Prime Minister Keir Starmer is facing fresh questions over his use of disappearing messages after only nine iMessages between himself and Lord Mandelson appeared in more than one thousand pages of documents released in relation to Mandelson's controversial appointment as United States ambassador.
The documents were released in response to a humble address, a parliamentary mechanism requiring the government to hand over correspondence. While extensive exchanges between Peter Mandelson and senior ministers were included in the release, the correspondence between the Prime Minister and the peer amounted to just a single page.
Starmer defended himself by stating that he had complied with the humble address and that all messages he held had been passed over. He insisted that he went through the same process as everybody else, though critics questioned how so little correspondence could exist between two political figures with a long relationship.
Critics point out that Starmer, as a former barrister, is acutely aware of what constitutes discoverable material in a court of law. The use of disappearing messages makes correspondence impossible to request through parliamentary processes or scrutinise through the press, effectively placing communications behind an impenetrable screen.
The controversy has drawn comparisons to the Signal messaging scandal in the United States, where members of the national security apparatus were found sharing sensitive information on non-government secured applications. Commentators note that such platforms are not designed to provide the security or record-keeping required for government communications.
The question of whether politicians should be required to communicate only via secure government devices has been raised in the wake of the revelations. Non-government applications like WhatsApp and Signal do not capture and consolidate data in the manner required for accountability and are vulnerable to foreign intelligence operations.
The release has intensified calls for reform of how government communications are preserved and made available for scrutiny. With many politicians across democracies increasingly using encrypted and self-deleting messaging services, the challenge of maintaining transparency and accountability in government continues to grow.