Mail on Sunday reporter could lose Lobby pass after Angela Rayner article

Mail on Sunday political editor Glen Owen is facing questions over whether his Lobby pass should be removed after a page five lead story about Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner was widely condemned.

At time of writing the story had prompted 5,500 complaints to press regulator IPSO.

The article said: “All is fair in love, war and Commons duels with Boris Johnson, if the claims of Tory MPs are to be believed.

“Conservatives have claimed that Labour Deputy Leader Angela Rayner likes to put Mr Johnson ‘off his stride’ in the chamber by crossing and uncrossing her legs when they clash at Prime Minister’s Questions.”

It went on to quote one unnamed MP as saying: “She knows she can’t compete with Boris’s Oxford Union debating training, but she has other skills which he lacks. She has admitted as much when enjoying drinks with us on the [Commons] terrace.”

Conservative MP Caroline Nokes, chair of the Women and Equalities Committee, has written to the Speaker of the House of Commons to ask whether Owen should have a parliamentary Lobby pass.

Labour MP David Lammy said: “The Mail on Sunday ‘story’ is sexist trash designed to put women off politics. The journalists and grubby politicians who made it happen should be utterly ashamed.”

Angela Rayner said on Twitter: “Women in politics face sexism and misogyny every day – and I’m no different. This morning’s is the latest dose of gutter journalism courtesy of @MoS_Politics.”

Campaign group Stop Funding Hate has begun targeting advertisers who appear alongside the online version of the Mail on Sunday article and it appears to calling for a wholesale boycott of the brand by identifying any advertisers on Twitter.

However others have said that the story exposes a truth about parliamentary life.

TalkTV political editor Kate McCann said: “You see all those female MPs and journalists tweeting their rage at this story? It’s because nearly every single one of us has experienced something like this in the course of doing our jobs – often repeatedly – and we are utterly, utterly sick of it.”

And Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves said: “It’s a great sadness that I’m not surprised. This sort of sexism and misogyny is the sort of rubbish that female MPs and also female staffers in the House of Commons have to put up with every single day.

“And when I hear a minister just now say I haven’t heard this sort of thing before, talk to your female colleagues, talk to the women who work in your office because a lot of them would have experienced this sort of thing.”

Press regulator the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) had received more than 5,000 complaints over the article as of 9.30am on Monday 25 April. Complainants have alleged breaches under Clause 1 (accuracy), Clause 3 (harassment) and Clause 12 (discrimination) of the Editors’ Code.

The latter states: “The press must avoid prejudicial or pejorative reference to an individual’s race, colour, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation or to any physical or mental illness or disability.”

Anyone can complain to IPSO about accuracy issues.

On other clauses, an individual has to be directly affected by the article. IPSO also allows complaints from “representative groups… where the alleged breach of the Code is significant and there is a public interest in doing so”.

Technology minister Chris Philp has said that if the Tory MP responsible for misogynistic comments about Labour deputy leader Angela Rayner is identified they will face “serious consequences”.

Philp said he expected efforts would be made to find out who spoke to Owen but suggested the chances of success were limited.

“I think that if anyone is identified having views like those that were expressed, which are just outrageous and misogynistic, then I would expect serious consequences to follow,” he told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

“I expect efforts will be made to identify who is responsible for those views. But journalists fiercely guard their sources and I doubt Glen Owen will be volunteering that information.

“I think there is ongoing, active work to make sure anyone holding offensive views, including the misogyny we saw demonstrated over the weekend, is called out and action is taken.”