No 10 not telling truth over Chris Pincher, says
former top civil servant
Boris Johnson was briefed in person about 2019
complaint about alleged groping by ex-deputy chief whip, says Simon McDonald
Peter
Walker Political correspondent
@peterwalker99
Tue 5 Jul
2022 08.35 BST
Boris
Johnson’s claim that he was not aware of prior specific allegations against
Chris Pincher is falling apart, after a former top civil servant wrote a formal
letter to allege that Downing Street’s version of events was untrue.
In a highly
unusual move, Simon McDonald, who had been the most senior official in the
Foreign Office and is now a crossbench peer, told the parliamentary standards
commissioner that Johnson was briefed in person about a 2019 complaint about
alleged groping by Pincher.
Dominic
Raab, who was foreign secretary at the time, confirmed to the BBC that he had
launched an investigation into claims about Pincher, then a junior foreign
office minister, who resigned as deputy chief whip after being accused of
drunkenly groping two men.
However,
Raab said he did not know if Johnson had been briefed about the inquiry, as
McDonald said. Raab said: “That’s news to me, I wasn’t aware of that. It’s not
clear to me that that is factually accurate.”
He added:
“I have discussed this with the prime minister over the last 24 hours. It is
not my understanding that he was directly briefed.”
Asked if
Johnson had specifically said he was not briefed, Raab added: “To be honest
with you, I didn’t ask him. He didn’t raise it.”
McDonald’s
letter, sent to Kathryn Stone, the parliamentary standards commissioner, and
tweeted on Tuesday morning, appears to demolish the insistence of No 10
spokespeople and a series of ministers that Johnson was not aware of any
“specific” allegations against Pincher before last week.
On Monday,
Johnson’s official spokesman amended this to argue that the prime minister had
been aware of allegations, but that these were “either resolved or did not
proceed to a formal complaint”.
In a
scathing letter, McDonald, a long-time senior diplomat who was permanent
under-secretary at the Foreign Office from 2015 to 2020 and became a peer in
2021, made it clear he believed this was also untrue.
In the
summer of 2019, shortly after Pincher became a Foreign Office minister,
McDonald wrote, a group of officials complained about his behaviour, McDonald
said, saying the claims were “similar” to those that emerged last week. An
investigation upheld the complaint and Pincher apologised, he added.
It was,
McDonald wrote, “not true” for No 10 to either claim Johnson knew about no
earlier complaints, or the amended line about the only complaint he knew about
being unsubstantiated.
“Mr Johnson
was briefed in person about the initiation and outcome of the investigation,”
the letter said. “There was a ‘formal complaint’. Allegations were ‘resolved’
only in the sense that the investigation was completed; Mr Pincher was not
exonerated. To characterise the allegations as ‘unsubstantiated’ is therefore
wrong.”
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He added:
“I am aware that is unusual to write to you and simultaneously publicise the
letter. I am conscious of the duty owed to the target of an investigation but I
act out of of my duty towards the victims.
“Mr Pincher
deceived me and others in 2019. He cannot be allowed to use the confidentiality
of the process three years ago to pursue his predatory behaviour in other
contexts.”
Asked about
the letter on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Raab confirmed the investigation
had taken place. He said: “Simon and myself both spoke to Chris Pincher in
person to make it clear that the inappropriate behaviour should never be
repeated.”
Raab said
he told the then-chief whip, but did not know if the prime minister was
informed.
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