The bishops have told Cardinal Cormac Murphy- O’Connor, the Archbishop of Westminster, that it is unacceptable for Austen Ivereigh, his director for public affairs and one of his closest advisers, to remain in his post.

Ivereigh has been accused of “heinous hypocrisy” after it was claimed he helped pay a former girlfriend to have an abortion when he was a student at Oxford.

As Murphy-O’Connor’s main policy adviser, Ivereigh is credited with being the architect of the cardinal’s drive to demand tougher laws to curb abortion.

He is also accused of getting a second woman pregnant. Friends of the second woman have claimed he told her he would marry her and then changed his mind. She had a miscarriage a short time later.

Another friendship with Franca Brenninkmeyer, a child psychologist, ended earlier this year when she allegedly threw a glass of wine over him when he told her he was finishing their relationship.

Earlier this year, Ivereigh, a former Jesuit novice, said: “There has been a moral awakening over the last few years about abortion; the British public have been undergoing a reality check.

“The cardinal sees in this moral awakening a growing unease and erosion of the idea of abortion as simply a woman’s right.”

Senior sources said the cardinal was under pressure this weekend and facing one of his most difficult periods at Westminster.

The bishops raised their concerns about Ivereigh at a meeting earlier this month. According to insiders, Vincent Nichols, the Archbishop of Birmingham, was the most vociferous about Ivereigh’s position being untenable.

Another senior bishop, who asked not to be named, said that if the disclosures were true, the situation could not continue. “Cormac cannot be fighting this all the time,” he said. “If I had someone in that position I’d find it would impede my own work and become a preoccupation. It would be very difficult to carry on.”

George Stack, one of the cardinal’s auxiliary bishops in Westminster, has passed on the worries of a number of clergy. “It is a delicate matter,” he said.

Journalists on the Catholic Herald newspaper boycotted a drinks party given by the archdiocese of Westminster last week in protest against Ivereigh’s continuing role.

Ivereigh said last week he was unaware of the bishops’ concerns.

Brenninkmeyer, a psychologist at the post-adoption centre in Camden, London, said: “He used to be a flatmate. It is between him and me, I am afraid.” She later denied they had had an affair.

Additional reporting: Jack Curd

Explore UK News

• Crime News

• Education News

• Health News

• Science News

• Scotland News

Times Recommends

• Catalogue of failings ‘leaves others at risk’
• Tourists told to stay away amid Venice floods
• Google generation has no need for rote learning