A FORMER special adviser to Nadhim Zahawi said he is “hopeful” that the investigation will clear the Conservative Party chairman.

Mark Lehain told Eamonn Holmes in an interview on GB News: “I’m obviously really biased, because I got to work with him for just under a year and I found him to be really straight.

“He’s a really, really lovely guy. He was an exceptionally good Education Secretary.

“I don’t know any more about this situation than you guys do, than what we’ve seen in the press, and I totally understand that when you hear about people potentially not paying their tax it really cuts to the quick doesn’t it? It really offends our sense of fair play.”

He added: “I don’t think there’s any doubt that is pretty embarrassing for Nadhim but, like I said, I don’t know any more about it than you guys do.

“It’s one of those awkward situations now where there’s this independent inquiry going on, we’re going to have to wait and see…”

Asked if the spotlight has also fallen on the Prime Minister’s judgment, he said: “Yeah, and when you’re trying to put a government together, if you’re the Prime Minister, you’ve got a relatively limited number of people you can pull from in order to make cabinet ministers and ministers.

“You will be briefed by the officials and by other people within the party as to who’s available and what their skill sets are, and for some people, you may be briefed that there are things you need to be aware of that aren’t necessarily publicly available.

“You have to put the best people in the best places possible. You don’t always get everyone you get to pick from.”

Mr Lehain added: “An important part of integrity and doing things in the right way is to try and let independent people go about their work trying to get to the bottom of it.

“ I don’t think this inquiry is going to take forever, because that pressure is going to build and build and build and every time a politician goes on the news from the Government, they’re going to be asked by people like yourselves, what do you think about the Nadhim Zahawi situation and we don’t want that to go on.

“But right now, we don’t really know any more than the media reports out there.”