Boris Johnson groping allegation haunts Tory conference

Conservative activists raise concerns despite ministers’ efforts to avoid issue. Speeches were given by ministers, activists crammed into overheated meeting rooms, panels were under way on all manner of topics. Yet 24 hours after the journalist Charlotte Edwardes made an explosive allegation that Boris Johnson had inappropriately grabbed her thigh, the Conservatives were still dealing with that revelation by trying not to talk about it. Cabinet secretaries stuck to scripts about “get