Tom Watson’s controversial letter to Britain’s top prosecutor did not lead to Leon Brittan being interviewed by police over sex abuse allegations, the Crown Prosecution Service has said.



The CPS said a letter it received from Watson complaining about the case was not passed to Metropolitan police detectives investigating the former Tory cabinet minister until after they had interviewed Brittan under criminal caution.

Watson, Labour’s deputy leader, has been at the centre of a firestorm over his role in the treatment of Brittan and has been called to appear before MPs on the home affairs committee next week.

Conservative MPs are furious with Watson over his pursuit of Brittan, who was suffering from cancer in his final months, as well as the Labour MP’s comment soon after Brittan died that the Tory peer was “close to evil”.

Brittan died in January 2015 without knowing that he had been cleared of suspicion over the allegation that he had raped a woman. It has emerged that Watson had previously written to the director of public prosecutions, Alison Saunders, about an allegation of rape when he learned that the police inquiry was being dropped.

The CPS said it had not pressured the police, but merely passed on Watson’s letter “to the relevant officer for their information”.

The letter to Saunders, who is head of the CPS, was received in the final week of April 2014, but it was not passed to police until the first week of June. Brittan was interviewed by Met detectives on 30 May.

In a statement, the CPS said: “The CPS at no point made any request to the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) that they reopen their investigation into Lord Brittan in relation to complaints highlighted by Tom Watson MP.

“Lord Brittan was interviewed by the MPS before the CPS had forwarded the correspondence from Mr Watson.

“As is normal when we receive correspondence relating to operational police matters, the letter from Mr Watson was forwarded by CPS London staff to the relevant officer for their information.

“It is for the police to decide whether or not, or how, they will investigate an allegation that is referred to them. The CPS has no power to direct them and did not seek to do so.”

The Met never asked the CPS to make a decision on whether Brittan should be charged, because there was insufficient evidence to do so. Detectives had themselves concluded they had not “amassed sufficient evidence for a prosecution”, the CPS said, and thus prosecutors declined to look at the case to back or challenge the police’s decision.

Police were investigating an allegation that Brittan had raped a 19-year-old female student in 1967.

Watson issued a defiant response on Monday to the prime minister’s demands that he apologise for putting the police under pressure to reopen the rape inquiry.

He told parliament it was the children who had been the victims of abuse who deserved an apology after he was urged earlier in the day to “examine his conscience” by David Cameron.

Watson’s scheduled appearance before MPs on the home affairs committee means the tables will be turned on Watson, who gained a reputation as a ferocious select committee inquisitor after he grilled Rupert Murdoch over phone-hacking allegations in 2012.

On Monday Watson was asked to respond to a point of order from Sir Nicholas Soames, who said he had “vilely traduced” the former home secretary. The Labour deputy leader told the Commons: “I understand that honourable and right honourable members feel aggrieved that Leon Brittan was interviewed by the police and that they are angry with my use of language.

“But I’m sure that they would also agree that when anyone is accused of multiple sexual crimes by numerous, completely unrelated sources, the police have a duty to investigate, no matter who it is,” he said.

Addressing Cameron’s comments, he said the survivors of abuse had been ignored and belittled for too long. “Earlier the prime minister said that I should examine my conscience. Well, I think we all need to examine our consciences in this house.

“We presided over a state of affairs where children have been abused, and then ignored, dismissed and then disdained. If anyone deserves an apology, it’s them,” he said.

In unusually tense scenes, as Watson sat down, some Tory MPs shouted “shame” and “disgrace” across the floor of the House of Commons.