Labour MP and tweeting wife split

Simon Danczuk confirmed that he has split from his second wife, Karen, after their high-profile relationship had come under increasing pressure.

Mrs Danczuk stood down from her role as a Labour councillor for Rochdale’s Kingsway ward in May, saying she wanted to get a better balance of work and family life.

Writing on the Twitter, Mr Danczuk, 48, the Labour MP for Rochdale, said of the split from his second wife: “I’m devastated, but life has to go on.”

The couple have two young sons.

Mrs Danczuk, 32, is a prolific user of social media, with almost 13,000 followers on Twitter, and became well known for selfies featuring her cleavage.

The Sun newspaper reported yesterday that she is “gutted” by the separation after the couple had been together eight years - with three years of them as husband and wife.

Mrs Danczuk revealed in February that she had been raped and sexually assaulted “hundreds of times” as a child at her family home in Manchester.

Police then confirmed in May that a 36-year-old man had been arrested in connection with sex abuse allegations made by Mrs Danczuk.

She had claimed the abuse took place between 1989 and 1995 when she was aged between six and 12.

Her estranged husband has himself been a vocal campaigner for tackling the scourge of child abuse across the country.

Mr Danczuk said he was “very concerned” by claims that a long-delayed inquiry into historic child sex abuse could take eight years to complete.

And during a Commons Select Committee hearing in March, Mr Danczuk accused Roger Stone, who was the leader of Rotherham Council while hundreds of girls were being abused, of refusing to accept a mountain of evidence that his leadership had failed.