Fox says sorry but faces new inquiry into relationship with Werritty

Liam Fox is to face a new inquiry into his relationship with his friend Adam Werritty, as he apologised to parliament for his conduct.

Dr Fox, who was forced to resign as defence secretary last week ahead of a damning report by the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Gus O’Donnell, has admitted he broke the ministerial code of conduct.

But yesterday it was announced that the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner, John Lyon, will launch another investigation into a complaint about the affair.

Labour MP John Mann wrote to Mr Lyon last week asking him to examine allegations that Dr Fox allowed Mr Werritty to live rent-free and run a business in a property funded by his parliamentary allowances.

A spokesman for Mr Lyon said: “The commissioner has received a complaint from John Mann, and he has accepted it.”

The news came hours after Dr Fox apologised to the House of Commons in a personal statement in which he accepted that his association with Mr Werritty breached the ministerial code.

Dr Fox said he resigned from his job as defence secretary “without bitterness or rancour”.

Dr Fox said he had been “overwhelmed” by the support he had received from colleagues, as he made a five-minute statement in the chamber.

He said he accepted the conclusions of Sir Gus’s report into his relationship with his friend.

But he criticised sections of the media for running a vindictive campaign, adding that elderly members of his family had been harassed.

He said his resignation last week had come as “a deep personal disappointment”.

He said his case had been the subject of a “media frenzy”, which included expressions of “a personal vindictiveness, and even hatred, that should worry all of us”.

Dr Fox paid tribute to his wife, Jesme, and pledged his continuing loyalty to David Cameron’s government.

“I will continue to give this government my full support as they rescue the economy from the mess we inherited,” the former defence secretary told the House.

In his report, the Cabinet Secretary said there had been an “inappropriate and unacceptable” blurring of lines between official and personal relationships that risked creating the false impression that Mr Werritty spoke on behalf of the UK government.

Mr Werritty met Dr Fox 22 times in the Whitehall HQ of the Ministry of Defence and 18 times on trips abroad, and used business cards describing himself as an adviser to the then defence secretary.

The report disclosed that Dr Fox had turned down an offer to have an MoD official attend a meeting with the defence supplier Harvey Boulter in Dubai last June, something that Sir Gus described as “unwise and inappropriate”. It was also revealed that Dr Fox had been warned twice by his private office and MoD permanent secretary Ursula Brennan of the risks posed by his association with Mr Werritty, but he chose to ignore the advice.

Sir Gus made five recommendations, including telling senior civil servants to report concerns about ministers’ behaviour to the Prime Minister.

Yesterday, Bernard Jenkin, the Conservative MP and chairman of the public administration select committee, said the senior civil service needed to be more confident about holding ministers to account. He criticised Sir Gus’s report into the controversy and questioned why it took more than a year for Mr Werritty’s frequent presence alongside Dr Fox to become an issue.

“The senior civil service are part of the checks and balances of our constitution,” Mr Jenkin said.

“Just to say in this report the risks of Mr Fox’s association with Mr Werritty were raised with Mr Fox by both his private office and his permanent secretary I don’t think is the get-out-of-jail-free card.”