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Global cooling
Epstein fallout , Issue 1669
GLOBAL Counsel, the lobbying firm co-founded by Peter Mandelson, is in a fight for its life as blue-chip clients abandon it over the links between both its co-founders and Jeffrey Epstein.
Earlier this month, co-founder Ben Wegg-Prosser, who owns 31 percent of the firm, resigned as Global Counsel's CEO. Newly released emails showed Wegg-Prosser (to whom, it has now emerged, Keir Starmer offered a peerage in 2024) had visited Epstein in 2010; the convicted criminal apparently helped the two men design their lobbying firm.
Among the many clients deserting Global Counsel in recent weeks are Barclays, Tesco, Bank of America and pharma giant GSK.
Dinner dates
Global Counsel had developed a technique of hosting "roundtable" dinners that effectively disguised its clients. Transparency releases for government meetings show that a long list of senior civil servants had attended its dinners, but they give no details of which of GC's clients were also there.
The Eye obtained one invitation to one Global Counsel roundtable dinner, apparently written by Mandelson.
"I periodically invite people from business and elsewhere to meet for dinner and to discuss the world and to share views," it reads. "There is no agenda, simply an opportunity for a small group of smart and engaging individuals to meet and talk."
By labelling them "dinners", Global Counsel ensures that clients brought to meet the government officials are not listed in official transparency releases. Departments are also resisting freedom of information requests for details of "guests" at these events, claiming this is "personal information".
Wiring issues
The Cabinet Office did release some details of a February 2025 dinner with John Stevens, special adviser to Pat McFadden, chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster at the time. They showed that "director general" level civil servants from the Treasury and DSIT also went along.
The invitation said the dinner was to discuss "rewiring the state" with "attendees from a combination of tech firms". The government refused to say which firms, but Global Counsel has been lobbying for controversial tech firm Palantir since 2023 (Eye 1597).
Doyle trading
There was even less information about two Global Counsel dinners attended by Matthew Doyle in October 2024 and February 2025.
Doyle – now ennobled but recently suspended from Labour over his support for a paedophile councillor – was Keir Starmer's director of communications at the time of the dinners. Number 10 said it had no record of these meetings, apart from the dates.
GLOBAL Counsel, the lobbying firm co-founded by Peter Mandelson, is in a fight for its life as blue-chip clients abandon it over the links between both its co-founders and Jeffrey Epstein.
www.private-eye.co.uk
