The plot rumour led to the former cabinet minister’s arrest, but while BVI officials avoid comment, residents wonder why anyone believed it

Is it really plausible that Peter Mandelson could have hatched a daring plot to escape to the British Virgin Islands? In the capital of Road Town for the last week or so, the question has been on many minds. And even if the UK’s Commons speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, came away with that possibility in mind from a recent visit, very few of them are convinced.

“It seemed strange to me,” said one bemused local official who had met Hoyle at a function a few days earlier, “that if you were going to flee, it would be to a British territory. From a logical point of view, you’re still more or less in the UK. It’s like fleeing to Southampton.”