Clement Freud child sex abuse: son Matthew Freud cancels party tonight
Sir Clement Freud, left, and his son Matthew CREDIT: REX/GETTY
Gordon Rayner, chief reporter Telegraph
Matthew Freud has cancelled a party which was due to be held tonight following his father Sir Clement's exposure as a paedophile.
Mr Freud, the 52-year-old founder of Freud Communications, has contacted guests to say he will no longer be holding the get-together, which would otherwise have been going on at the same time that ITV's Exposure documentary about Sir Clement's child abuse was being broadcast.
Mr Freud has a contacts book filled with celebrities, and guests at his previous parties have included Kate Moss, Idris Elba, Naomi Campbell, Tilda Swinton and Bob Geldof.
However the party that had been scheduled for tonight was described as a get-together for senior staff of Freud Communications and their friends.
Mr Freud has so far made no comment about the revelation that his father abused girls over a period spanning at least four decades.
His mother, Lady Freud, has apologised to Sir Clement's victims, saying she is "shocked, deeply saddened and profoundly sorry" for what he did to them.
Mr Freud's parties at his £20 million home in Primrose Hill, north London, often draw together clients and friends from the world of fashion, music, television and film.
Pop superstars including Noel Gallagher, Muse front man Matt Bellamy, TV presenters such as Dermot O'Leary and the actress Liv Tyler have all been party guests at his home, but no famous faces were expected at tonight's event, according to insiders.
This morning Andrew McGuinness, chief executive of Freud Communications, emailed guests to say: "With everything that's going on we think it's best to postpone this evening."
Sources have told The Telegraph that Mr Freud has already been shown the ITV documentary, which features interviews with two victims who were abused between 1948 and the late 1970s.
Sir Clement Freud, who died in 2009, had been "on the radar" of child abuse charities even before his death.
ITV/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK
Born:
April 24 1924 in Berlin
Died:
April 15 2009 (age 84)
Married to:
June Flewett (referred to as Jill)
Children:
Five including Emma and Matthew Freud; 17 grandchildren
His early life
The grandson of psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud and brother of artist Lucian, Clement was born in Berlin in 1924, but fled to Britain with his Jewish family when the Nazis came to power.
After the war he trained as a chef at London’s Dorchester, before being made manager of the glamorous Martinez Hotel in Cannes.
His rise to fame
With his finger on the capital's showbiz pulse, he helped propel a number of young acts to stardom and later boasted of being the first person to book the now disgraced entertainer, Rolf Harris.
As one of the country’s first celebrity chefs, he became a regular on TV and became a household name thanks to a series of dog food adverts in which he starred alongside a bloodhound called Henry.
Political power
He later moved into journalism before beginning a 14-year career in the House of Commons in 1973, where he shared an office with Cyril Smith, who was subsequently exposed as a serial paedophile.
Accusations of grooming and sexual abuse
Two separate women came forward to allege that he groomed and sexually abused them when they were young girls.
Freud spent years abusing a girl who he brought up as a daughter, and violently raped a teenager while he was an MP.
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