Profumo affair Party was marked by the scandal, which may have contributed to its defeat by the Labour Party in the 1964 general election. When the Profumo–Keeler affair was first revealed, public interest was heightened by reports that Keeler may have been simultaneously involved with Captain Yevgeny Ivanov, a Soviet naval attaché, thereby creating a possible security risk. Keeler knew both Profumo and Ivanov through her friendship with Stephen Ward, an osteopath and socialite who had taken her under his wing. The exposure of the affair generated rumours of other scandals, and drew official attention to the activities of Ward, who was
Profumo affair title of Baron Profumo, upon his father's death on 27 March 1940. He first entered Parliament in 1940 as the Conservative member for Kettering, while serving with the Northamptonshire Yeomanry, and combined his political and military duties through the Second World War. He lost his seat in the 1945 general election, but was elected in 1950 for Stratford-on-Avon. From 1951 he held junior ministerial office in successive Conservative administrations. In 1960, Macmillan promoted him to Secretary of State for War, a senior post outside the cabinet. After his marriage in 1954 to Valerie Hobson, one of Britain's leading film actresses,