Police investigating child sex abuse claims involving Edward Heath

The child abuse controversy surrounding former UK prime minister Sir Edward Heath continued as it has now emerged that at least five police forces were running investigations into the late former Tory leader.

The Met, Wiltshire, Kent, Jersey and Hampshire forces are conducting separate inquiries into Heath while it is understood that the Wiltshire Police halted an inquiry into a brothel keeper in the 1990s after she said Heath was involved in child sexual abuse.

The Sir Edward Heath Charitable Foundation said it was confident he would be cleared of any wrongdoing.

Detectives in Wiltshire, London, Jersey, Kent and Hampshire are now known to be examining claims that the former Tory leader was a paedophile, including an allegation that he raped a 12-year-old boy.

On Tuesday night, Hampshire became the fifth force to say it was investigating "allegations", but gave no further details.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission sparked a flurry of revelations when it revealed it was investigating claims made by a retired senior officer that Wiltshire police dropped the prosecution in the 1990s.

The former officer making the allegations of a coverup was a constable at the time, and rose to the rank of inspector or above.

Wiltshire police appealed on Monday for potential victims and witnesses to Heath’s alleged abuse to come forward. The force said it had received a number of calls after issuing the appeal.

Scotland Yard has reportedly been investigating claims against Heath as part of Operation Midland, which was set up to examine claims of systematic child abuse by a Westminster paedophile ring, bringing the total number of forces looking at allegations against the former PM to four.

Scotland Yard said it “does not provide a running commentary on Operation Midland”.

The allegations against Heath, who was unmarried and subject to lurid speculation about his private life, come amid a succession of claims about establishment figures sexually abusing children and the crimes being covered up. The government has set up the Goddard inquiry to investigate the scale of child sexual abuse and of establishment coverup.

Brian Binley, who was MP for Northampton South from 2005 to 2015 and worked in Heath’s office earlier in his career, said he would be “very, very surprised” if there was substance to the allegations, adding that he believed Heath was a “good guy”.

Binley questioned why the retired Wiltshire police officer had not come forward sooner. “We must remember that Ted Heath was never even questioned about these allegations and it might be that the police at the time felt that the allegations were so unreliable as to dismiss them – as they do, of course, with many allegations made,” he said.