone ever did come to the door to check what I'm watching I'm pretty sure I'd just tell them to bugger off, though given some people are convicted I assume they do go to people's houses sometimes so its not an empty threat. How they get any evidence, unless they can see the TV from outside the house, is beyond me.

Last time I used the link, it insisted that you declare how you do watch this and that and the other. There was no way to answer None. I gave up trying and wrote them one last snail-mail.

So they're not prepared to believe you don't watch telly at all?

Apparently not, their base assumption is that every person alive consumes some type of product that they can charge for. I make a point of never watching anything live at all, not even live-streams from YouTubers. And I actually don't know what these other things are about catch-up or iPlayer or whatever.

I think they try to make you choose one of their list just to get through the /notv thing, so they can say "Aha! so you do watch something we can charge for!"

Friday afternoon

The Times is told that both the Foreign Office and Number 10 were aware of the Bloomberg front up message on Tuesday morning

Government sources say that Starmer was not **aware** of the messages when he spoke at PMQs. This has yet to be confirmed on the record by No 10

This is the best timetable we've been able to pull together from multiple sources in government

I'm told that there are several different timelines circulating in government which are still being worked on

Number 10 and the foreign office will now come under mounting pressure to disclose exactly what it knew, and more importantly who knew, about the emails

It comes down to Mandelson should not have been appointed in the first place

To be fair ISTR that quite a lot of people thought it was a good idea at the time.

I doubt they do now though

Wise after the event!