LONDON (Reuters) – A senior British Conservative lawmaker has accused Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s father of touching her inappropriately at the party’s annual conference in 2003 when they were both parliamentary candidates ahead of an election.
During a panel discussion on Sky News about violence against women and girls, Caroline Nokes, chair of parliament’s Women and Equalities Select Committee and a former government minister, said Stanley Johnson had smacked her on the bottom.
“I can remember a really prominent man, at the time the Conservative candidate for Teignbridge in Devon, smacking me on the backside about as hard as he could and going, ‘oh, Romsey, you’ve got a lovely seat’,” said Nokes, who has been the member of parliament for Romsey and Southampton North since 2010.
Asked who it had been, she replied: “Stanley Johnson did that to me.”
When approached for comment, Johnson, who was never elected to the British parliament but served as a Member of the European Parliament, told Sky: “I have no recollection of Caroline Nokes at all, but there you go. And no reply.”
(Reporting by Kylie MacLellan; Editing by Nick Macfie)
