Matt Hancock has been told to apologise for suggesting sexual harassment allegations are a part of a man’s “private” life.
In an interview with HuffPost UK on the fringes of the Conservative Party conference on Sunday, the health secretary was asked if Boris Johnson had “questions to answer” about accusations he had squeezed a female journalists thigh.
Hancock said: “No.”
“Boris has never lectured other people about their private lives.”
Hancock added that the government was “concentrating on the things that are real priorities” even if there were “lots of other stories in the papers”.
Dawn Butler, Labour’s shadow women and equalities secretary, said when women speak out “those in power should have the decency to listen and take action”.
“Dismissing sexual harassment allegations as a private matter has been used to silence women for centuries. The health secretary should apologise for his disgraceful remarks,” she said.
“The prime minister must be held to account for these accusations. No man, no matter how powerful, should get away with abusing his position to harass women.”
Journalist Charlotte Edwardes today claimed the PM had put his hand “high” up her leg during a lunch at The Spectator magazine’s HQ in 1999 when Johnson was editor.
“His hand is high up my leg and he has enough inner flesh beneath his fingers to make me sit suddenly upright,” she wrote in The Sunday Times of the incident.