Tory plant? No, I just wanted a straight answer
A BUSINESSWOMAN who took Ed Miliband to task for his party’s record on the economy has dismissed claims she was a Tory plant in the TV debate audience.
The election campaign was electrified by the Question Time special in Leeds that saw Catherine Shuttleworth give the Labour leader a piece of her mind.
The 48-year-old marketing company boss asked Mr Miliband how she could trust Labour to run the economy again after a minister in the last government left a note warning: ‘I’m afraid there is no money.’
But Labour supporters claimed that she had not been an undecided voter – as she had claimed – and was secretly a Tory.
Comprehensive- educated Miss Shuttleworth last night told the Mail: ‘Oh god no. I’ve never been a member of any political party and I do not intend to be. I’m not a Tory at all, it’s absolute nonsense. Absolutely not, categorically no.
‘I’m just an ordinary business person who asked what I thought was a simple and easy question. If you come to Yorkshire this is what will happen, people will ask you questions, they will be fairly direct.’
Miss Shuttleworth is the chief executive and founder of Savvy Marketing, an advertising and marketing company employing 76 people that has worked on campaigns for clients including Morrisons and Britvic.
During the BBC One debate, she told the Labour leader: ‘Going back to the letter, I run a business in Leeds. The last five years have been really tough, but the economy is improving. What worries me is you are about to put Ed Balls back in as Chancellor and he called that letter a joke.
‘Running a business the last few years is anything but a joke, and if that’s the way you want to treat business how can we trust you?
Miss Shuttleworth, who has a son, 12, and daughters aged nine and ten, said: ‘What I talked about was being a business owner and it being quite tough, that’s what I do and I’m not a political commentator.
‘I got a round of applause when I walked in to the office this morning. I have never had that in nine years.’
Miss Shuttleworth applied to be in the audience after she saw an advert while watching Question Time a fortnight ago.
She said it was ‘quite nerve-racking’ putting her hand up and asking the question, but she added: ‘I just had something I wanted to ask.’
Labour sources were furious at the grilling Mr Miliband received, which they claimed was a BBC ‘stitch-up’ with the Tories.
Left-wing bloggers pointed out that Miss Shuttleworth was one of 5,000 small-business leaders who backed the Tories’ economic plansin a letter, but last night she said she had signed it ‘because I agreed with it’. She added: ‘I have never done anything like that before.’
They also highlighted that Andrew Jones, Tory MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough, had been her company secretary – but she said they worked together long before he became involved in politics.
‘Come to Yorkshire and this is what will happen’