Former MP for Old Bexley and Sidcup Sir Edward Heath would have been quizzed over allegations he raped and indecently assaulted boys as young as ten if he was still alive, according to a police report.

A police operation conducted found that seven of the claims against Heath would have been sufficiently credible to justify the questioning of Sir Edward, who served as Prime Minister between 1970 and 1974, under caution.

Sir Edward represented Bexley from 1950 to 1974, then Sidcup and Old Bexley and Sidcup until 2001. The claims against him stretch between 1961 and 1992 in areas covered by the Met Police, Kent, Sussex, the Channel Islands and Wiltshire.

It has previously been reported that one man claimed Sir Edward picked him up along the A2 in north Kent as he hitched a lift before taking him back to a Park Lane apartment and raping him when he was 12.

This new report does not address the question of Sir Edward's guilt or innocence because the remit of the two-year £1.5 million inquiry was to see whether there was enough evidence to interview the politician, who died at home in Salisbury in July 2005, aged 89.

None of the allegations about which Wiltshire Police would have questioned Sir Edward relate to when he was Prime Minister, the force said.

The allegations Sir Edward would have been questioned over include rape of a boy aged 11, indecent assault of a 10-year-old boy and the indecent assault of a 15-year-old boy during three "paid sexual encounters".

The report concluded: "The SIO concluded that there is sufficient suspicion to have interviewed Sir Edward Heath under criminal caution regarding his suspected involvement in child sexual abuse.

"This conclusion relates to seven of the 42 disclosures that were considered by the Operation Conifer investigation."

The report stressed that "no inference of guilt" should be made from the fact he would have faced questioning.