A veteran Tory MP is taking money from a crisis communications firm to coach its corporate clients on how to swerve parliamentary scrutiny, I can reveal. James Gray is paid to train witnesses to side-step tricky questions thrown at them by Commons select committees. Gray has sat on 12 committees, including defence, transport and environment, since he was elected MP for North Wiltshire in 1997. Yet Gray has repeatedly refused to tell me the identities of witnesses he coached and for which committee appearances. On his MPs’ register of interests, Gray listed £550 ‘for training witnesses coming before a select committee hearing’ in July.

Source: Daily Mail August 07, 2021 21:56 UTC