Cover-up

MPs probe claims of a 'cover up' surrounding resignation of GCHQ boss who had helped paedophile priest escape jail

Parliament's security watchdog has launched a probe into 'cover-up' claims around the resignation of GCHQ boss Robert Hannigan first revealed by The Mail on Sunday.

Mystery surrounded the 2017 departure of the spy chief until this newspaper discovered he had helped a paedophile priest escape jail by giving him a character reference, only to see him reoffend.

Theresa May was accused of a cover-up after allowing the powerful director of Britain's listening station and largest spy agency to quietly resign when alerted that Hannigan's connection to Father Edmund Higgins had been unearthed by a sister intelligence agency.

At the time of his departure, Mr Hannigan had cited 'family reasons', with the crucial Higgins link kept secret even after the paedophile was jailed for child abuse in 2018.

Now Parliament's intelligence and security committee is investigating whether the Mr Hannigan – at the time a Foreign Office official – used Foreign Office headed notepaper for the 2013 letter defending the disgraced priest, a family friend.