I’m ‘exci-ded’ yelped Heidi ... the ladies were in disco mode
sees 3 more join the shelter for the politically homeless
Seven Labour MPs stomping off on Monday. One more on Tuesday. Three Tories gone yesterday. And, we are promised, more to come. All this with a Prime Minister isolated and a Leader of the Opposition in denial.
To top it all, the future of Britain’s two-party democratic system hangs in the balance.
As the late, great cricketing authority eW Swanton was wont to deadpan when reflecting on a particularly exciting Test match: It has been an absorbing few days here in Westminster.
Anna Soubry, Sarah Wollaston, Heidi Allen. not quite Conservative giants in the mould of Churchill, Thatcher and Peel.
Considering the recent behaviour of the latter two of this europhile coven, you could have been prosecuted under the Trade Descriptions Act 1968 to have called them Tories.
now, after another day of defections, all three belong to The Independent Group, the hastily constructed shelter for the politically homeless.
They had performed the traditional – some might say unnecessarily incendiary – act of crossing the chamber floor yesterday morning prior to an oxygenstarved Prime Minister’s questions.
Their new colleagues sat waiting for them, ready and regimented as the Trumpton fire brigade: Berger. Shuker. Umunna. Coffey. Smith. Leslie. Ryan. Gapes.
Angela Smith (Penistone and Stocksbridge) gave them a round of applause.
Luciana Berger (Liverpool Wavertree) and Ms Allen and stroked and mewed each other like playful tabby cats. What a cosy scene.
Then it was off with their new friends to face Westminster’s gathering press circus.
Gone were the glum drop faces of Monday’s Labour deserters. These girls were in disco celebration mode, a female version of Kool & the Gang.
Heidi Allen (South Cambridgeshire) was an excitable whirl of spangly earhoops and jazz hands. ‘Oh, yes, it’s ladies’ night, and the feeling’s right.’
‘ I’m exci- ded!’ she yelped. ‘And I haven’t been this exci- ded since I got elected. I, we, are prepared to dare to dream that this could be possible!’
Ms Allen sounded like one of those women you see in slimming adverts tossing away their elasticated drawers in delight. Sarah Wollaston ( Totnes) said with a marked grin it was with ‘great sadness’ she was leaving the Conservative Party. After that, she spoke honestly.
ANNA Soubry (Broxtowe), Butlins blue blazer, voice smokier than two packs of Rothmans, claimed she could no longer tolerate being in a party ‘in the grip of the european Research Group’. The mere mention of this faction of hardcore Brexiteers prompted Dr Wollaston, a GP of 25 years, to flinch, as though one of her patients had shown her a particularly angry case of gonorrhoea.
Ms Soubry said her own decision to leave the Conservatives had been made ‘with a great deal of thought and a considerable amount of heartache’.
I did actually believe her when she said that. A capable former minister and highly effective Parliamentarian, she leaves behind far more than the other two. She made an appeal to her fellow
one-nation Tories and like-minded Lib Dems: ‘Please, come and join us.’ Did I detect the faintest air of desperation in Soubry’s visage during that final plea?
We can, of course, read a little too much into facial expressions. Entire books, after all, have been given over to the significance of the Mona Lisa’s alluring smile.
But for this talented performer and obstinate backbench harrier par excellence to have lumped herself in with these political also-rans really does seem a frightful waste.