The Scandal That Killed a Government: Harold Wilson on the Profumo Affair (1963) | Political History

Описание: On this day in 1963, Conservative Secretary of State for War John Profumo resigned from his post in disgrace. A member of Prime Minister Harold Macmillan's government, Profumo was found to have lied to Parliament after he denied having an affair with 21-year-old model Christine Keeler. The minister told a crowded House of Commons on 22 March 1963 that "there was no impropriety whatsoever in my acquaintanceship with Miss Keeler." In truth, the pair had begun an extra-marital affair in July 1961. The affair took on a greater significance when it was reported that Keeler might have at the same time been involved with Soviet naval attache and suspected KGB officer Captain Yevgeny Ivanov. This interview with Labour leader Harold Wilson was filmed on 6 June 1963, the day after Profumo's resignation. It captures the moment at which, at the height of the Cold War, the affair grew from a sex scandal into an issue of national security.

The Profumo Affair rocked British political life. It contributed greatly to the resignation of Prime Minister Harold Macmillan later that year and the subsequent election victory of Harold Wilson's Labour Party. It also shaped forever the lives of those at the heart of the scandal, the greatest casualty being Dr Stephen Ward, the osteopath, socialite, and occasional MI5 informant through whom Keeler had been introduced to both Profumo and Ivanov. In July 1963, Ward was convicted on two counts of living off the earnings of the prostitution of Miss Keeler and her friend and fellow model Mandy Rice-Davies, as the two had made contributions to living costs while staying with Ward. Before the trial's verdict was announced, Ward took his own life. The trial has since been described as a gross miscarriage of justice, with historian Richard Davenport-Hines arguing Ward was used as a scapegoat in a trial that served as an act of "revenge" by the political establishment.

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