Chris Pincher, deputy chief of discipline at Westminster, is suspended from the Conservative parliamentary group
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has lost one of his most faithful deputies in a new incident of harassment or sexual misconduct that shakes his government and the Conservative Party. Chris Pincher, a 52-year-old bachelor, has been suspended from the parliamentary group while investigations into allegations that he tried to grope two colleagues at a drunken evening at Club Carlton, the elite St James neighborhood society that was founded in the 19th century. as a forum for contacts and meetings of the Tories. He is the fifth Conservative lawmaker to face allegations of misconduct so far this year.
Pincher resigned the night before from his high post in the parliamentary discipline office, but he still retained Johnson’s confidence until Friday afternoon. Downing Street wanted to close the incident without precipitating new casualties in its benches due to another scandal of the so-called “sexual plague” policy. Johnson’s popularity remains low as a result of illegal parties during the coronavirus pandemic and last week the electorate boycotted Tory candidates in two partial elections caused precisely by the resignation of a deputy who watched porn on his mobile from his seat in the House of Commons and another colleague from the bench who is serving a sentence in prison for molesting a minor under 15 years of age.
Johnson finally yielded to the pressure and gave the green light to the suspension of the deputy chief of the ‘whips’, those responsible for imposing discipline in the Commons until yesterday. “I drank too much last night and embarrassed myself and others… and for that I apologize to you and those affected,” Pincher wrote to the prime minister in his resignation letter, which was released after the allegations of sexual harassment were revealed in the tabloid ‘The Sun’.
It is the second time that the humiliated deputy has resigned from a political position due to his sexual conduct. In 2017, he left the post when a Tory activist and Olympic rower, Alex Story, accused him of sensual advance and emotional blackmail. The allegation ultimately came to nothing, but suspicions about an apparent tendency to act out of tune and measure with other men were never cleared up in the Westminster environment. The Political platform maintained this Friday that Downing Street was aware of the alleged flaws in Pincher’s personality before entrusting him with the important role of deputy in the control of the conservative parliamentary group.
The opposition has criticized Johnson’s delay in sanctioning his faithful collaborator. Pincher has supported his political career since he ran for mayor of London in 2012, and this year led the “save Boris” campaign which has succeeded, at least to date, in keeping the prime minister in Downing Street during the ongoing tidal wave of the ‘partygate’.
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