Anderson exit leaves big hole in Red Wall
THE resignation of Lee Anderson, one of the most prominent Right-wing “Red Wallers” elected in 2019, poses a large and unwanted problem for Rishi Sunak.
The Prime Minister, seen as being on the Left of his party, had been relying on the Tory deputy chairman to help him win the next election by gathering the support of voters he cannot reach.
Downing Street advisers saw him as a “secret weapon” in their bid to win the Conservatives a fifth successive election victory.
Now he is on the outside of government, and No 10 will be concerned that thousands of Tory voters on the Right of the party will look elsewhere when the next ballot comes later this year.
Last night Conservative insiders were asking how on earth it was possible that Mr Sunak had got himself into a position, months before an election, where he had managed to alienate the most public face of Boris Johnson’s victory in the Red Wall.
Mr Anderson, a former coal miner and Labour councillor, defected to the Tories in 2018 and a year later was elected as Conservative MP for the Nottinghamshire seat of Ashfield. He became one of the most recognisable Red Wall MPS, with a reputation for saying the unsayable. In July 2021 he said he would not watch any England matches in the Euros tournament in protest at the players’ decision to take the knee. Later he accused travellers in Ashfield of thievery, claimed the majority of those crossing the Channel in small boats were economic migrants, and told the poor they could cook meals for 30p a day rather than having to visit food banks.
He cemented his position in the party by replacing Esther Mcvey as chairman of the Blue Collar Conservatives, where he urged leaders to put tax cuts first.
It was therefore seen as a surprise in February 2023 when Mr Sunak, a few months after becoming prime minister, made him one of the Tory party’s vice-chairmen.
This did not stop him being controversial: he said migrants who disliked being housed in barges “should f--- off back to France”.
No 10 insiders said in recent weeks that they were lining him up as a “secret weapon for the election”.
Tory strategists had hoped that Mr Anderson’s strident views would help retain many Red Wall voters, particularly former Labour Leave voters who supported the Conservatives in 2019 for the first time.