THOUSANDS of documents and messages detailing Lord Peter Mandelson’s appointment and activities as US ambassador were published by the government on Monday.

The disclosure, including internal emails and WhatsApp messages, is an “unprecedented piece of government transparency,” Downing Street said. 

The files were ordered to be published because of Lord Mandelson’s ties to paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein and relate to his appointment as ambassador to the United States after the Epstein relationship was public knowledge. The peer was sacked in September 2025, just nine months into the job.

A note written to then foreign secretary David Lammy by Lord Mandelson, dated November 18 2024, read: “Dear David… I just wanted you to know that if you were minded to appoint me, I would make sure you never regret it. 

“For me it would be the last thing I do in public life and it would be a huge honour to serve you.”

In another message, he told pensions minister Torsten Bell: “The government doesn’t do policy, generally speaking, well enough.”

Mr Bell replied: “That is definitely true – everyone seems to think it’s someone else’s job to get the policy right.”

Lord Mandelson replied: “As the saying goes, rubbish in rubbish out…”

He also told former transport secretary Louise Haigh that her exit was “harsh” after she quit over a fraud offence, “given you were appointed in full knowledge.”

Lord Mandelson was twice forced to quit government posts during the New Labour era.

The three volumes of documents, in a release totalling 1,504 pages, cover subjects ranging from discussions around a trade deal with the US to Lord Mandelson seeking to facilitate meetings between ministers and his friends and contacts – including suggesting that Sir Keir should have a “chat” with Tory former prime minister Sir John Major after the 2024 election.

Sir Keir replied: “I’ll reach out to John M, he’s a very thoughtful man.”

The documents also reveal that Lord Mandelson had messaged Reform UK leader Nigel Farage and was “trying to keep him nice without complete success” in the days before he went to Washington to take up the ambassador post. 

Officials discussed the need to “delete all traffic” in one exchange. Ailsa Terry, private secretary for foreign affairs at No 10, told recipients to “delete all traffic on this,” which Lord Mandelson also advised.

Parts of the emails have been redacted, and it is not clear what they were discussing.

In other exchanges with Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden in May 2025, Lord Mandelson said former PM Gordon Brown had lost faith in Keir Starmer and Chancellor Rachel Reeves. 

He also said that the Parliamentary Labour Party was in a “mutinous state” and that former deputy leader Angela Rayner was seen as an “instrument of destabilisation.”

And Mr McFadden, who was Cabinet Office minister at the time, complained about Labour MPs always asking “who can we tax in order to pay benefits to others?”

The government said it had withheld some documents from publication so they would not prejudice a police investigation into Lord Mandelson and made other “targeted redactions” to prevent “real world harms,” which were reviewed by Commons public administration and constitutional affairs committee chairman Simon Hoare, a Tory MP.

The government said it intended to publish the withheld documents once the investigation is complete, or earlier if they cease to be prejudicial to the police’s work.

Other redactions were made on national security grounds or to protect privacy and that other information was omitted where there was no public interest in publishing it.

It said politicians’ names had not been redacted, nor had references to Lord Mandelson’s company Global Counsel, except to “protect the privacy of individuals who are not public figures.”

References to the companies Palantir and Anduril have only been redacted with the agreement of the intelligence and security committee.

Lord Mandelson “declined to comply” with a request to hand over his personal phone for the publication of messages.
MPs will debate the files on Wednesday.