Greg Evans
May 01, 2022
BBC
Neil Parish, the now-former Tory MP, has resigned after he admitted to watching pornography in the House of Commons in a "moment of madness."
The 65-year-old MP said that he first accidentally viewed it after looking at tractors online before then acting deliberately. The select committee chair, who is a farmer by trade, said the second time was while sitting waiting to vote on the side of the Commons chamber in a “moment of madness”.
He had been vowing to continue as the MP for Tiverton and Honiton after it was revealed he was the politician seen watching porn by two Conservative colleagues, but bowed to pressure to resign on Saturday.
The backbencher said in an interview with BBC South West that he recognised the “furore” and “damage” he was causing his family and his constituency in Devon before deciding “it just wasn’t worth carrying on”.
“The situation was, funnily enough it was tractors I was looking at, so I did get into another website with sort of a very similar name and I watched it for a bit, which I shouldn’t have done,” Mr Parish said.
“My crime, my most biggest crime, is that on another occasion I went in a second time, and that was deliberate. That was sitting waiting to vote on the side of the chamber.”
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Although his apology felt sincere people couldn't get over the fact that he had originally been looking at tractors then somehow ended up on a porn site with a similar name. Cue lots of Cornhub jokes and NSFW puns about tractors. Here are some of the few that we could get away with posting on here.
Well, who had \u201ctractor porn by-election\u201d on their 2022 bingo card?https://twitter.com/markpack/status/1520472819800449030\u00a0\u2026— James Ball (@James Ball) 1651344024
\u2018Porn MP quits blaming tractors\u2019pic.twitter.com/DMDn56KtM0— Toby Earle \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6 (@Toby Earle \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6) 1651353629
This is my absolute favourite quote so far from his neighbouring MP pic.twitter.com/14RVIz2Jzy— Anna Turley \ud83c\udf39\ud83d\udc99\ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6 (@Anna Turley \ud83c\udf39\ud83d\udc99\ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\udde6) 1651322866
His wife has sent him a John Deere letter.https://twitter.com/AngelaRayner/status/1520408936658128896\u00a0\u2026— David Quantick (@David Quantick) 1651329894
A tale as old as time.pic.twitter.com/ryANlPKxdP— Rick Burin (@Rick Burin) 1651329443
I was trying to look at tractors in parliament but accidentally googled hardcore pornographypic.twitter.com/pzOXoq5t15— James Felton (@James Felton) 1651329293
\u201cWhat is the charge? Watching some porn? Watching some succulent workplace porn?\u201dpic.twitter.com/nS2hhBbTlN— Gwdih\u0175 \ud83e\udd89 (@Gwdih\u0175 \ud83e\udd89) 1651324050
NSFWpic.twitter.com/dep8ZUo7VU— Anton Bitel (@Anton Bitel) 1651337687
I accidentally turned on BBC Politics when I was trying to watch Babestation last night.— THE SECRET TORY \ud83d\uddfd (@THE SECRET TORY \ud83d\uddfd) 1651309383
I actually think being a Tory MP might be more embarrassing than being caught watching porn at work— Matt Lucas (@Matt Lucas) 1651313306
Lawn Hub?https://twitter.com/georgeaylett/status/1520402406173036544\u00a0\u2026— Josh Barrie (@Josh Barrie) 1651329618
nsfwpic.twitter.com/YguNq9NYKI— Ahir Shah (@Ahir Shah) 1651327349
Damn, accidentally opened porn again whilst looking for the weather forecast.— Brian Moore (@Brian Moore) 1651305982
After a tory MP resigned for accidentally looking at pornography when searching for tractors, the corn farmers guild are looking at changing their group name from 'cornhub'— Dave (@Dave) 1651329435
To be fair to Neil Parish, the word 'tractors' is quite similar to 'free porn videos'.— Parody Boris (@Parody Boris) 1651330010
"I drove to a castle to test my eyesight"\n"I didn't know I was at my own birthday party"\n"I accidentally looked at porn after looking for tractors"\nThe UK Government really are the smartest of us.— TechnicallyRon (@TechnicallyRon) 1651329525
pic.twitter.com/d5qP75fst1— dean (@dean) 1651327639
This is fantastically Little Britain.https://twitter.com/AngelaRayner/status/1520408936658128896\u00a0\u2026— David Baddiel (@David Baddiel) 1651328988
I shouldn't click on this, but I can't help myself...https://redtractor.org.uk/— Stephen Fry (@Stephen Fry) 1651331191
Additional reporting from PA.
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