Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey has said he’s “shocked” at the claims surrounding the former business secretary Lord Mandelson and his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.

At a news conference on Thursday, Bailey was asked about emails Mandelson allegedly sent to Epstein during the financial crisis.

At the time, Mandelson was business secretary and the global banking industry was close to collapse, prompting huge government bailouts in many countries, including the UK. There was a great deal of anger about this and the then Labour government proposed taxing bankers’ bonuses.

As the BBC’s economics editor, Faisal Islam, has written, the latest emails appear to show that Mandelson seemingly suggested that Jamie Dimon, boss of one of America’s biggest banks JP Morgan should mildly threaten the then Chancellor, the late Alistair Darling, over the tax.

Bailey, who played a key role in helping to stabilise the UK banking sector during the 2008-09 financial crisis, said “there are times in which things seemed to happen, lobbying happens, which has frankly ethics attached to it that I do find shocking”.

“To see those pictures of Peter Mandelson with Alistair Darling… Alistair Darling was doing all the right things and he was doing them, in my view… with a thorough sense of honesty and decency,” Bailey said.

“And he can’t speak for himself today.”