Tory caught with his trousers down

It's the big political expose that they did not manage to cover up.

A snapshot of a none-too-trim Tory MP, minus his trousers, is the talk of Westminster - and today it is published for the first time.

Colleagues fear that Michael Mates, whose ample frame is captured in the photo, will explode with anger and order a leak inquiry.

He chairs the Commons Northern Ireland Committee, whose members paid an official visit to Washington DC last week.

In the bus to the airport on the way home, Mr Mates, 68, felt the need to change from his suit into casual gear. So he stripped off in the aisle, down to his big blue boxer shorts. He also revealed a pair of black socks, pulled up - what more do you expect from a former Lieutenant-Colonel in the Queen's Dragoon Guards?

The only woman present averted her eyes, but cruel colleagues whipped out their cameras to record the scene.

Once he had covered himself up, the MP turned to grin at the photographers.

However, news of the pictures quickly spread on the Parliamentary grapvine, leaving Mr Mates embarrassed and cross.

Back at Westminster, he claimed that his strip was "all perfectly decent" and explained: "It had been a long day and I just wanted to change out of my city suit into a pair of corduroys for the flight home." But MPs who witnessed the event called the sight "appalling" and maintained that they had never before seen such a spectacle.

Before his strip, the MP for East Hampshire is arguably most famous for resigning as Northern Ireland Minister post in June 1993 for giving fugitive businessman Asil Nadir a watch inscribed "Don't let the buggers get you down".

He also contributed to one of former Commons Speaker Betty Boothroyd's least impressive moments when she tried to silence him over the Nadir affair. Mr Mates was not going to stop, despite her cries of "order".

However, more recently BBC's Watchdog put him at the bottom of the league in the House of Commons during Labour's first term in office. The MP made only 23 appearances in the records between 1997 and 2001. He was certainly more active in 1986 when a Private Member's Bill he proposed became law. It gave sunken Royal Navy ships the status of official war graves. And last year he was campaign manager for Ken Clarke's doomed bid to win the Tory leadership.