British minister admits he made his secretary buy sex toys, defends actions

After a Christmastime lunch in 2010, then-British Parliament member Mark Garnier handed his secretary cash and took her to a sex shop in the west end of London. He told her that he wanted her to go inside and purchase two vibrators, one for his wife and another for a woman in his constituency office.

Then, Caroline Edmondson told the Sun, Mr. Garnier stood outside the shop while she completed the purchase.

Another time, at a bar in front of other people, he called her a sexist name that referenced her breasts.

Ms. Edmondson’s claims about the employer she quit working for in 2010 spread across Britain, and then the world, on Sunday — part of a growing avalanche of sexual harassment accusations made against male British politicians by female colleagues.

Faced with a growing crisis, Britain’s cabinet office has launched an investigation to determine whether Mr. Garnier broke conduct rules, according to The Associated Press. And Prime Minister Theresa May is scrambling to show the public that Britain’s political leaders are assisting female colleagues who have silently endured sexual harassment — sometimes in offices down the hall or around the corner.

For his part, Mr. Garnier, who was first elected to Parliament in 2010 and appointed to Ms. May’s cabinet lastyear, acknowledged that the claims were true but dismissed his actions as harmless “hijinks.”

The statement about his former secretary’s breasts was a reference to a popular BBC show, he said, adding that his conduct could be taken as “dinosaur behavior” but “absolutely does not constitute harassment.”