Keith Vaz: Disgraced MP taken to hospital hours after facing six-month suspension over cocaine and prostitute scandal

Leicester East representative has been treated for ‘serious mental health condition’ since 2016, statement says

Keith Vaz has been taken to hospital after a major report recommended he be suspended from the Commons for offering to buy cocaine during an encounter with two male prostitutes.

The disgraced MP significantly damaged the reputation of parliament and should be barred for six months, the standards watchdog ruled.

According to a statement on his website, Mr Vaz was taken to hospital yesterday following the publication of the report. The statement added that the 62-year-old has been treated for a “serious mental health condition” during the three years since the scandal first broke in 2016.

Phone calls to Mr Vaz’s office went unanswered on Tuesday morning. His Twitter account has been suspended.

The veteran MP's ill health had previously delayed the Commons inquiry.

However, the committee said that if Mr Vaz had given a "candid and co-operative account" of the incident from the beginning, it could have concluded much sooner.

It said "much of the welter of documentation and procedural challenges which has emanated from Mr Vaz has been designed, in our opinion, to 'throw dust in the eyes' of the commissioner and the committee".

Its report added that although the core issues facing the inquiry were relatively simple, "Mr Vaz has done his best to complicate, obfuscate and confuse the inquiry through arguments of little merit and documentation of dubious relevance".

Additional reporting by Press Association