INSIDE NO 10
Tories rallied round ‘Pincher by name, Pincher by nature’ in spite of warnings
Chris Pincher’s behaviour might have been checked long ago if the PM had acted on Westminster’s worst-kept secret
It was a late November evening in 2017, a few weeks after Chris Pincher had resigned as a government whip over allegations that he made an unwanted pass at a former Olympic rower.
Despite the scandal, he was back in one of the stately parliamentary rooms facing the Thames and spotted two young male colleagues propping up the bar.
One of the Conservative MPs made his excuses, leaving the other, a junior backbencher, to make awkward conversation. Having agreed to a drink, he sat down with Pincher at a nearby table.
It was here, surrounded by other parliamentarians, that Pincher is alleged to have moved his chair next to the MP’s before sliding his hand down under the table and placing his hand firmly on the man’s inner leg.
The MP — who is married with children — considered it an unwanted physical pass, and quickly reached down and removed Pincher’s hand. Embarrassed but not wanting to cause a scene, the MP maintained conversation as they finished their drink before making a beeline for the exit.
The next day he asked to meet his whip in Westminster Hall. He raised concerns about Pincher’s mental health and urged the whips’ office to keep an eye on his behaviour when drinking.
However, the MP chose not to disclose the full details of the encounter; he thought it not serious enough to merit a formal complaint and was conscious of his status as a newly elected backbencher. The whip has confirmed this conversation took place but cannot recall what action was taken. Pincher, through his lawyers, denies acting inappropriately.
The MP now questions what might have happened if he had acted differently — and whether others could have been spared what happened to him.
Five years on, the reputation of Pincher, 52, is in tatters. On Thursday he resigned as the government’s deputy chief whip after being accused of groping two men while out drinking the night before at the Carlton Club, a Tory watering hole.
One of his alleged victims said he was left “shell-shocked” after Pincher groped his left buttock and groin shortly after purchasing a round of drinks in the club’s Macmillan bar.
“I had my drink in my hand and then he then went down and grabbed my arse and then slowly ... moved his hand down the front of my groin. I froze a little bit and it ended after about two or three seconds, but it was a very bizarre thing.” An MP corroborated this account.
His ordeal was made worse, the alleged victim claims, when Sarah Dines, a Tory whip who was also present and whom he spoke to about the incident, asked him if he was gay. “I was a bit taken aback by that and said, ‘What’s that got to do with it? But yes, I am,’ ” the man said. “And her words were: ‘Well, that doesn’t make it straightforward.’ ”
Friends of Dines say she was attempting to establish the full circumstances of what happened and whether there had been a prior relationship between Pincher and the man. She later reported the incident to her superiors, which friends say shows she took the matter seriously.
The second man recounted having a similar encounter shortly afterwards. Pincher was thrown out of the club at 1am on Thursday by Mark Fletcher, the Conservative MP for Bolsover, who witnessed him staggering around the room.
Within minutes Chris Heaton-Harris, the chief whip and Pincher’s boss, was alerted and the next morning he spoke to at least two MPs who witnessed Pincher’s behaviour. Pincher was summoned to explain himself.
Shortly before 8pm on Thursday, Pincher resigned. In a letter to Boris Johnson, he confessed to drinking “far too much” and embarrassing “myself and other people”, though he did not comment specifically on the allegations levelled at him.
Rather than suspending the whip from Pincher, the prime minister instead attempted to draw a line under the matter.
The cause of Johnson’s leniency was multifaceted: Pincher, a staunch loyalist, had been instrumental in keeping his premiership alive during the depths of the partygate scandal. Suspending him would also increase the likelihood of a by-election in Tamworth, where Pincher holds a majority of almost 20,000. Another Tory defeat would reignite calls among rebels for another confidence vote in his leadership.
But today, Johnson finds himself under attack from all sides. Even ministerial aides expressed alarm at the apparent disregard for the alleged victims, as well as the “bonkers” response from No 10, where Johnson and his senior aides seemed determined to protect Pincher.
They pointed to a meeting on Friday in which Guto Harri, Johnson’s director of communications, said colleagues should support Pincher because he had lost his career. This promptly leaked. Later, in a wider meeting of ministerial aides, Harri sought to clarify his comments.
He then compared Pincher to David Kelly, the weapons expert who killed himself after he was exposed as the source of a BBC report that the Blair government’s official dossier on weapons of mass destruction had been “sexed up”. The suggestion was that Pincher, like Kelly, was struggling to cope with the public scrutiny.
“It was unbelievable,” said one present. “You want to intervene and just say, ‘What the f*** are you thinking?’ But what’s the point?”
By Friday afternoon Johnson had capitulated, having heard from one of the MPs at the Carlton Club and learnt that one of the alleged victims had logged a formal complaint with parliament’s independent complaints and grievance scheme. Both men have now submitted complaints.
The prime minister announced that Pincher would have the whip suspended, but by then the damage had been done, with Johnson facing separate claims he had ignored warnings about Pincher in February, when he promoted him to deputy chief whip.
More concerning for the Conservative Party, Pincher is facing allegations that stretch back two decades.
Since being allowed to return to the front bench after his resignation in 2017, he has been accused by at least two Conservative MPs and an activist of making unwanted physical advances towards them. Senior figures in the whips’ office, both under Johnson and Theresa May, had been aware for years of rumours circulating about Pincher’s conduct.
Alarm bells first rang in 2017 when The Mail on Sunday published details of the alleged encounter between Pincher and Alex Story, the former Team GB rower.
At the height of the Pestminster scandal, the paper revealed how Story had accused Pincher of untucking his shirt and rubbing his neck after he had been invited back to Pincher’s flat in 2001. Pincher was then said to have left the room, and Story described how he returned in a bathrobe “like a pound-shop Harvey Weinstein, with his chest and belly sticking out”. Story promptly left.
The article also contained allegations that Pincher had in a separate incident been accused of “touching up” Tom Blenkinsop, a former Labour MP. Pincher said then that he “did not recognise either the events or interpretation placed on them by The Mail on Sunday”.
He says he and Story are on good terms and the situation was not as described. He denies acting inappropriately towards Blenkinsop.
Within 24 hours, however, Pincher had resigned as a whip and referred himself to the police, encouraged by Julian Smith, chief whip at the time, who had become alarmed by the “noise” swirling around Pincher in Westminster.
No complaint is believed to have been made. A separate inquiry carried out later by the Conservative Party also cleared Pincher of wrongdoing.
Pincher’s rehabilitation was swift: by January 2018 he had been reappointed by May as deputy chief whip.
That year, he is alleged to have behaved inappropriately towards a second young Conservative MP.
The incident, relayed by the MP to a number of close friends and confirmed to The Sunday Times, is alleged to have occurred after Pincher messaged the MP asking him to come up to his parliamentary office.
Believing that Pincher wanted to discuss government business, the MP did as instructed. He is said to have been subjected to an unwanted physical advance by Pincher, who he believed had been drinking heavily. He told Pincher to “sod off” and left the room. He too chose not to make a formal complaint against Pincher, not wanting the bother of publicity — although that would change this year.
Pincher denies the allegation and says he does not know who the MP is.
By July 2019, Pincher had become close to Johnson, who appointed him a foreign minister for Europe and the Americas in his first reshuffle after taking office as prime minister.
Around this time, a third alleged incident involving a young Tory activist took place in Tamworth, Pincher’s constituency. The activist, who was invited for drinks with Pincher, alleges that during the course of the day Pincher massaged his shoulders and attempted to undo his shirt at a private property. He claims he rejected the advances and left as soon as possible.
He says he chose not to complain partly for fear of the consequences but also because he had not been traumatised.
Lawyers for Pincher say he does not recognise the account or know who the complainant is. He denies acting inappropriately.
Pincher was made a housing minister in February 2020.
By February this year, Pincher had become an integral member of Johnson’s inner circle and was being widely tipped to replace Mark Spencer as the government’s chief whip.
One minister told Spencer five days before the reshuffle that he would resign if Pincher were promoted back into the whips’ office.
When the reshuffle began, on February 8, a rumour that he was about to be handed the top job reached the Tory MP who in 2018 had been invited up to Pincher’s parliamentary office and rebuffed his advances.
Appalled, the MP fired off messages to Heaton-Harris and an official in No 10.
In his exchange with Heaton-Harris, the MP is said to have recounted the alleged encounter in 2018 and claimed to have been aware of colleagues who had been subjected to similar behaviour. While confirming the exchange of text messages, a government source said the MP did not formally complain.
The reshuffle was delayed for four hours as a senior Downing Street aide referred the matter to the government’s propriety and ethics team. A short review was carried out, with officials reporting that there was nothing in Pincher’s formal record that could prevent the appointment. In any event, political appointments are a matter for the prime minister alone.
Despite both No 10 and Heaton-Harris being alerted, Johnson now insists that he was not informed of the MP’s allegation until after the reshuffle, and had only ever heard unsubstantiated rumours about Pincher. Senior officials who have worked for Johnson in No 10 give this explanation short shrift, with one claiming that the prime minister had referred to Pincher by various nicknames, including “Pincher by name, Pincher by nature”.
Pincher duly did become deputy chief whip, with Heaton-Harris promoted to the top job. Heaton-Harris is said later to have spoken to the MP who complained and provided personal assurances.
A government spokesman said: “In the absence of any formal complaint, it was not appropriate to stop an appointment on the basis of unsubstantiated allegations.”
Tonight, Pincher is said to be seeking professional medical support. His future as an MP remains unclear.
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