Tory MP David Davis defends homeless man from attackers | David Davis

The Conservative MP David Davis has spoken of how he fought off an attack near parliament as he intervened to help a rough sleeper who was being beaten up.

Davis, a former cabinet minister and leadership contender, said he aggressively stood between the attackers and the homeless man, and dodged two punches.

After “manhandling” the main attacker away, he took the beaten-up man, whose name was Gareth, back to his Westminster flat and let him stay the night on the sofa.

He took Gareth to St Thomas’ hospital the next day, because he was still bleeding.

Davis, who was with Guto Harri, a former Downing Street communications adviser, at the time, said: “I stepped between them. Guto and I were going up Great Peter Street towards Victoria. Two guys were kicking seven bells out of a third, and I just saw one boot connect with his head, and a spray of blood, real Hollywood fashion.

“I really didn’t think about it. I just ran over. I was really very aggressive with the attackers. I just stepped between them and got the other guy on his feet. One of the attackers backed off and one of them was stunned for a second because I was very aggressive. And then he sort of recovered a bit of his composure and took two swings at me, neither of them connected, which meant I had to manhandle him a little bit to stop that.

“Then I just left them and took this guy home so we could try and mend him. He was absolutely covered in blood, and we cleaned him up … the next morning he was still bleeding, so I got an Uber and took him to A&E.”

The incident on Tuesday was first reported by the Evening Standard.

Davis, who trained with the SAS before entering parliament, said it appeared the attackers were “very vicious” and addicted to the drug spice.

The MP said he had intervened in clashes before because, some decades ago, a man had died on a south London common near to where he lived after being attacked.

“Ever since then, I’ve never been able to walk away from a fight like this. I’ve had my nose broken, and my teeth broken, but this time I got away with nothing, so I’m all right,” he added.