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'I met a woman at a club but I think she is a KGB agent'

The Independent

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February 21, 2025

Former chief whip's diaries reveal life at heart of government

- HOLLY EVANS

'I met a woman at a club but I think she is a KGB agent'

In a book filled with startling claims, former chief whip Simon Hart has recounted surreal moments from the ailing Conservative government's final months.

Serialised in The Times, it covers orgies, Matt Hancock’s abrupt departure to the I’m a Celebrity... jungle, a Tory MP becoming stuck in a brothel, and the various misconduct scandals that engulfed members of Rishi Sunak’s government.

Hart was the Conservative MP for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire from 2010 to 2024, and his diary covers the final 21 months of Tory leadership before the party’s crushing defeat at the last general election.

Here are some bizarre moments from his book, ‘Ungovernable’.

imageTory MP asks to be rescued from a brothel

Hart recalls that, just one month into the job, an MP elected in 2019 called him at 2.45am to report that he was in a brothel with a woman he suspected was a Russian agent.

Hart recounts the MP telling him: “I met a woman as I left the Carlton Club who offered me a drink, but I now think she is a KGB agent. She wants £500 and has left me in a room with 12 naked women and a CCTV.”

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