Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been accused of using the crimes of notorious sex offender Jimmy Savile as a distraction from the Downing Street ‘partygate’ scandal.
Speaking to the House of Commons after the publication of Sue Gray’s report earlier this week, Johnson implied Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer - formerly head of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) - was at fault for failing to prosecute Savile in 2009.
The comment prompted an outcry from the Labour leadership, and even some Conservative MPs have been bitterly critical of the PM. So what are the facts of the matter?
Did Keir Starmer fail to prosecute Jimmy Savile?
In 2009, when Keir Starmer was Director of Public Prosecutions - the most senior figure in the Crown Prosecution Service - a decision was taken not to prosecute Jimmy Savile.
Savile was the subject of four complaints in 2007-8 alleging child sexual abuse. He was interviewed under caution by police in October 2009.
However, at this time he was neither arrested nor prosecuted; and he died a free man in October 2011. After his death, it emerged that he had been a prolific paedophile and sex offender.
Mr Johnson appeared to suggest in the Commons that Keir Starmer was in some way culpable for the failure to prosecute Savile - but this is, at best, a misreading of the facts.
According to fact-checking website Full Fact, while Starmer was head of the CPS at the time the decision not to prosecute was taken, he wasn’t the person who made that call as he was not the reviewing lawyer in the Savile case.
Subsequently, in 2013, Starmer commissioned barrister Alison Levitt to investigate whether or not the CPS had been right not to charge Savile in 2009. She concluded that she had “reservations” about the decision not to proceed with criminal charges.
“On the face of it, the allegations made were both serious and credible; the prosecutor should have recognised this and sought to “build” a prosecution,” she said.
Sir Keir accepted Alison Levitt’s conclusions and apologised for the CPS’ “shortcomings” in the Savile case. He left the CPS in November 2013, and was elected as a Labour MP at the 2015 general election.
Speaking to Sky News after Johnson’s remarks, Sir Keir hit out at the PM for his “ridiculous slur” and said many Tory MPs had looked visibly uncomfortable about it.
