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| Home Affairs committee summons Tom Watson over Leon Brittan allegations | Home Affairs committee summons Tom Watson over Leon Brittan allegations |
| (34 minutes later) | |
| Labour's deputy leader Tom Watson has been asked to appear before MPs over his pursuit of sex abuse allegations against the late Lord Brittan. | Labour's deputy leader Tom Watson has been asked to appear before MPs over his pursuit of sex abuse allegations against the late Lord Brittan. |
| The Home Affairs committee has asked Mr Watson to "provide clarification on a number of issues" on 21 October. | The Home Affairs committee has asked Mr Watson to "provide clarification on a number of issues" on 21 October. |
| Mr Watson has refused to apologise for demanding police investigate the claims against Lord Brittan. | Mr Watson has refused to apologise for demanding police investigate the claims against Lord Brittan. |
| The former Conservative home secretary died unaware that police had dropped a rape inquiry against him. | |
| The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) found in July 2013 that there was not enough evidence for a prosecution over the claim Lord Brittan had raped a 19-year-old female student in 1967. | |
| The Home Affairs committee, chaired by Labour MP Keith Vaz, has also asked representatives of the Metropolitan Police to appear. | |
| On Monday Mr Watson was urged to apologise by Tory MP Sir Nicholas Soames, who said he had "vilely traduced" the former home secretary. | |
| In response, the Labour MP told the Commons he had been right to raise the issue. | |
| CPS letter | |
| In a letter to director for public prosecutions Alison Saunders in April 2014, Mr Watson said he was "driven to the unpalatable conclusion that the identity of the alleged perpetrator - Leon Brittan - may in some way have influenced treatment of the case". | |
| He urged Ms Saunders to look at the case again. | |
| The Crown Prosecution Service has now released a statement saying it did not ask the police to reopen the investigation as a result of Mr Watson's letter. | |
| It said it had forwarded Mr Watson's letter to the Metropolitan Police, saying this was normal practice, and that Lord Brittan had already been interviewed by the Met by the time it received the letter. | |
| "It is for the police to decide whether or not, or how, they will investigate an allegation that is referred to them," the statement added. | |
| "The CPS has no power to direct them and did not seek to do so." |