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Daily Record
Daily Record
World
Rory Cassidy & Talia Shadwell

Matt Hancock's aide seen packing up car and leaving marital home as affair is exposed

The aide captured in a passionate tryst with Matt Hancock has been spotted packing up her car and leaving her family home.

Gina Coladangelo was snapped filling the boot of her £70,000 Audi Q7 high with bags, outside the £3.6million home she shares with her husband.

The aide - who was appointed by Hancock - was caught on camera kissing Hancock in his office at the Department for Health and Social Care, The Sun reports.

And she was then seen driving away from her home hours after learning their clutch was about to go public.

Explosive pictures showing the married 43-year-old in a steamy embrace with the Health Secretary - in breach of coronavirus rules - emerged on Friday.

Matt Hancock with aide Gina Coladangelo. (AFP via Getty Images.)

And The Mirror reports that The Sun pictured Miss Coladangelo packing up outside the home she shares with her millionaire husband, Oliver Tress.

The 54-year-old, who founded online department store Oliver Bonas, was also snapped by the newspaper speaking to Miss Colandangelo before she left the property on Thursday evening.

It's understood her father, 70-year-old Rino Coladangelo, who is the chief executive of international pharmaceutical firm Rephine, has spoken with his daughter.

Hancock has come under fire over the encounter in Westminster, as public anger mounts over accusations that he hired his pals into taxpayer-funded roles.

Grieving families said him keeping his job is a "slap in the face" to people who could not hug loved ones at funerals and lost family members during lockdown.

Gina Coladangelo, with her husband, Oliver Tress. (Getty Images.)

And Boris Johnson rejected calls to sack Hancock after he admitted breaching the government's social distancing rules.

Labour has said Hancock's position had become "hopelessly untenable" and called for him to be sacked if he does not resign.

But a Downing Street spokesman said that Johnson had accepted Mr Hancock's apology and "considers the matter closed".

Mr Hancock said he was "very sorry" for letting people down after The Sun published CCTV images of him kissing Miss Coladangelo.

The paper reported he was having an extramarital affair with the aide, whom he has known since their days at Oxford University.

She was initially taken on as an unpaid adviser on a six-month contract in March last year, before being appointed as a non-executive director at the department.

In a statement, Mr Hancock said: "I accept that I breached the social distancing guidance in these circumstances, I have let people down and am very sorry.

"I remain focused on working to get the country out of this pandemic, and would be grateful for privacy for my family on this personal matter."

Labour Party chair Anneliese Dodds said if Mr Hancock had been secretly having a relationship with an adviser he appointed to a taxpayer-funded role, it was "a blatant abuse of power and a clear conflict of interest".

She said his admission that he had breached the rules on social distancing also meant his position in office was no longer tenable.

She said: "He set the rules. He admits he broke them. He has to go. If he won't resign, the PM should sack him."

Despite Mr Johnson's determination to defend his minister, Labour insisted it would continue to pursue the matter and would not allow the Government simply to "cover it up".

A spokeswoman said: "Matt Hancock appears to have been caught breaking the laws he created while having a secret relationship with an aide he appointed to a taxpayer-funded job."

The Metropolitan Police said late Friday they were not investigating Hancock.

A spokesman said: "As a matter of course, the MPS is not investigating Covid-related issues retrospectively."

The force had also not launched any investigation into how the CCTV showing the embrace had been made public.

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