SNP MP Patricia Gibson has been named as the second MP facing sexual harassment charges, after their alleged victim registered an official complaint with Commons watchdogs.
The accusations relate to an SNP staffer who claims that SNP MP Patrick Grady, who has since resigned as Chief whip, inappropriately touched him when he was 19, and that another female MP drunkenly pestered him for sex during two separate incidents in London.
The female MP in question has now been named as Patricia Gibson.
The SNP staffer said the first alleged incident took place in The Water Poet pub in 2016, saying: “I was sitting on a couch speaking with colleagues and he perched himself on the side of the couch” he said.
“At that point, he started putting his fingers down the back of my collar, touching me inappropriately there. He was also grabbing my hair.”
The alleged victim said he declined to raise the matter further as he did not want to go “head to head with an MP”, and later complained about the party’s processes after being ‘ambushed’ by group boss Ian Blackford who called him.
A meeting, he claims, was arranged by Blackford with the man and the MP he complained about to attempt to quash the scandal.
He said: “He calls me into the office and the other MP is sitting on the couch, crying.”
“At that time. I felt the only thing I could say was that it was OK. I wasn’t going to tear this guy down in front of me. It was pretty hard for me to watch.”
He added: “I wouldn’t view this as mediation – I would view it as ambush.”
The complainer said the separate incident, allegedly involving Patricia Gibson, happened in January last year in the Strangers Bar in Westminster.
He has also accused SNP Commons leader Blackford of an “ambush” after calling him into a meeting to accept an apology from one of the alleged abusers.
New evidence has been added to complaint, which is understood to include witnesses to the alleged incidents.
Ms Gibson, 52, is married to Cunninghame North MSP Kenny Gibson, and has not been suspended from her role in the Scottish Parliament as spokesperson for housing, communities and local government.
Gibson has denied the claims, saying there is “no substance to allegations suggesting inappropriate sexual behaviour by me” and that the new evidence “does not support the allegations being made by this complainant about me which appear to have changed over time”.
An investigation is still underway.
