Party Conservative Party Preceded by Archie Hamilton Name Peter Morrison | Role British Politician Siblings Charles Morrison | |
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Died July 13, 1995, London, United Kingdom Books The North Sea: A Conservative Success Story | ||
Sir Peter Hugh Morrison PC (2 June 1944 – 13 July 1995) was a British Conservative politician, MP for Chester from 1974 to 1992, and Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. He is commonly known as a sexual abuser and for being heavily involved in the North Wales child abuse scandal.
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Background and education
Morrison was the third son of John Morrison, 1st Baron Margadale, by the Honourable Margaret Smith, the daughter of Frederick Smith, 2nd Viscount Hambleden and Lady Esther Gore. Sir Charles Morrison, Conservative MP for Devizes from 1964 to 1992, was his elder brother. He was educated at Eton and Keble College, Oxford, where he read Law.
Political career
Morrison was first elected to the House of Commons in the general election of February 1974 for Chester. He was one of the first backbench MPs to urge Margaret Thatcher to stand for the Party leadership in 1975. In 1986 he became Deputy Conservative Party chairman under Norman Tebbit having been previously a Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State and Minister of State in the Department of Employment. In 1987, he was Minister of State for Energy, with responsibility for oil.
During this period it was alleged that Morrison joined the small group of MPs, including Michael Grylls, Neil Hamilton, and Michael Brown, who took money from Ian Greer on behalf of third-party clients. During the Cash for Questions Inquiry, Ian Greer Associates admitted Morrison received payments after ceasing to be an MP. The Parliamentary Report in Hansard quotes Ian Greer as stating he made "Two commission payments, perhaps three, for client referrals" to Morrison between 1993–1994.
He became Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher in 1990 and was the leader of her campaign team in the Conservative leadership election in the same year. He was relaxed about Thatcher's prospects and predicted an easy win for her. Alan Clark went to visit Morrison one afternoon during the campaign and found him asleep in his office. Morrison claimed that he had enough MPs down as Thatcher supporters to ensure she would win.
After the first ballot among Conservative MPs had shown that Thatcher did not have enough votes to win outright, Morrison suggested to her that she should consult the Cabinet one-by-one to gauge support. He said to her: "Prime Minister, if you haven't won then there are a lot of Tory MPs who are lying". He stood down at the 1992 general election, being succeeded as MP for Chester by Gyles Brandreth.
Morrison was knighted by the Queen in February 1991. He died of a heart attack early in the morning of 13 July 1995, aged 51.
Homosexuality
According to the journalist Simon Heffer, Morrison was gay and went cruising (looking for men for sex) in Sussex Gardens, west London. Fellow Conservative MP Michael Brown, himself gay, described Morrison as gay in a column published by The Independent in 2002.
Allegations of child abuse
In October 2012, Rod Richards, a former MP and ex-leader of the Welsh Conservatives, implicated Morrison in the North Wales child abuse scandal.
Between 1974-90, up to 650 children from forty children's homes (such as Bryn Estyn in Wrexham) were sexually, physically and emotionally abused. Richards said that Morrison and another high-profile Conservative politician were named in documents as regular and unexplained visitors to the care homes.
Investigative journalist Nick Davies reported in The Guardian that Morrison received a caution for cottaging with underage boys in public lavatories.
Former Conservative minister Edwina Currie stated that Morrison regularly had sex with 16-year-old boys – whilst the legal age of consent (for same-sex relations) at the time was 21. In 2002, Currie described Morrison as a "notable pederast".
In July 2014, Barry Strevens, a former bodyguard to Margaret Thatcher, claimed he warned her that Morrison allegedly held sex parties with under-age boys. Strevens said that despite passing on the allegations to Thatcher she later promoted Morrison to the position of deputy chairman of the Conservative party. Thatcher's private secretary, Archie Hamilton, reportedly took notes of what was said.
In January 2015, The Daily Telegraph reported allegations that Morrison raped a 14-year-old boy at Elm Guest House in London. The alleged victim said he was walking in the village of Harting in West Sussex in 1982 when Morrison gave him some money and later lured him to London.