Boris Johnson has dropped the Mark Field inquiry – misogyny still plagues the halls of Westminster

When the treatment of MPs accused of abuse and assault against women is affected by how much their parties fear the polls, gender equality is severely undermined

This week, three male MPs accused of assault or abuse of women are back in the headlines. Many in Westminster have long sought to gloss over the mistreatment of women by male politicians. Will it be any different under Boris?

Let’s just say it isn’t a good start. The prime minister yesterday dismissed the Whitehall inquiry against Mark Field, the Conservative MP who was filmed grabbing a Greenpeace gatecrasher by the throat, slamming her against a wall and dragging her out of a banquet.

Field justified his aggression by saying that he feared Janet Barker, the activist, could have been armed. Fellow Tory MP Sir Peter Bottomley defended Field’s actions as “what any sensible person would have done” – ironic, given that no other MP in the room did – because Barker could have been carrying a collapsible truncheon up her dress. Field was suspended from his role as a Foreign Officer minister and an inquiry launched, but was allowed to retain the whip – presumably to better fend off a truncheon.

Johnson ended Field’s time in government this week, which was no less surprising than any other dismissal. But what did surprise is that he also ended the Field inquiry, with his spokesman saying that a chokehold is “a matter for the previous PM”. As if Johnson expunged all pre-existing skidmarks when he flushed away half the Cabinet this week.

It goes without saying that clean slates for potential criminals under new leadership is the most slippery of slopes. And the timing is particularly fishy – the Field inquiry cannot have been thoroughly looked into in a week where Johnson’s priorities have clearly been elsewhere. It appears to be just a misguided ploy to sure up shaky authority.

Which brings us rather neatly to Charlie Elphicke, the MP for Dover, who has been charged with three counts of sexual assault. That whip was first suspended in 2017 after the accusations against him were originally reported to the police, but Theresa May reinstated it just in time to pointlessly back her in the no-confidence vote last December. Even by her standards of craven flip-flopping, that move was laughable futile.

Elphicke’s latest de-whipping, however, has cut Johnson’s flimsy majority down to two. If, as seems likely, the Conservatives lose the Brecon and Radnorshire by-election on Friday, that goes down to one. Might we then expect a pardon for Elphicke?

Speaking of by-elections, we come to Jared O’Mara, the independent, ex-Labour MP for Sheffield Hallam, who announced his resignation on Saturday after The Times reported accusations of sexual harassment. (Ironically, that was just after his chief of staff used the official O’Mara Twitter account to quit in spectacularly insulting fashion)

O’Mara was suspended by the Labour party last October after he was accused of misogynistic and transphobic comments by one of his constituents. However, the party’s NEC ruled that it did not meet the grounds for expulsion – even though this was just months after revelations that O’Mara had made a series of misogynistic and homophobic remarks online between 2002 and 2004. Nevertheless, O’Mara resigned from Labour in protest over his treatment. You can see his point – what does a man have to say to get sacked?

This is one week, and just three men: a tiny snapshot of our political landscape. But with these cases, both the Labour and Conservatives parties have shown unforgivable inconsistency. How, after #MeToo and the lingering “Pestminster” scandal, aren’t there concrete procedures in place to deal with accusations of assault and harassment?

Innocent until proven guilty is the bedrock of our justice system, but accusations must still be thoroughly – and apolitically – investigated. When the procedural is allowed to become political, it ceases to have meaning at all. In other words, if the treatment of MPs accused of abuse and assault against women is affected by how much their parties fear the polls, then any advancements Whitehall can claim in gender equality are undermined – if not completely shredded.

Speaking of, take a look at our new Cabinet this week. Our foreign secretary Dominic Raab in 2011 described feminists as “obnoxious bigots”. Not to be outdone, the new leader of the House Jacob Rees Mogg said that it was “ridiculous” to call a man a feminist at all – which I suppose permits me to call them both obnoxious bigots. Perhaps we can be grateful that the new “Brexit war cabinet” doesn’t include a single woman – I think the women in government have dodged a bullet there.

And what of our new prime minister, a man who was lauded as a real feminist for his strong stance against FGM – despite his 2002 article in The Spectator, which resurfaced this summer, that mocked aid worker efforts to combat the practice in Africa as an “obsession”.

That ties with Johnson’s long history of casual chauvinism, ugly homophobia and Islamophobic misogyny – including a joke that more Malaysian women were attending university because they had to find husbands. Let’s hope they fared better than both his wives, whom he has long flagrantly disrespected. I’d fear for his children, if we knew how many he had.

I suppose we can say that he pales in comparison with his counterpart across the pond, the pussy-grabber who became president – an inspiring tale for our times. But if that’s really the best we can say this week, then for the love of God, fetch me my collapsible truncheon.