𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

Yet after reports that Lord Mandelson failed his vetting, No 10 has blamed civil servants. Sir Olly Robbins, boss of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), was sacked after he was accused of failing to tell the Prime Minister about the outcome of the vetting.

Tory party leader Kemi Badenoch has demanded that Sir Keir resign. On Monday, she told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “Somebody who was a national security risk – and this had been flagged – was put into the most senior and sensitive diplomatic post, where all sorts of information, intelligence, which I would not have seen as a secretary of state, would have come across his desk. A national security issue.

“And what I find really shocking is how so many people’s careers are being ended over this, but the Prime Minister is not taking responsibility. He’s throwing everybody under a bus.”

Sir Olly is reportedly seeking legal advice ahead of an appearance before MPs at the Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday. Sir Keir will deliver his version of events in a statement to the House of Commons on Monday.

But was the Prime Minister right to sack Olly Robbins? We give Express readers a chance to have their say below.

Sir Olly was made the permanent under-secretary of the FCDO in January 2025.

He was also the head of the UK’s Diplomatic Service and the top policy adviser to the Foreign Secretary.

He served as the previously permanent secretary of the Department for Exiting the European Union in 2016, and former PM Theresa May’s Europe adviser from 2017-19, overseeing Brexit negotiations.

Earlier, he served as principal private secretary for former PMs Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.