LONDON (WJC) — A British lawmaker resigned as a member of parliament ahead of a report on his behavior, which included saying that a female soldier “looks like a bloody Jew”.
Patrick Mercer, a member of the governing Conservative Party, committed one of the worst-ever breaches of parliamentary lobbying rules, the UK House of Commons Standards Committee concluded in its report, which was published on Thursday.
Among Mercer’s other misdemeanors were using his position for paid advocacy and describing a fellow parliamentarian as a “crook of the first order.” The report recommended Mercer’s suspension from parliament for six months, but he had already stepped down by the time it was released.
Mercer was caught in a sting by an undercover reporter posing as a public affairs consultant for Fiji. During the course of a meeting with the reporter, he told an anecdote about a Fijian soldier in which he described her as looking like a “bloody Jew.” He later apologized for the statement, saying that he had been “very tired at the time” and admitted it had been a stupid thing to say, the parliamentary report said.
The lawmaker had added: “I am married to a woman of Jewish extraction. I have lots of friends in the Jewish community, and, yes, I can prostrate myself no further, it’s just a stupid thing to say, and I didn’t even … I accept I said it, and I am conscious that my speech isn’t always as balanced as it should be.”
*
Preceding provided by World Jewish Congress