Tuesday 16 August 2016

Today's personal attack on Bill Etheridge MEP is unacceptable

The invasion of +Bill Etheridge MEP's privacy by his ex-girlfriend today is not acceptable.

Lorraine Chew posted a picture of Viagra with a box showing that it had been prescribed to Etheridge on Twitter, accusing him of having an affair. She later deleted the picture along with tweets endorsing his rivals in the leadership campaign.

Bill is thick skinned but it was a very personal attack on him and goes far beyond what elements of their personal life a public figure should be expected to accept being made public. No matter how upset you are with someone, this sort of behaviour is unacceptable and the press should certainly have recognised that this simply was not a matter of public interest and shouldn't have been given the oxygen of publicity.