Tory Bullying - Three Misbehaving MPs

As this blog has suggested while covering the bullying scandal which has hit the Tory Party and some of its hangers-on, there are a number of politicians looking anxiously at the party’s own Inquiry, the Inquest into the death of young activist Elliott Johnson, and the determination of Johnson’s parents Ray and Alison to find out exactly what has been going on. And help has now come from a most unexpected source.

The perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog have, on occasion, proved rather well informed about what went on within the Road Trip organisation and the Tories’ youth wing - perhaps so well informed that someone very close to now sacked organiser Mark Clarke may have been the source of some of their information. And now Zelo Street has a second source to back the Fawkes claims.

Back in November, the Fawkes folks put together a graphic showing all the alleged relationships of Clarke, together with several other liaisons that had occurred around the Road Trip campaign, telling “One MP is threatening an injunction, and at least three others have been accused of inappropriately having sexual relations with young volunteers on Mark Clarke’s infamous RoadTrip campaigns”.

This is detailed as one married MP having a relationship with a female Tory activist, and two male MPs being involved with perhaps multiple young male activists. All three of these Tory MPs have been identified to Zelo Street. One of the MPs has already featured in one newspaper article on the bullying scandal, although his part in that piece was merely tangential and no accusation was made against him.

I’ll go further: two of the three MPs have constituencies in the North of England, with the third representing an area very much in the South of the country. One of the three is highly regarded by some who have worked with the Young Britons’ Foundation and Conservative Way Forward. One of the three constituencies represented by these MPs had returned a Labour MP between 1997 and 2010.

Think about that: three serving Tory MPs effectively using gatherings of young party activists as a means of enjoying casual sexual encounters. Yet thus far there has been no exposure by the press, and indeed, there was little or no follow-up to the Fawkes blog’s very revealing graphic last November. My information is that one of the three believes that he has got away with his involvement. He could not be more mistaken.

Moreover, as the Fawkes blog makes clear, Harlow MP Rob Halfon, who had a relationship with Conservative Future chair Alexandra Paterson, is NOT one of the three. So there you have it: three more interested parties who would rather the press and the Johnson family not get too keen with their enquiries. And three Parliamentary careers that would almost certainly be terminated were they to be unmasked.

It was always about more than Elliott Johnson. Now you know just how much more.