MP Chris Huhne plays down Tweet error

CHRIS Huhne has insisted that mistakenly Tweeting a message meant for a member of staff was a “fairly marginal mistake”.

The Energy Secretary published a message that read “from someone else fine but I do not want my fingerprints on the story. C”.

It was quickly deleted but screengrabs swiftly circulated on Twitter, fuelling speculation about which article Huhne may have been referring to.

The Guardian has run a story referring to the Liberal Democrat’s Eastleigh constituency and local newspaper.

It suggests that the section of Home Secretary Theresa May’s conference speech which sparked a public spat with colleague Ken Clarke over claims that an illegal immigrant dodged deportation because he had a pet cat appeared to have been lifted from an address made by Ukip leader Nigel Farage.

In July, Farage told an audience at Eastleigh Railway Institute that a court decided a man “should not be deported because – and I really am not making this up – he had a pet cat”, the newspaper reported.

Huhne told the BBC that Tweeting a private message to a member of staff was a “fairly marginal” mistake.