Editing Jonathan Aitken (section)

==Parliamentary career==
Aitken initially worked in parliament as private secretary to Conservative MP [[Selwyn Lloyd]] in 1964–66.<ref name=debrett>{{cite book|editor-last=Mosley|editor-first=Charles |title=Debrett's Handbook 1982, Distinguished People in British Life|publisher=Debrett's Peerage Limited|page=20|isbn=0-905649-38-9}}</ref>

Defeated at [[Meriden (UK Parliament constituency)|Meriden]] in the [[West Midlands (county)|West Midlands]] in [[1966 United Kingdom general election|1966]] and dropped as candidate for Thirsk and Malton (above), he was elected as MP for [[Thanet East]] in the [[February 1974 United Kingdom general election|February 1974 general election]]; from [[1983 United Kingdom general election|1983]] he sat for [[South Thanet]].  He managed to offend PM [[Margaret Thatcher]] by ending a relationship with her daughter, [[Carol Thatcher]], and suggesting that Thatcher "probably thinks [[Sinai Peninsula|Sinai]] is the plural of [[Sinus (anatomy)|Sinus]]" to an Egyptian newspaper. He stayed on the [[backbenches]] throughout Thatcher's premiership, as well as participating in the re-launch of [[TV-AM]], when broadcaster [[Anna Ford]] threw her wine at him to express her outrage at both his behaviour and the unwelcome consequent transformation of the TV station.

===Hollis affair===
Aitken wrote a highly confidential letter to Thatcher in early 1980, dealing with allegations that the former Director-General of [[MI5]], Sir [[Roger Hollis]], had been a double agent also working for the [[Soviet Union]]. This information had come to Aitken from retired [[CIA]] spymaster [[James Angleton]]. Espionage historian [[Chapman Pincher]] obtained a copy of the letter, and used former MI5 officers [[Peter Wright (MI5 officer)|Peter Wright]] and Arthur Martin as his main additional secret sources, to write the sensational book ''Their Trade is Treachery'' in 1981. This matter continued to be highly controversial throughout the 1980s, and led to Wright eventually publishing his own book ''[[Spycatcher]]'' in 1987, despite the government's prolonged Australian court attempts to stop him from doing so.<ref>''A Web of Deceit: The Spycatcher Affair'', by [[Chapman Pincher]], London 1987, Sidgwick and Jackson, {{ISBN|0-283-99654-4}}</ref>

===Minister of State for Defence Procurement===
Aitken became [[Minister of State]] for [[Defence Procurement Agency|Defence Procurement]] under prime minister [[John Major]] in 1992.<ref name="timeline"/> He was later accused of violating ministerial rules by allowing an [[Arab]] businessman to pay for his stay in the [[Paris Ritz]], perjured himself and was jailed (see [[#Libel, arrest and prison|below]]).<ref name="timeline"/>

Aitken had previously been a director of BMARC, an arms exporter during 1988–1990.<ref name="timeline"/> In 1995, a Commons motion showed that while a Cabinet minister he had signed a controversial [[Public Interest Immunity]] Certificate (PIIC) in September 1992 relating to the [[Matrix Churchill]] trial, and that the "gagged" documents included ones relating to the supply of arms to [[Iran]] by BMARC for a period when he was a director of the company.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Blackhurst |first=Chris |date=29 June 1995 |title=MPs to question Aitken over BMARC arms allegations |work=The Independent |location=London |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/mps-to-question-aitken-over-bmarc-arms-allegations-1588805.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220614/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/mps-to-question-aitken-over-bmarc-arms-allegations-1588805.html |archive-date=14 June 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |access-date=7 May 2010}}</ref>

===Chief Secretary to the Treasury===
He became [[Chief Secretary to the Treasury]] in 1994, a [[Cabinet of the United Kingdom|Cabinet]] position, but resigned in 1995 following the allegations that he had violated ministerial rules.

He was defeated in the [[1997 United Kingdom general election|1997 general election]].<ref name=timeline/> Within a year he had been appointed as a representative for the defence manufacturer [[GEC-Marconi]]<ref name=timeline/> (part of [[BAE Systems]] since November 1999).