A top civil servant has been grilled over The Independent's reporting, which revealed concerns that Lord Peter Mandelson had failed security vetting.
The newspaper approached No 10 about claims that Lord Mandelson had not cleared his security vetting as long ago as last September, when the disgraced peer was sacked from his post as ambassador to the US.
A WhatsApp exchange from that time between The Independent and Downing Street’s then director of communications, Tim Allan – in which Mr Allan responds that “vetting was done by FCDO in the normal way” – has been described as a “smoking gun” that makes it impossible to deny that No 10 was made aware of concerns in September, seven months before the PM claimed he found out.
Cat Little, the most senior civil servant at the Cabinet Office, was asked which organisations might have had access to such information and were able to share that with the press.
