What is really going on in politics? Get our daily email briefing straight to your inbox Sign up Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Invalid Email

The MP who gave the Home Secretary an “explosive” dossier naming alleged VIP paedophiles was targeted by a triple murderer.

Campaigner Geoffrey Dickens handed over 50 pages of claims to Leon Brittan in 1983.

The Tory backbencher promised it would “blow the lid off” a network of child-sex perverts at the heart of the establishment.

But soon afterwards, Mr Dickens’ constituency home in Saddleworth, Lancs, and his flat in London were ransacked – and his name was found in a notebook owned by killer Arthur Hutchinson.

The armed robber had murdered a bride’s parents and brother hours after she had got married in Sheffield in 1983.

He had also raped one of the wedding guests.

Hutchinson was jailed for life and told he would serve at least 18 years.

But the sentence was later changed to a whole-life tariff – by Mr Brittan.

(Image: Getty Images)

The discovery of Mr Dickens’ name in the notebook led to the MP being given police protection. His son Barry said: “The fact my father was on a killer’s hit-list was frightening, all the more so because the killer was spotted scoping out our home.

“Maybe dad was on it because of his anti-paedophile campaign.”

Hutchinson has never revealed why the name of Mr Dickens, who died in 1995, was in his notebook.

But there were suspicions the murderer may have had links to paedophile rings.

Barry said: “It was very serious at the time.

“I was in my late teens and the first I knew about it was when I came home and found several police cars outside the house.

“We had two armed officers for a couple of weeks until the killer was arrested.

“Apparently he was considered very dangerous indeed.

“He was spotted near the house several times by the police but managed to give them the slip.

“They also found a sort of lair where he’d been laying up at night and there was food there.

“One night there was a power-cut and I came out of my bedroom to find Dad on the landing with a snooker cue in his hand. The two protection officers were lost in the dark in the cellar trying to find the trip-switch without a torch.

“It was a lighter moment in a deadly serious situation.”

Hutchinson was caged in 1984. But last year the European Court of Human Rights ruled his whole-life tariff should be reviewed.

Meanwhile, the Home Office has launched an internal probe into its handling of the Dickens dossier.

Permanent secretary Mark Sedwill has told David Cameron it will be led by a “senior independent legal figure” and will make sure the findings of a previous investigation “remain sound”.

That inquiry – carried out last year – concluded all relevant information provided by Mr Dickens had been passed to police.

Any leftover material had been destroyed in line with the Home Office rules then in force.

The new review will study official records between 1979 and 1999 to double-check what information the department was given about child abuse and what action it took.

Investigators have been told to find out if – and why – any key documents are missing.

And they have been ordered to report back to Mr Sedwill within four weeks.

They have also been asked to provide a summary of their findings for the public.

Labour MP Tom Watson said: “Does this sound illogical? It certainly does to me.

“Whether the PM wasn’t aware of the previous inconclusive review, or he didn’t have confidence in the previous inquiry doesn’t really matter.

“The point is that the missing Dickens Dossiers are only a tiny part of a bigger allegation that powerful people avoided being investigated for child abuse.

“The only way that we will establish the facts is through an overarching national inquiry into historical cases of organised abuse.”