Bad bet: why can't the Tories shake off the gambling scandal?

A fourth Conservative Party official is being investigated by the gambling watchdog in a growing scandal that has engulfed the Tories 10 days before the general election.

Nick Mason, the party's chief data officer, has been informed by the Gambling Commission that he is part of their inquiry into bets being placed on the timing of the election, said The Sunday Times. The Conservative Party has said he has now taken a leave of absence.

Mason is the latest person to be implicated in the scandal, which erupted last week. Those involved include a police officer who was part of Rishi Sunak's protection team and Sunak's parliamentary private secretary Craig Williams, the Tory candidate for Montgomeryshire and Glyndwr, who has admitted placing a bet on the date of the election and is facing an investigation. Tony Lee, the party's director of campaigns, and his wife Laura Saunders, the Tory candidate for Bristol North West, are also under investigation.

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What did the commentators say?

Contempt was "oozing" from the audience as Sunak appeared for his BBC "Question Time" grilling on Thursday night, said Rosa Prince on Politico. As Fiona Bruce "read out the charge sheet" concerning the latest scandal, Sunak "appeared a broken man". 

Speaking to a largely hostile audience, the prime minister said he was "incredibly angry, incredibly angry, to learn of these allegations". He admitted that it is "a really serious matter – it's right that they're being investigated properly by the relevant law enforcement authorities". And he added that "if anyone is found to have broken the rules, not only should they face the full consequences of the law, I will make sure that they are booted out of the Conservative Party."

But despite the strong words, the antipathy towards Sunak "was clear from the moment the prime minister entered the room", said Prince. "His responses were a death rattle, the atmosphere heated, tense".

Political scandals in Britain "do not have to involve large sums of money, but they linger in the public imagination if they feel politicians have been acting with impunity", said Dan Sabbagh and Jim Waterson in The Guardian. 

It was 15 years ago that dozens of MPs were forced out of Parliament after the expenses scandal, with one memorably forced to quit "after asking taxpayers to pay £1,645 for an ornamental duck house". And it was Sunak's predecessor but one, Boris Johnson who was forced out of office just two years ago for another scandal — the so-called "Partygate" affair.

"There was a terrible human smallness" to the Partygate scandal, said Sam Leith in The Spectator, "and there's a terrible human smallness to the scandal now". Even if "you're not the sort of person for whom self-respect, or respect for the party with which you're affiliated and its traditions, or basic moral principle have any real sway" then one is still left with "a cold calculation of interest". What the scandal has revealed is that there appears to be a "dismaying number of such people in positions of trust at the top of the Conservative party" and that "the calculation of interest they are making is that there's nothing parliamentary Conservatism can now offer them that's worth more than a few hundred quid from Ladbrokes".

"The danger of this scandal, I think, is that it's pretty funny," said Stephen Bush in the Financial Times. The Conservative Party has long had to battle the perception it is the "nasty party", he wrote, "but I do not foresee that it will win elections anytime soon when it looks hapless and silly – and this story makes it look both". 

What next?

Campaign officials and Tory MPs are reportedly "braced for the possibility of more party figures being named as under investigation for election-related bets in coming days", said the Financial Times, with one Tory insider describing the party as in "freefall", with the scandal just the latest blow in a beleaguered campaign.

The decision to keep Williams and Saunders as Conservative Party candidates has reportedly "sparked anger" within the party, with many believing that support should be withdrawn even if it is now too late to remove them from the ballot papers ahead of the 4 July election.