Nick Boles has hit out at his former party over its handling of the Angela Rayner smear campaign in a damning letter to the Editor.
Police are investigating whether Labour’s deputy leader broke electoral law after Tory allegations that she may have given false information about her main residence a decade ago.
Ms Rayner has promised to resign if she is found to have committed a crime over the accusations, but said she “followed the rules at all times”.
Greater Manchester Police (GMP) initially said they would not be investigating the allegations, but following a complaint from Conservative Party deputy chairman James Daly, the force confirmed it had reassessed information and launched a probe.
Responding to the month-long smear campaign orchestrated by the Conservatives and the Daily Mail, Boles wrote:
“Sir, Having served for nine years as an MP I know how low politicians can stoop when their backs are against the wall.
“But the Conservative attack on Angela Rayner is one of the most grotesque spectacles of hypocrisy I have witnessed.
“On one side is a billionaire Tory peer, Lord Ashcroft, and a multimillionaire Tory prime minister, Rishi Sunak, whose families have all avoided paying millions of pounds in the UK tax as beneficiaries of non-dom status and who live lives of luxury.
“On the other is a woman who grew up in poverty caring for her illiterate mother, who is now mother to a child who is registered blind, and who through her own guts and character has risen to be deputy leader of the Labour Party.
“Even Rayner’s accusers accept that the most she might have benefited from the error that they allege – and which she denies – is less than £3,000 in tax.
“I suppose that her attackers cannot bear the idea that they are about to lose to a woman who pulled herself up by her bootstraps. “And who is going to wipe the floor with them.”
Related: Farage reacts as police shut down conference he was speaking at