Mellor: Currie acted like a cheap trollop
Senior Conservatives and close friends of John Major today rallied around the former Premier as more details emerged of his four-year affair with Edwina Currie.
The bombshell disclosure by Mrs Currie, that she and Mr Major were lovers between 1984 and 1988, when she was a junior Health Minister and he was in the Whips Office emerged at the weekend as The Times published extracts from her diaries.
The book, which it is estimated, could earn Mrs Currie a handsome five-figure sum looks set to top the best-seller list for political works.
But today, there was an angry backlash from some of Mr Major’s associates, and ex Westminster colleagues as they defended their former boss after what they see as Mrs Currie’s shocking betrayal.
David Mellor, one of Mr Major’s closest Cabinet allies accused Mrs Currie of acting like a “cheap trollop” over her revelations and only deciding to go public to make money.
Mr Mellor who resigned as Heritage Secretary in 1992 over a sex scandal, wrote in the Evening Standard: “So basically she sold John Major down the river for cash, like a cheap trollop.
“As someone who has been there, I can only shudder at the torment of the dammed he must have gone through every time someone else’s private life was in the headlines.”
Another close friend of Mr Major’s also criticised a flurry of speculation published in today’s newspapers saying: “A lot of the stuff that is being said is complete nonsense.
“The impression I have is that the reason the media are swarming about him is because they didn’t spot it (the affair) at the time and they are pretty cross about it.”
According to the Daily Mail, the former Prime Minister feared his affair with Mrs Currie had wrecked his ambition to become a Knight of the Garter, the highest honour the Queen can bestow.
All other surviving former Prime Ministers are members of the Order and he was said to be “desperate” to join Sir Edward Heath, Lord Callaghan and Baroness Thatcher in its ranks.
Mr Major’s friend said: “He is genuinely a commoner, that is why he didn’t want to go to the House of Lords.
“So, I don’t think you will find he is kept awake at night by worries about the Garter.”
The diaries reveal that the couple ended the relationship in 1988 as Mr Major’s political career was beginning to take off.
Mr Major described the affair as the event in his life of which he was “most ashamed” a comment which today brought an angry response from Mrs Currie.
She told The Times: “He was not very ashamed of it at the time, I can tell you. I think I am slightly indignant about that remark.”
While she was pleased that the former Premier had not been so “foolish” as to try to deny the relationship, she added: ”It’s sad he was unable to say a kind word.
“These are secrets which have been kept for the best part of 15 years. There was a lot of pain involved in keeping those secrets.”
