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An MP has said he will resign after admitting to watching pornography in the House of Commons.
Neil Parish, a 65-year-old farmer, said he watched adult material twice in parliament, claiming the first time was accidental after looking at tractors online but that the second was “a moment of madness”.
Mr Parish had initially vowed to continue as MP for Tiverton and Honiton but said he would quit after recognising the “furore” and “damage” he was causing his family and constituency.
‘It was tractors that I was looking at’: Tory MP says he watched porn accidentally – Politics latest
The scandal comes amid accusations of misogyny and sexual misconduct at Westminster.
A spokesperson for Tiverton and Honiton Conservatives said: “We would like to take this opportunity to thank Neil Parish for his service to our communities over the past 12 years.
“We support his decision to step down as our member of parliament.”
Friends of Mr Parish were said to be unhappy at the way he kept quiet and allowed speculation to form about party colleagues, according to Sky News deputy political editor Sam Coates.
The former farmer MEP had referred himself to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, days after two female Tory MPs said they witnessed him watching pornography on his mobile phone on two separate occasions.
The departure of Mr Parish, who also chaired the Commons Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee, will trigger a by-election in what has been a safe Conservative seat.
Mr Parish, who had represented the Devon constituency since 2010, was returned in 2019 with a majority of of 24,239, securing 60% of the vote.
But it will be a key target for the Liberal Democrats looking to pull off another upset like that in North Shropshire in the aftermath of the Owen Paterson lobbying scandal.
In an interview with the BBC, a tearful Mr Parish said: “I thought I could explain to the Standards Committee what happened and it would be worth explaining what happened…but in the end I could see that the furore and the damage I was causing my family and my constituency and association, just wasn’t worth carrying on.”
He added: “The situation was that, I, funnily enough, it was tractors that I was looking at, and so I did get into another website sort of a very similar name and I watched it for a bit, which I shouldn’t have done.
“But my crime, my most 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 chamber.”
Asked why he had done so, Mr Parish said it was “a moment of madness, and also, totally wrong”.
Mr Parish said he wanted to put on record “for all my rights and wrongs, I was not proud of what I was doing and the one thing I wasn’t doing, which I will take to my grave as being true, is I was not actually making sure people could see it”.
“In fact I was trying to do quite the opposite,” he insisted.
He said: “I was wrong what I was doing, but this idea that I was there watching it, intimidating women, I mean I have 12 years in parliament and probably got one of the best reputations ever – or did have.”
The real damage is likely be to politics as a whole
Neil Parish must have known from the moment news of the ‘porn MP’ surfaced that he wouldn’t be able to stay in his job.
His admission today that he deliberately watched explicit material while waiting to vote in the Commons is an outrageous development, even in the context of current scandalous standards in Westminster.
So ultimately his resignation was probably always inevitable.
But as is often the case in politics, what has forced him out today is his – and arguably his party’s – botched handling of this scandal.
The accusations that someone had viewed porn in the Commons were first raised in a meeting on Tuesday.
Yet it took three days for Neil Parish to be identified and for him to be suspended.
Senior MPs say in that period several of their colleagues were linked to the allegations, causing much trauma.
Not only did Mr Parish not identify himself, he also went on TV calling for the inquiry into the ‘anonymous MP’ to be allowed to run its course.
But this isn’t just on him, the government and Tory party could have acted more quickly as well.
We know the chief whip – responsible for discipline among MPs – was in that meeting on Tuesday.
So he had direct knowledge of the allegations and yet initially failed to suspend Mr Parish or make his name public.
Where we go from here is the government fighting another by-election.
This one is in a safe Conservative seat.
But the vote share in Tiverton and Honiton is strikingly similar to North Shropshire, where the Lib Dems pulled off a massive upset after another Tory resignation last year.
Be in no doubt that Ed Davey’s party will be pushing hard in Devon and have already called for a speedy vote.
The real damage of this unsightly debacle though, will probably be to politics as a whole.
When pressed on why he chose to view the material in the Commons, he said: “I don’t know, I think I must’ve taken complete leave of my senses and my sensibilities and my sense of decency, everything.”
Mr Parish said he was “not defending what I did for one moment” arguing he thought the best thing he could do was to “tell the truth”.
But mocking the MP’s explanation on Twitter, Labour’s deputy leader Angela said: “He was looking for tractors but ended up with porn actors?
“Neil Parish must think you were all born yesterday.
“Boris Johnson’s Conservatives are a national embarrassment.”
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