LONDON (Reuters) - British Attorney General Jeffrey Cox apologized for a "joke" about domestic violence during a violent defense of Boris Johnson's decision to suspend parliament. Cox was severely criticized during an urgent question about his legal advice on suspension, when he compared his question when he found out that the advice was "incorrect" with a question raised by some in the legal tradition: "When did you stop beating your wife?"
The Labor MP, Emma Hardy, stood by and asked the leading conservative politician not to make domestic violence a topic of humor and joke and urged him to "modify his language." Opposition deputies could be heard calling his comments "disgusting."
Hardy said these words would cause certain abuse, because the future of the important domestic violence bill was questioned by parliament. Cox apologized for his comments, saying it was a well-known phrase used by lawyers in relation to the "questioning technique of asking a question based on hypotheses."
The Attorney-General was responding to a question from Labor MP Clive Afford, who asked, "When did you know that the advice given to Her Majesty the Queen, the Speaker of the House and this House on the reasons for the suspension, and that those reasons were not true?" What we used to call in legal terms: When did you stop beating your wife? "The truth is, I don't accept the hypothesis of the question."