Keir Starmer is in trouble. Serious trouble. The kind of trouble you don’t stumble into by accident unless you’re actively moonlighting as your own worst enemy.

His decision to appoint Peter Mandelson, twice sacked by Labour and permanently scented with scandal is every bit as absurd as it sounds. It’s the political equivalent of hiring a lifeguard who’s been fired twice for pushing people under the water.

Let me be clear: I don’t think Starmer is an evil paedophile, a Prince of Darkness, or some Machiavellian villain stroking a white cat. But there is one question that simply refuses to go away: where, exactly, was the judgement of a lawyer and former head of the Crown Prosecution Service?

The CV That Should Have Met the Bin

If someone sent me the CV of an Electrical Project Manager who’d been fired twice and was known to keep the company of unsavoury characters, I wouldn’t “weigh up the risks.” I’d put the kettle on and throw the CV straight in the bin. He might be brilliant at wiring substations, but I’m not torching my own reputation on the hope that he’s merely misunderstood.

And yet here we are. Starmer looked at Mandelson and thought: Yes. That’s the man.

Presumably this came via Morgan McSweeney, in a conversation that can only be imagined along the following lines. “Keir, let’s be honest. He’s a wrong ’un. But America is absolutely packed with wrong ’uns. We’re sending him into his natural habitat. If we’re dealing with weirdoes, crooks, and sex offenders, we might as well use someone with experience.”

Everyone Knew. Everyone.

Starmer now claims he didn’t know quite how bad Mandelson was. This is a bold defence, akin to a pilot saying he hadn’t noticed the wings were missing.

Everyone else in political and financial circles knew. In June 2023, documents aired in a New York court case between the US Virgin Islands and JP Morgan Chase included an exhibit stating the following: “Jeffrey Epstein appears to maintain a particularly close relationship with Prince Andrew the Duke of York and Lord Peter Mandelson, a senior member of the British government”.

This wasn’t buried in a locked filing cabinet at the bottom of the Atlantic. It was public. Widely reported. Inescapable.

Forensic Attention to Detail (Terms and Conditions Apply)

So which is it? Did Starmer know and proceed anyway, or did he somehow miss this while the rest of the political class was reading it over breakfast?

If it’s the latter, it fatally undermines the very quality his supporters sold him on: forensic attention to detail. Many people voted for Starmer precisely because Boris Johnson treated detail like a personal enemy, Liz Truss detonated the economy in a live experiment, and by the time Rishi Sunak tried to reintroduce reality, the building was already on fire.

Starmer was supposed to be the grown-up. Instead, he’s rehired an arsonist.

I don’t see a way out for him. His judgement, innocent or otherwise, may well finish him. Even those of us who didn’t especially like him but wanted him to succeed watched in disbelief as Mandelson was hauled back into high office like a cursed artefact no one should ever touch.

Perhaps Starmer didn’t fully grasp the depth of Mandelson’s treachery. But instinct alone should have screamed that this appointment was riddled with risk. And if a former prosecutor lacks instinct, that’s not a minor character flaw, it’s a career-ending one.

Opening the Door to Something Worse

The wider implications are grim. This kind of folly clears the runway for Reform UK to parade themselves as a party of “values.” A far-right populist movement, bankrolled by billionaires, eager to whip up enough resentment to justify dismantling workers’ rights, health and safety, financial regulation, and environmental protections; all under the cheery slogan of “cutting red tape” to make Britain great again.

If we’re generous, Starmer has displayed an innocent but catastrophic lack of judgement. If we’re realistic, he knew Mandelson was radioactive and bought into the idea that someone corrupt and morally hollow would make the perfect ambassador to a country increasingly comfortable with corruption and moral bankruptcy.

If that’s the case, Starmer may go down in history not as a reformer, but as the unwitting architect of Britain’s slide into far-right populism.

What a time to be alive.