[Bones McCoy]

Lost for polite words!

Owen Paterson taking UK to human rights court after lobbying scandal
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... SApp_Other

Presumably retaining one of those hated "lefty lawyers" to fight his corner.

I’m guessing he’s been advised by former Attorney General Suella Braverman, who’s a KC don’t you know!

Won it in a Christmas Cracker.

[Yug]

...Suella Braverman, who’s a KC don’t you know!

She should be a KFC. Someone who is thick, stupid and incompetent is perfectly capable of asking "Do you want fries with that?". If she was doing that it would free-up a job for some poor sod currently stuck at KFC who isn't thick, stupid and incompetent.

[Samanfur]

Chloe Smith, Norwich North (2009), majority 4,738

Mention of Chloe Smith gives me an excuse to share this filleting she received live on air from Jeremy Paxman in 2012 (from about the six minute mark).......

Despite everything, Smith and Wragg came across as comparatively sane individuals. I shudder to think at the Johnsonian flotsam and jetsam who'll be replacing them as Tory parliamentary candidates in 2024.

To me, she will always be the MP who had so little knowledge of northern geography that she suggested that Sunderland was "somewhere near" Bolton for job-seeking purposes.

[Tubby Isaacs]

This sounds like a problem for Sunak. Well done Cameron for dumping this one on him.

Ms Mone (as she'd likely revert to being) might find herself the face of the campaign to abolish the Lords.

Documents seen by the Guardian indicate tens of millions of pounds of PPE Medpro’s profits were later transferred to a secret offshore trust of which Mone and her adult children were the beneficiaries.

Asked by the Guardian last year why Mone did not include PPE Medpro in her House of Lords register of financial interests, her lawyer replied: “Baroness Mone did not declare any interest as she did not benefit financially and was not connected to PPE Medpro in any capacity.”

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/202 ... e-ppe-firm

[kreuzberger]

This is quite the story about Michelle Mone and how it is finally unravelling. Again.

No surprise here, mind. Her Ultimo brand was a fiasco from the start with little more than fawning from the local press to provide anything that resembled any proper substance. Then the Scottish retail "club" got themselves involved and provided underwiring that beggared belief for a product which is and always was unable to hold a light to the established lingerie brands which continue to knock hers, or whatever micro proportion of it is still in her hands, in to a D-cup.

One might suspect that she believes her own clumsily-curated success story and has let it manifest itself as a McMidas touch which has never really stood up to much scrutiny. Sure, that wasn't a problem in the past while men who sold trainers turned their clammy hands to undies. But, if you help yourself to 29m quid with the aid of a husband who has proven - yeah, you love - to snare wives half his age, that overreach begins to look rather awkward.

A tenner says that nothing will happen unless there have been some cataclysmically stoopid mistakes. The neighbouring dominos are far too vulnerable but it is still far too early to suggest that they made those "mistakes" on Mone's behalf.

[Andy McDandy]

Mone also got much free publicity, due to the British media culture of any excuse to show pictures of ladies in their underwear.

[Watchman]

Is she taking the flak for others? £29m compared to others, not that massive, here’s a seat in the Lords, while the real criminals go under the radar

[Crabcakes]

Is she taking the flak for others? £29m compared to others, not that massive, here’s a seat in the Lords, while the real criminals go under the radar

Possibly not so much taking the flack as the canary in the mine - the money trail linking her to the deal, and the record of her denial of any benefit, is rock solid. If she’s brought down expect others to follow even if the evidence is a little weaker or better hidden.

In some ways, it also suggests she’s the most stupid/arrogant and simply did the least to cover her tracks.

[Watchman]

Wonder if she’s going for the Hancock gambit

‘Red wall’ MP Dehenna Davison joins list of Tories standing down at next election
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... SApp_Other

[Abernathy]

Interesting that a lot of these Tory MPs deciding to step down are of the thrusting young ambitious type, who might have been considered to have a bright future in parliament, but were elected as part of the 2019 intake in one of the so-called “red wall” Labour seats that fell to the Tories thanks to the perfect storm of Corbyn/Get Brexit Done, but which are now all but certain to come back to Labour. Davison has obviously seen the writing on the wall, and I dare say she won’t be the last.

[Yug]

While the recent intake of Tories are as thick and ignorant as the rest, they're not so stupid that they can't read the writing on the wall when it's in big enough letters done in bright red crayon.

[Arrowhead]

Wonder if she’s going for the Hancock gambit

‘Red wall’ MP Dehenna Davison joins list of Tories standing down at next election
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... SApp_Other

That's a real surprise, as she seemed to be one of the newer Tory MPs to have made a bit of an impact.

There was a very odd story a few months ago naming her as one of the next likely CON switchers, I didn't detect anything in her public pronouncements which indicated anything like that at all.

[Malcolm Armsteen]

While the recent intake of Tories are as thick and ignorant as the rest, they're not so stupid that they can't read the writing on the wall when it's in big enough letters done in bright red crayon.

I take it you aren't including Gullis in that...

[Yug]

While the recent intake of Tories are as thick and ignorant as the rest, they're not so stupid that they can't read the writing on the wall when it's in big enough letters done in bright red crayon.

I take it you aren't including Gullis in that...

Nothing could be further from my mind. I said writing, not pictures.

[Malcolm Armsteen]

I stand corrected...

[davidjay]

Anyone running away from a majority of eight thousand either has something else lined up, or they're in bigger trouble than even we might have hoped.

[Abernathy]

While the recent intake of Tories are as thick and ignorant as the rest, they're not so stupid that they can't read the writing on the wall when it's in big enough letters done in bright red crayon.

I take it you aren't including Gullis in that...

Or "30p" Lee Anderson.

[Crabcakes]

I suspect a lot of these ‘early retirement’ Tories simply don’t want swings like this on their CVs

[Watchman]

I believe this Brendan Clarke-Smith territory, wonder if he’ll be reconsidering his options

[mattomac]

A seat Labour had never won apparently and usually average around 50-100, seems the council elections have started to catch up with the polls.