A Tory minister has been slammed after suggesting there could be "some little man in China" eavesdropping on his own private conversations on the phone as he fielded questions over security breaches concerning senior UK Government figures.
Former chief whip Mark Spencer was trying to defend his Conservative colleagues following reports that Liz Truss's personal mobile was hacked by Russian spies while Foreign Secretary.
Shadow ministers Afzal Khan and Sarah Owen accused Spencer of using "outrageous and reckless language" which showed "ignorance".
Labour whip Chris Elmore hit out at “the state of this”, while his parliamentary colleague Chris Bryant appeared incredulous, tweeting: “Little man”? Honestly?”
It comes as the UK Government has faced accusations of "ill discipline" and not taking national security "seriously enough", with criticism of Home Secretary Suella Braverman’s return to the role after being forced out for sharing a sensitive document with a Tory backbencher from a personal email.
On Sunday, Cabinet minister Michael Gove declined to deny an incendiary report that Truss’s personal phone was accessed by Kremlin agents, as he insisted the Government has “very robust protocols” in place.
But Spencer, a minister in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, said during a round of interviews on Monday that Truss was “clearly” hacked.
"The former prime minister clearly was hacked,” he told Sky News.
"So, that is the first thing you do, say ‘Oh my goodness, I’ve been hacked, help’, and the security services will help you with that challenge.
"Now, of course, you don’t always know, which is why you’ve got to be super-careful.”
The Mail on Sunday reported that the agents who hacked Ms Truss’s phone were thought to have gained access to sensitive exchanges with foreign officials on Ukraine, as well as private conversations with Kwasi Kwarteng.
Questioned on the potential breach, Spencer said: “We all talk on personal phones, don’t we? I ring my wife, maybe there’s some little man in China listening to the conversations between me and my wife.
"But, you know, you’ve just got to be careful about what information you use on which phone and you get a lot of help and support from the security services on that.”
He said ministers get "quite a lot of briefing" on "what to do and what not to do".
Asked if he uses his UK Government phone for personal business, he said: “I do not, no.”
He added: "You do get quite a lot of briefing from the security services on what to do and what not to do. So, you know, it’s quite important to get that right.
"I don’t want to comment too much on it because, of course, what I don’t want to do is tell the world exactly what that briefing says. But you do get a lot of support when you become a Government minister on what is appropriate and inappropriate as a Government minister.”
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