Home Office Minister Mike Tapp this said the prime minister continues to have "confidence in Mandelson" and his abilities as ambassador, adding the "disturbing" emails made him "shudder". Lord Mandelson is reported by Bloomberg to have told Epstein to "fight for early release" shortly before he was sentenced to 18 months in prison, and told him, "I think the world of you" the day before he began his sentence for soliciting prostitution from a minor in June 2008.
On Wednesday, the deputy prime minister acknowledged for the first time that she had mistakenly not paid the correct amount of stamp duty when she bought a flat in Hove earlier this year. When she bought the 800,000 property in May, she paid the standard rate of stamp duty, estimated to be about 30,000, rather than the rate for second homes, which is higher, and would have amounted to as much as 70,000.