Mandelson says he won’t ‘hide under a rock’ as he praises Epstein’s parties in bizarre interview

Former Labour minister also praised his own ‘skills’ and talked about ‘contributing’ ideas to British public life

Lord Mandelson has insisted he will not hide “under a rock” despite a series of shocking revelations about his relationship with the paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.

The Metropolitan Police is reviewing reports of alleged misconduct in a public office after the peer was accused of leaking sensitive information to Epstein while a cabinet minister.

There are also calls for him to be thrown out of the House of Lords and removed from the Privy Council, the elite group which advises the monarch.

Concerns over the former top spin doctor’s relationship with Epstein were reignited late on Friday, when the US Department of Justice released the latest batch of documents relating to the disgraced billionaire.

The files apparently show Lord Mandelson passing information to Epstein while the business secretary in Gordon Brown’s government.

Mr Brown himself has demanded an investigation into the “wholly unacceptable disclosure”.

In an interview given over a number of days, both before and after he resigned from the Labour party over the emails on Sunday night, Lord Mandelson said that “hiding under a rock would be a disproportionate response to a handful of misguided historical emails, which I deeply regret sending.”

Bizarrely, he added: “I too am amazed by some of the conversations I had and areas of my life where I was seeking advice from Epstein.”

There are calls for Mandelson to be thrown out of the House of Lords and removed from the Privy Council (PA Archive)

He also praised Epstein’s dinner parties, hailed his own “skills” and talked about “contributing” ideas to the UK, in an interview with The Times.

He also said he could not recall anything related to an extraordinary photo, released by the DoJ, that pictured him in his underpants.

He said he had “no idea what I am doing in this photograph or who the woman was. It looks as though she came in and showed me something on an iPad”.

He claimed his sacking as US ambassador to Washington last year, after previous emails came to light, “was like a 5.30am drive-by shooting.” He and his partner were told to be out of their US accommodation “in a week, with everything packed up and removed,” he complained.

“It felt like being killed without actually dying,” he said of what he described as a “life-changing crisis”.

On Sunday, after his resignation from Labour, he said the decision “wasn’t easy”, but he feels “better for it as I need to reset”.

A newly released picture which appears to show Lord Mandelson in his underwear speaking to an unknown person wearing a bathrobe (PA Media)

On his husband taking money from Epstein for an osteopathy course, he said: “The idea that giving Reinaldo an osteopath bursary is going to sway mine or anyone else’s views about banking policy is risible.”

He also insisted he had “absolutely no recollection or records of receiving” payments from Epstein amounting to $75,000.

He said he “learnt the truth about him after his [2019] death, not in the early Noughties. He was a master manipulator. I can see that now.”

Describing Epstein as a “classic sociopath”, he also talked about how, at a dinner the financier threw, “I sat next to someone in charge of brain research at Harvard. I was sitting opposite the founders of Google. At the other end of the table was Bill Gates.” There is no suggestion of wrongdoing on their parts.

He also defended urinating on a wall after dinner with George Osborne in Notting Hill in the wake of his sacking last year. “People said it was very humanising,” he said, blaming the decision on two Uber cars cancelling, leaving him “bursting for a pee. I could have gone back and woken them all up, but they did have three children [there].”

Lord Mandelson pictured with Jeffrey Epstein (US Department of Justice)

He made clear he still has plans to take part in British public life.

“A friend has said to me, ‘Remember, tough times don’t last. Tough people do,” he said. “That’s the belief I held on to. Someone else said, ‘Remember, you are the same person with the same knowledge and the same skills you had before this crisis hit you. This crisis has not taken any of those things away from you.’”

He added: “I think I want a sea change. I want to be more of an outsider looking in rather than the other way round. I want to contribute ideas that enable Britain to strengthen and to work for all, in every part of the country.”

He also revealed there was a “serious wobble in London over the agreement and its sellability to the British public” over Keir Starmer’s controversial Chagos Islands deal last year.