Don’t desert the Tories for independents, Major warns
TORY MPS considering quitting the party to join the Independent Group over Brexit must not leave the Conservatives in the hands of “extremists and zealots”, Sir John Major has warned.
The former party leader said both Labour and the Tories were being “manipulated by fringe groups” and suggested a new party was not the solution. In a speech in Glasgow he said the three main political parties must retain a “mainstream majority of their own”.
Three Tory MPS – Sarah Wollaston, Heidi Allen and Anna Soubry – are deciding whether to join the new party in a bid to secure a second referendum.
Richard Harrington, a business minister, yesterday did not rule out quitting the Tories to join the group of MPS if Britain was leaving without a deal, although he suggested it was unlikely.
It came as a Tory peer and former minister became the first to say publicly she is prepared to join the new group amid concerns of a no-deal Brexit. Baroness Altmann, a former pensions minister, said she was “disillusioned with the Ukip-isation of the Tory party” and would be prepared to join the Independent Group if a no-deal Brexit became the likely outcome. The group, formed after seven MPS quit Labour, is understood to be in talks with “demoralised” Conservative MPS. Lady Altmann said she is increasingly concerned the party is being “infiltrated by Ukip”.
“I want to cry, I want to weep at what we are doing,” she said. “If a group of like-minded Conservatives give up on the party because it is intent on taking the UK out of the EU without a deal, then I would consider supporting them. I would like the Conservatives to get back to being Conservative. I have not given up on the Tory party but I can’t countenance supporting no deal.”
On the Independent Group, Lady Altmann said: “This group really have a free-market social democrat centrist approach – and that’s what’s missing.”
She said a number of peers would consider supporting a new party. “There are people who are horrified on the Tory [Lords] benches, on what hard Brexit is threatening to do on the economy,” she said. “A lot of Labour peers are very uncomfortable. There are a lot of people feeling politically homeless. Once people start, others will follow.”
Chuka Umunna, now an Independent Group MP, urged “demoralised” Tories to join him: “We’re inviting anybody who shares our values,” he said.
“There are clearly a lot of Labour MPS wrestling with their conscience, and Conservatives who are demoralised for the Ukip-isation of [their] party.”