Anger at Lords bid for MP in VIP abuse row

HOUsE of Lords chiefs have been urged to block a fresh peerage bid for the Labour politician who pushed false claims of a VIP paedophile ring.

An application has been made for exLabour deputy leader Tom Watson to be given a seat in the upper house, just two years after he was first nominated.

The House of Lords Appointments Commission is under pressure to reject him again from the Opposition’s latest honours list because of his involvement in the scandal of false child abuse claims.

Its chairman Lord Bew has been told by Tory MP Harvey Proctor, one of the victims of scotland Yard’s disastrous Operation Midland, that Mr Watson has made ‘no genuine apology to those his actions damaged, including myself’.

Mr Watson shocked the Commons in 2012 by claiming there had been a ‘powerful paedophile network linked to Parliament and No 10’ in the 1980s. It emerged the claims were fantasies of hoaxer Carl Beech, also known as ‘Nick’. Mr Watson, now head of trade body UK Music, said in a TV interview he was ‘very sorry on many levels’.

Last night, the House of Lords Appointments Commission, Labour and Mr Watson declined to comment.