I was planning to begin this column by saying how relieved I was to be mentioned in the latest Epstein files. Finally! After all, -Jeffrey Epstein’s list of acquaintances reads like a Who’s Who of the global power elite. How embarrassing would it be to have lived in the same city as him from 1995 to 2000, as I did, and not even receive a glancing reference?
But I realise this is a subject that shouldn’t be made light of. The revelations about Lord Mandelson are genuinely shocking, even to someone as jaded as me, and raise important questions about what Sir Keir Starmer knew and when. They may also concern me more directly since, in an effort at damage control, the Prime Minister has called for the House of Lords’ code of conduct to be overhauled so people who bring it into disrepute can be stripped of their titles. That’s a rule change that could have a chilling effect on free speech in the Upper House, so I will be opposing it.
There’s also the fact that plenty of people named in the latest batch of documents are completely innocent of any wrong doing, yet will nevertheless be dragged through the mud. I’ll come to some of them in a minute, but first let me deal with my own case.
According to a Canadian woman called Polly St George, the files reveal I was in ‘regular contact with -Jeffrey Epstein’ and she has demanded an explanation. In fact, the files contain just two emails from me to Ghislaine Maxwell. The first, sent in 2001, is to her directly and says: ‘From your lips to God’s ears, as they say in your part of the world.’ That’s a Jewish colloquialism which means the same as ‘Inshallah’, but for the life of me I can’t remember what it’s a reference to. The second – far more embarrassing – is a round robin I sent in 2002 to hundreds of people, including Ghislaine, publicising my appearance on a writers’ special of The Weakest Link.
By all means cancel me – but for shameless self-promotion, not because I was in ‘regular contact’ with a convicted paedophile. For the record, I did meet Ghislaine a few times during my five years in New York, and subsequently in London, but I never met Epstein, never went to any of his parties, was never a passenger on the Lolita Express and never went to Paedo Island. I didn’t correspond with him either, let alone regularly.
Not that that stopped the Unity News Network from running a story gleefully claiming the emails prove I was lying when I said I had ‘no idea’ how I ‘ended up in Epstein’s little black book’. That particular roster of villainy must be from Ghislaine’s address book, so it’s no surprise I’m in it. Tony Blair’s in there too, although that wasn’t mentioned by Hope Not Hate, which ran a story this week describing it as ‘a private contact list kept by Epstein’ and saying it was ‘in the interest of the public’ that my ‘association with Epstein’s circle is scrutinised’.
Plenty of people in the latest batch of documents are innocent, yet will nevertheless be dragged through the mud
OK, so much for me. What about the others? Elon Musk has protested that, though he exchanged emails with Epstein, as revealed in the latest document dump, he too never flew on the Lolita Express or ‘set foot on his creepy island’. Other high-profile figures in the documents include Bill Clinton, Donald Trump, Bill Gates and Larry Summers, but there’s no evidence they engaged in any wrongdoing, and I doubt any prosecutions will be brought. In addition, there are hundreds of ordinary people in the documents who will now be victims of guilt by association, including a hapless businessman whose only sin was unknowingly to try to buy one of Epstein’s former planes.
Closer to home, another lord has been identified by sleuths on social media: Ken Macdonald, a former director of public prosecutions and ex-head of Wadham College. In 2012, he was contacted by Epstein, who was then acting as an intermediary for a Yemeni billionaire whose son is linked to the death of a student in London in 2008. Macdonald subsequently met with the son in Yemen to try to persuade him to return to face justice, but was unsuccessful. Lord Macdonald is a practising barrister and had notified the Metropolitan Police of his visit, yet he too will now have to answer questions about his ‘association’ with Epstein. The poor man isn’t even in the address book.
The New York financier was without doubt a very shady character and some people connected with him deserve what’s coming to them. But being named in the Epstein files, which now number more than three -million documents, does not make you a wrong ’un. Let’s keep things in -perspective, please.
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