Smith humiliated by adult film row

The former home secretary said it was "horrible" and cited the subsequent pressure on her family as among her reasons for quitting the Government earlier this month.

In an interview with the BBC World Service, she also complained that women in power were treated differently to men.

Asked whether her husband Richard Timney's televised apology outside their home had been humiliating, she said: "Yes - and for him. It was horrible."

Ms Smith said that he had apologised to her and their children.

Describing the photographers camped outside her house as "a real intrusion", she added: "I could have coped with it on my own but my oldest son was doing... his GCSEs, and I just felt that it was not fair on all of them.

"After a while you know having your wife or your mum or your daughter or your sister called a liar and a thief by national newspapers and having to face that degree of scrutiny gets a bit wearing on the family - and in many ways they're less protected than I am."

She warned that the exodus of women ministers in the last reshuffle had been "bad for the Government" but did not join criticism of Number 10.

Ms Smith did say, however, that she had been annoyed by being described as "stroppy" on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, adding she had never heard a man described as that.

"A lot of language that has been used, not only about me but about other women politicians, I just don't think would be used about men," she said.