THE disgraced former Kent Conservative MP Jonathan Aitken is to take on a key role advising a Conservative think-tank on prison reform.

The former minister and Thanet South MP, who was jailed for perjury for 18 months in 1999, is to head a study on prison reform for the Centre for Social Justice, a think-tank led by former Conservative leader Iain Duncan Smith that advises David Cameron on social issues.

Mr Aitken said it was time to move on and he felt he could offer some insight into the issue.

In an interview with the BBC, he said: "Of course, Iain Duncan Smith would have weighed on the one hand the advantages of having somebody who obviously cared about, knew about, the prison system, with that fact that anybody who has been through the criminal justice system - three people on our panel have - they’ve all got some baggage, and I certainly have."

His return to a public role has been mocked by Labour but Thanet North Conservative MP Roger Gale said: "Of course there will be minnows within the system who will cite this as a political comeback and seek to denigrate him but Jonathan is well used to that.

"The bottom line on all of this is that you either believe in redemption or you do not. I do and I welcome the fact that he has been invited to put his knowledge and his energies into a most worthwhile and important project."

But Thanet South MP Dr Steve Ladyman said the decision would simply remind people of the years when the Conservatives faced a series of sleaze scandals.

He added: "They seem to want to remind everyone of what they were like ten years ago. Jonathan has many talents but unfortunately he’s an attention seeker and every so often he pops up in some new guise."