When Vetting Goes Wrong, Heads Roll—But Does It Fix Anything?

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Sir Olly Robbins is out. Not in the “we’re mutually parting ways” way. In the “you’re effectively sacked because your department couldn’t be bothered to tell the Prime Minister something pretty important” way.

The something important? That Lord Mandelson—the man Keir Starmer wanted as Foreign Secretary—had failed security vetting.

Let that sit for a second. The Foreign Office didn’t mention this. To the Prime Minister. Before he announced the appointment.

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The Vetting Disaster Nobody Saw Coming (But Everyone Should Have)

Chris Mason’s reporting makes it crystal clear: Starmer is absolutely furious. Not “disappointed.” Not “concerned about process.” Furious. The kind of fury that ends careers.

Here’s the actual sequence: The Foreign Office knew about the vetting failure. They apparently didn’t think it worth mentioning to Number 10 before the public announcement. Starmer found out like the rest of us—in the press. Robbins, who headed the department, has now exited stage left.

What’s wild is that this isn’t some obscure procedural glitch. Vetting a Foreign Secretary is table stakes. It’s not like forgetting to book the conference room. It’s the Foreign Office’s entire job—manage sensitive information, protect national security, brief the PM on things he desperately needs to know.

The reputational damage here cuts both ways. Starmer looks incompetent for not catching it before the announcement. The Foreign Office looks either negligent or, worse, deliberately evasive. Neither look good.

But here’s what really gets me: This is Britain. They’ve had 15 years to master government since the 2009 expenses scandal, the Dominic Cummings chaos, the entire Brexit meltdown. Institutional competence should be returning. Instead, basic vetting gets botched at the highest levels.

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Meanwhile, Back at the Immigration Desk

While Starmer’s fixing one security failure, another one’s playing out in real time—just in a different corner of government.

The Home Office is now investigating how migrants are making false domestic abuse claims to stay in the UK. The BBC found this. Not the Home Office. The Home Office is responding to the BBC’s investigation. Number 10 says the government’s working to hold accountable “anyone potentially abusing our immigration system,” which is a way of saying: yeah, we didn’t catch this either.

Here’s the thing that should worry them: these aren’t edge cases. The BBC’s undercover investigation revealed a pattern—rules designed to protect abuse victims are getting weaponized as a loophole for immigration claims. That’s not a bug. That’s a vulnerability that got exploited long enough for it to become systematic.

The UK government is simultaneously trying to get “closer to its European neighbours” with what the EU minister called a “ruthlessly pragmatic” approach. Pragmatic is fine. But pragmatism requires you to actually control your own borders first. Hard to negotiate from strength when your immigration system’s got this kind of leak.

The American Surveillance Shuffle (And the Lesson Britain Should Notice)

Across the Atlantic, the House just passed a 10-day extension of FISA surveillance law. Libertarian-leaning House Republicans blocked a long-term extension, so now Congress gets to do this dance again in 10 days. Forever kicking the can down the road.

Why mention this in a British column? Because it’s the other side of the same coin: governments doing the minimum competence required, patching holes instead of fixing systems.

Britain’s vetting failure and America’s surveillance stopgap both scream the same thing: institutions are running on fumes. They’re reactive, not proactive. They’re patching rather than rebuilding.

The Actual Risk Here

I think Starmer’s handling of the Mandelson fallout—firing Robbins, taking the hit publicly—might actually be the right move politically, even though it looks bad short-term. It shows accountability. It shows he won’t tolerate this. Compared to the last three prime ministers, that’s almost refreshing.

But let’s be honest: Robbins is a scapegoat for a broken system. The Foreign Office’s institutional culture didn’t change because he got fired. Tomorrow, some other department could have the same problem. The vetting process is still the same. The handoff procedures between departments still have the same gaps.

My read is this goes one of two ways. Either Starmer uses this as a wake-up call to genuinely audit how government’s handling sensitive information across the board—Foreign Office, Home Office, security services—or this becomes the first of several embarrassments that chip away at his credibility. Given how hard government dysfunction is to fix, I’m not betting on door number one.

The immigration chaos makes it worse. The Mandelson mess was about a system failing at one moment. The migration false-claims thing suggests the system’s continuously failing. Home Office investigations usually move at the speed of continental drift. By the time they finish, the story’s buried and the actual vulnerability’s still there.

What I’m Watching

The Foreign Office audit. Starmer’s going to need to prove he’s genuinely fixing vetting and information-sharing, not just accepting Robbins’ head on a platter. Watch for whether he commissions an external review of Foreign Office procedures in the next month. If there isn’t one by mid-February, he’s just done performance accountability theater.

How many migrants actually get removed. Number 10 said they’re holding people accountable. But “accountability” in immigration usually means investigations that end in reports that end in quietly changed guidelines. Count actual deportations or immigration status rejections tied to false abuse claims over the next quarter. If it’s in single digits, the Home Office learned nothing.

Whether this emboldens more EU negotiations around border control. The UK’s pitching “ruthless pragmatism” to Brussels. But Brussels noticed the immigration system’s got holes in it. They’ll use that in trade-offs. Watch for whether Starmer has to concede more on things Britain wanted in exchange for EU help managing migration flows—basically, selling out control because we can’t execute control.

The Mandelson disaster will fade from headlines in a week. But it’s left something useful behind: a clear sign that British government isn’t firing on all cylinders. The next crisis won’t be as easy to contain.