A London Conservative mayoral candidate hopeful has been accused of groping a woman.

TV producer and writer Daisy Goodwin accused Daniel Korski of inappropriately touching her whilst at a meeting in Downing Street around a decade ago.

Korski, who has Jewish heritage and is a former No 10 adviser or ‘spad’, denied the accusations "in the strongest possible terms".

Goodwin, who used an article in the Times to name Korski, wrote on Tuesday: "When we both stood up at the end of the meeting and went to the door, the spad stepped towards me and suddenly put his hand on my breast.

“Astonished, I said loudly, 'Are you really touching my breast?' The spad sprang away from me and I left.”

Goodwin continued: “Although I suppose legally his action could be called sexual assault, I have to say that I did not feel frightened. 

“I was older, taller and very possibly wiser than the spad, and having worked for the BBC in the Eighties I knew how to deal with gropers.

"What I felt was surprise and some humiliation. I was a successful award-winning TV producer with 40 or so people working for me; this was not behaviour that I would have tolerated in my office.

"By the time I got back to work I had framed it as an anecdote about the spad who groped me in No 10. His behaviour was so bizarre that I couldn't help seeing the humour in it. It was as if I had walked into Carry On Downing Street."

Daniel korski Author (3)

Daniel Korski (Photo: Handout)

This is not the first time Goodwin has spoken about the incident, but she said that she now wanted to name Korski given the fact he was in the running to become the Tory mayoral candidate.

She added: "Naively I assumed that if everyone already knew then his egregious behaviour would not be tolerated any more.

"But now the spad who groped me, aka Daniel Korski, is running to be the Tory candidate for mayor of London. This I think is a reason to name him.”

A spokesperson for Mr Korski said: "In the strongest possible terms, Dan categorically denies any allegation of inappropriate behaviour whatsoever."

Korski made the final shortlist to be the Conservative Party's candidate for next year's London mayoral race earlier this month.

He told the JC in an earlier interview that he was “immensely proud of being Jewish”. Korski, a vice-president of the Jewish Leadership Council, added: “In political terms, my religion is lightly worn”.

He has also previously revealed how his “parents fled Poland in the 1960s along with thousands of Jews”.