Sizzling Scandals Open British Campaign

The British election campaign opened this week with a bumper crop of lurid sex and bribery scandals as an impressive line-up of Tory enemies vowed to pursue vendettas until they bring down the government of Prime Minister John Major. Thursday morning’s headlines trumpeted the tale of an affair between 46-year-old Piers Merchant, a Tory who is a strong advocate of “family values,” and Anna Cox, a 17-year-old nightclub hostess who told all in a dozen pages of detailed accounts shared by all morning papers and tabloids. The conservatives’ enemies are promising there is much more to come.

Joining the fray is Britain’s most fearsome publicist, Max Clifford, who has delivered one lurid story after another to tabloids, securing megabucks for his clients and a hefty commission for himself. He told the press he is sitting on at least two more sizzling sex scandals against Tory members to be released before election day on May 1. Clifford’s trophies of Tory heads include a former minister, David Mellor, whose affair with a woman was leaked to the tabloids, provoking his resignation. A few weeks ago, Clifford “arranged” for the tabloids to obtain copies of love letters from another conservative member of parliament, Jerry Hayes, to Paul Stone, his lover, insuring the end of Hayes’ political carrier.