Conservative leaflet takes aim at MPS who rejected May’s deal
CONSERVATIVE in-fighting has broken out after the party produced a European Parliament election leaflet which tells people to lobby Brexiteer MPS who have voted down Theresa May’s Withdrawal Agreement.
The leaflet says that “for a deal to pass it needs the support of more than half of all MPS”.
It includes a photograph and quote from Mrs May saying: “At this critical moment for our country, parties should not be playing politics – or acting for their own personal gain. We need to come together, stay the course, and deliver Brexit in the national interest.”
The leaflet, sent from Conservative Central Office, continues: “Which MPS are preventing the deal from being done?”
It then tells readers that they can “find out if your Member of Parliament has backed the Brexit deal yet at www. backthebrexitdeal.com”.
That website urges constituents to “write to your MP to tell them to back a Brexit deal. Check how your MP voted on the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement in Parliament here”.
The website adds: “The only way to prevent the EU elections is to tell your MP to vote for the deal.”
Last night a section on the site which allowed constituents to scrutinise their MPS’ record on voting had been removed. This is understood to have been done following protests by MPS.
Brexit-supporting Tory MPS believe the leaflet was “signed off ” by a group of Mrs May’s senior ministers.
Another said it showed there was evidence that Mrs May’s team had become “completely dysfunctional”.
Priti Patel, the former international development secretary, said the leaflet and website was an “outrage”, adding: “The Conservative Party has reached a new low when it is campaigning against its own Members of Parliament. It is totally unbelievable.”
Sir Bernard Jenkin, a senior Tory MP and chairman of an influential House of Commons committee, said: “The people who produced this leaflet have completely lost touch with reality if they think attacking MPS in your own party is any way to further the interests of the nation or the party.”
Government sources shrugged off the criticism. One said: “MPS who have three times walked through the division lobbies with Labour, the Lib Dems and the SNP to stop Brexit should perhaps think hard about what they are doing to deliver on the referendum result.”