Prosecutors have asked Scotland Yard to consider whether Max Mosley lied at his orgy privacy trial.
The dramatic move came after the Daily Mail today submitted a dossier to the Crown Prosecution Service from its investigation into the former Formula One chief’s evidence at his landmark court battle in 2008.
A CPS spokesperson said: ‘I can confirm that information was received from the Mail and has been passed to the Metropolitan Police.’
Detectives are now expected to carefully consider the file from the Mail and decide whether to launch a full scale investigation into Mr Mosley’s conduct.
Prosecutors have asked Scotland Yard to consider whether Max Mosley (pictured today) lied at his orgy privacy trial
A Met Police spokesman said: ‘This afternoon the CPS forwarded information from the Daily Mail to the Met Police. An assessment will be carried out.’
The CPS statement came hours after the Daily Mail raised questions about evidence given by Mr Mosley when he successfully sued the News of the World ten years ago.
Under oath at the High Court, Mr Mosley – the youngest son of Sir Oswald Mosley – was asked about his political activities as a young man supporting his father’s post-war party the Union Movement.
He categorically denied putting out racist election leaflets at the Moss Side by-election in 1961 which said ‘coloured immigrants’ spread ‘tuberculosis, VD and other terrible diseases like leprosy’ and should be sent ‘home’. The leaflet added: ‘Coloured immigration threatens your children’s health.’
Asked about the existence of the leaflet at the High Court, Mr Mosley said ‘if there was such a leaflet, you would be able to produce it’, adding he could ‘not recall’ it. He said it was ‘absolute nonsense’ to suggest such a pamphlet was put out.
But the Daily Mail found the leaflet in a historical archive in Manchester.
In a heated interview on Channel 4 News on Tuesday, Mr Mosley furiously denied he had told lies at the High Court.
The issue was raised at Prime Minister’s Questions today, where Tom Watson – who has received donations from Mr Mosley – sat next to Jeremy Corbyn. Theresa May said: ‘I think some people would have been surprised to learn of those links with some leading politicians’
A major investigation by the Mail last night revealed the racist and thuggish past of ex-Formula One boss Max Mosley
The CPS announcement came after the Labour party said it will not accept any more donations from Mr Mosley.
A senior Labour source described the views expressed in the leaflet as ‘repugnant’ and said neither deputy leader Tom Watson, who has received more than £500,000 in donations from Mr Mosley, nor the party would take any further payments from him.
‘The Labour Party has moved away for large-scale donations from wealthy individuals,’ the source said.
‘I don’t believe that there will be any more payments from Max Mosley to the Labour Party or Tom Watson. The last payments were made last year.’
Earlier this month, Mosley cited his victory in the orgy court case to demand newspapers erase the past by scrubbing his sex party from public record. He is attempting to use the Data Protection Act to prevent the media from ever mentioning it or his funding of media regulator Impress again.
This pamphlet was produced in support of one Walter Hesketh. In November 1961, Mr Hesketh was the Union Movement’s parliamentary candidate for Moss Side
The Mail investigation reveals that Mr Mosley has consistently erased controversial events in his life, either by not referring to them in his self-serving 2015 autobiography or by glossing over them when giving evidence to parliamentary committees.
Mr Mosley – via a family trust – is almost single-handedly bankrolling Impress, the controversial state-approved regulator of the Press that is shunned by every national newspaper. This has led to questions about Impress’s independence.
And he has given more than half a million pounds to Tom Watson – a sum that is one of the biggest political donations in modern British history.
Mr Watson who, as shadow culture secretary, would be in charge of overseeing media regulation if Labour came to power, makes no secret of his quest for greater curbs on the Press.
The revelations about Mr Mosley’s racist past raise troubling questions about whether the senior MP – 30 per cent of whose constituents in West Bromwich East in the Midlands are from ethnic minorities – was right to accept £540,000 in donations to date.
Mr Mosley – via a family trust – is almost single-handedly bankrolling Impress, the controversial state-approved regulator of the Press. He appeared on Channel 4 News tonight
Mr Watson has said he is ‘proud to call Mr Mosley a friend’ while Mr Mosley, who tried to become a Tory MP under Margaret Thatcher in 1983 but was rejected by the Conservative Party, has lauded the Labour frontbencher as a ‘very admirable politician, a fearless campaigner against injustice and a good man’.
Questioned over the leaflet on Channel 4 News last night, Mr Mosley said: ‘This was a statement in a leaflet which I am not even sure is genuine, which would never reflect my view, it would not reflect my view then or now because I simply wouldn’t dream of insulting people.’
He added: ‘I have never been a racist, I am not a racist, never will be a racist.’
Asked whether he is a fit and proper person to be funding Mr Watson, he replied: ‘Absolutely.’
Asked if he would be donating more money, he replied: ‘Why should I not support Tom Watson, who is probably one of the most honest and courageous politicians we have got.’
Max Mosley, left, with what appears to be a cut on his right knuckle and a plaster on his left, stands next to his clench-fisted brother Alexander during the Notting Hill riots in 1958
The Mail put 24 detailed questions to Mr Mosley on Sunday. In response, he said: ‘This was all more than 50 years ago. None of these obviously slanted questions are relevant today. Like the Daily Mail, my political views have changed since the early 1960s.
‘My record in motorsport demonstrates that I do not tolerate racism. It appears that this historical investigation is yet another misconceived attempt to intimidate and deter me and others from supporting the vital reforms needed to protect ordinary people against the bullying of newspapers like the Daily Mail.’
Mr Mosley also denied having any conviction for neo-fascist disorder.
Last night Tom Watson said last night: ‘My views on Press regulation are well known and have not changed. The views expressed by Max as a young man are not the views he holds now, just as the Rothermere family no longer uses its newspapers to support fascism.’
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