LONDON — A
lawmaker from Britain’s ruling Conservative party announced Saturday he will
resign, after admitting he had deliberately watched pornography on his mobile
phone in the House of Commons chamber.
اضافة اعلان
Neil Parish, who
represents a seat in southwest England, said he was standing down and
triggering a by-election in the Tory stronghold after what he called an
indefensible moment of “total madness”.
“I think I must
have taken complete leave of my senses and my sensibilities and in a sense of
decency, everything,” he told the BBC in a candid interview aired Saturday
announcing his resignation.
“(It was) a moment
of madness and also totally wrong ... I’m not going to defend it.”
The 65-year-old, who
has been an MP since 2010, had already been suspended from the Conservatives
and faced at least two parliamentary probes after he was publicly ousted Friday
in the scandal.
His public
identification ended days of speculation after it emerged at least two other
lawmakers had complained that an MP had been seen watching porn in the Commons,
amid broader accusations of a misogynistic environment in Britain’s parliament.
Parish’s decision
to resign triggers a by-election in the Tiverton and Honiton constituency in
Devon where he won a majority of more than 24,000 in 2019, as Prime Minister
Boris Johnson swept to a landslide victory.
The seat has
returned Conservative MPs ever since its creation in 1997, while Tories have
represented the area for the past century.
However, Johnson
and his party have faced a string of scandals since last summer that have
dented their standing. A by-election in the historically safe seat of North
Shropshire last December saw the Tories lose there for the first time.
The party is also
facing another tough by-election in Wakefield, in northern England, after
another Conservative MP, Imran Ahmad Khan, quit parliament this month following
his conviction for sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy.
Meanwhile, voters
go to the polls across Britain on Thursday, in local elections that the Tories
are predicted to struggle in and could further pressure the embattled Johnson.
Parish, a farmer
who has chaired a watchdog committee focused on the environment and rural
affairs, said in the interview that he first watched porn in parliament after
straying from a tractor website to an adult content site with a similar name.
“My biggest crime
is that on another occasion, I went in a second time and that was deliberate...
that was sitting waiting to vote on the side of the (Commons) chamber,” he
explained.
The MP added that,
contrary to reports, he had not sought for his actions to be visible to
colleagues.
“I will take to my
grave as being true... I was not actually making sure people could see it. In
fact, I was trying to do quite the opposite.”
The scandal comes
days after it was revealed that at least 56 MPs, including three ministers, are
currently being probed over allegations of sexual misconduct by parliament’s
own complaints office.
Meanwhile the
Conservative party has been accused of misogyny after the Mail on Sunday
newspaper last week quoted unnamed Tory MPs accusing the deputy leader of the
opposition Labor party, Angela Rayner, of trying to distract Prime Minister
Boris Johnson with her legs.
Rayner was among the first to publicly react to the news of
Parish’s resignation, calling the Conservatives under Johnson a “national
embarrassment”.
Read more Region and World
Jordan News
.jpg)
.jpg)
