ITV News have reproduced the disturbing Hancock texts. Just as Guido did in 2010, but the LibDems are pretending Clegg missed that. That excuse does not hold water though.

The LibDems said yesterday that they had not seen the report about Mike Hancock, yet they were explicitly told about the evidence – including texts messages – that implicated the sleazy MP and Councillor in scandal. The evidence was always there and Hancock’s pervy ways have been well documented by this website. The LibDems, even when contacted, have had their head in the sand.This dossier containing all of the text messages that Hancock sent to a vulnerable constituent was presumably put at the bottom of a pile somewhere in LibDem HQ. Hancock even went on the stand and admitted fondling a teenage girl and still managed to keep the whip.The spy saga was just the tip of the sleaze-berg.

In Febuary 2013, Guido wrote “Read the Full Hancock Dossier Ignored By Nick“, and in June of last year Labour MP Thomas Docherty wrote to the Deputy Prime Minister directly, calling for Hancock to be suspended as a councillor:

Rt Hon Nick Clegg MP
Leader of the Liberal Democrats
House of Commons
Westminster
LONDON
SW1A 0AA

19 June 2013

Mike Hancock MP

Mike Hancock MP has reportedly resigned from the Parliamentary Liberal Democrat Party rather than have the whip withdrawn, this means that he now sits as an Independent MP.

As you are aware he also represents the Fratton Ward of Portsmouth Council in which he has the remunerated position as an Executive Cabinet Member, which according to the Council website pays at least an additional £7,140 a year on top of his councilor allowances. According to his website and a press release issued today, Mr Hancock continues to describe himself as a Liberal Democrat MP. Furthermore as The News, Portsmouth, reported, he is continuing his tenure as the Council’s Executive Member for Economic Regeneration. This is a position that he holds only because the Lib Dem controlling group allow him to do so. As the Lib Dem Council Leader, Cllr Vernon-Jackson has said: ‘his role in the council does not change in any way – he remains as a member of the cabinet’.

I am sure that you agree with me that this position is untenable, inconsistent and neither liberal nor democratic. Furthermore it will seem to the public that the third Parliamentary party, the Liberal Democrats are giving the appearance of action being taken yet in practical terms allowing him to be both in the party and outside of the party simultaneously. Is this how a serious party in Government conducts itself and what are the public supposed to think?

As you will be aware, the Labour Group Leader of Portsmouth Council, Cllr John Ferrett wrote to you in May calling for Mr Hancock to be suspended from the Cabinet and yet Mr Hancock continues to hold this important position in a Lib Dem administration.

Will you now instruct the local council group to remove their support from him and take action by suspending him from the Cabinet?

I would be grateful for your early response.

Yours sincerely,

Thomas Docherty MP
Dunfermline and West Fife

He received no reply, and it took six further months for the LibDems to be forced into action. Yet another cover up…