A lawmaker from Britain’s ruling Conservative party, Neil Parish, resigned on Saturday, according to reports.
Parish admitted that he intentionally watched pornography on his mobile phone in the House of Commons chamber.
“I think I must have taken complete leave of my senses and my sensibilities and in a sense of decency, everything,” he told the BBC in an interview aired Saturday announcing his resignation.
“(It was) a moment of madness and also totally wrong… I’m not going to defend it.”
The 65-year-old, who has been an MP since 2010, had already been suspended Friday from the Conservatives and faced at least two parliamentary probes after he was publicly outed in the scandal.
His public identification ended days of speculation after it emerged at least two other lawmakers had complained that he had been seen watching porn in the Commons, amid broader accusations of a misogynistic environment in Britain’s parliament.
A by-election is expected to take place soon.
Johnson’s government is currently engulfed in numerous scandals, just days ahead of crucial local elections. The Prime Minister himself has been fined by police for breaching his own Covid rules during the 2020 lockdown, and faces an investigation into whether he misled Parliament about parties in Downing Street.
And last week, his party was accused of having a serious misogyny problem, after one of his backbenchers anonymously claimed to a newspaper that Angela Rayner, deputy leader of the opposition Labour Party, distracted Johnson in the House of Commons by crossing and uncrossing her legs, similar to Sharon Stone’s character in the movie “Basic Instinct.”
