Who is Adam Werritty?

Christian McBride

Fox and Werrity. Photo courtesy of guardian.co.uk

“The requirement to declare a relevant interest at the appropriate time covers almost
every aspect of a Member’s parliamentary duties extending to correspondence and
meetings with Ministers and public officials”

- House of Commons Code of Conduct, Chapter 2, paragraph 85

So as Dr Fox faces intensifying questions relating to his relationship with he is left defending a trepiditious position. As more comes out about Adam Werritty the worse things look for Fox. Today Fox denies claims that it was Werritty that was his guest during the robbery at his London home. This has given rise to the usual sexual speculation that the boys in Westminster love so much. Fox has defended his sexuality rather passionately in the past, denying he was gay in an interview in 2005 with the London’s Evening Standard.

But who is this Werritty character? Fox’s flat mate and best man at his wedding, Werritty ran six businesses which made a combined total of just £20,000 profit, two of which have seemingly no purpose and one of which made just £6000 profit but managed to make a £10,000 donation to the Atlantic Bridge Research and Education scheme which group Fox had established. A group Warritty would go on to be director of and would pay him £90,000.

This coupled with the high profile meetings Warritty attended with Fox as his adviser (a title he would put on business cards) yet holding no official position has led to questions being raised about the nature of their relationship and whether it has constituted a conflict of interest. One of the more pertinent questions being the funding of Werritty’s travel expenses, which, if paid for with tax payers money, would constitute an abuse of his position.