William Wragg resigns Tory whip after divulging MPs’ phone numbers | Conservatives

William Wragg has resigned the Conservative party whip days after admitting to giving out colleagues’ personal phone numbers to someone he met on a dating app.

The MP for Hazel Grove will now sit as an independent MP. Earlier on Tuesday he resigned as chair of the Commons’ public administration and constitutional affairs committee and as vice-chair of the 1922 Committee of backbench Tory MPs.

Last week Wragg told the Times he gave up colleagues’ numbers after he had sent intimate pictures of himself, saying he was “scared” and “mortified”.

Two police forces are investigating reports that explicit images and flirtatious messages were sent to MPs as part of an alleged “spear-phishing” attack.

Leicestershire police launched an investigation into reports that explicit images and flirtatious messages were sent to MPs as part of an alleged “spear-phishing” attack. On Friday, the Metropolitan police said they were investigating unsolicited explicit images and messages sent to MPs in a parliamentary honeytrap sexting scam.

Luke Evans, a Conservative MP, revealed that he was targeted in the Westminster sexting scandal and that he was the MP that first alerted the authorities. In a video posted on Facebook, Evans said he had been sent a photo of a naked woman on WhatsApp, which was followed by a message 10 days later.

At least a dozen people working in Westminster, including a serving government minister, received unsolicited WhatsApp messages from two suspicious mobile numbers.

Those targeted in the cyber-attack were sent messages from someone identifying themselves either as “Abi” or “Charlie”. The Guardian spoke to someone who was targeted by a WhatsApp user calling themselves “Abigail” or “Abi”.

A spokesperson for the government whips’ office said: “Following Will Wragg’s decision to step back from his roles on the public accounts and 1922 committees, he has also notified the chief whip that he is voluntarily relinquishing the Conservative whip.”