Why MI5 hid the evidence of his terrible crimes
HOW Cyril came to be afforded protection by MI5 is one of the great mysteries of his story. But the jigsaw is starting to piece together.
He is thought to have been a key catalyst behind the Lib-Lab pact in the Seventies that kept the faltering Labour government in power.
Any scandal surrounding him would have undermined the Liberals and that fragile pact at a time of great political turbulence. What’s less well known is that, earlier in the decade, the Conservatives had invited the Liberals to form a coalition under which there was a very real prospect of Cyril being made a minister.
Initially, he wasn’t keen, knowing that rank-and-file Liberals did not want to prop up a Tory government. But the talks worked to his personal benefit as he had to be vetted for a possible ministerial role.
Police files documenting the many allegations of child abuse committed by Smith began quickly disappearing.
Tony Robinson, a Special Branch officer with Lancashire Police in the Seventies, has confirmed that all files on Cyril were removed by MI5 officers from the safe at police headquarters in Preston.
Within the files were affidavits from young boys detailing their abuse at Cyril’s hands. These were taken to London and never seen again. Why?
MI5 had a unit that monitored MPs and reported to the Cabinet Office. ‘The fact that the security service wanted the file obviously indicated that he was about to be vetted,’ says Robinson.
But if Cyril was to ever become a minister, then scandals about child abuse could not become public. All evidence had to be hidden.
Powerful figures thought Cyril had a potentially useful role to play in a government of national unity. Militant trades unions were seen as the main reason for Britain’s decline and the Tories were itching to tackle their power.
He never did become a minister. But a no-nonsense populist like Cyril was seen as a useful bulwark against the Left. Perhaps for that reason the Establishment effectively granted him a pardon — and Cyril Smith became untouchable.