Monday, November 20, 2006

More Results from Tory Primaries

The 'open primary' is producing some interesting results for the Tory Party, in particular this evening, the result in the Essex seat of Witham has been to effectively deselect sitting MP (and only elected in 2005) James Brokenshire in favour of Priti Patel, a right-wing Asian who boosts, in one go, the Tories' ethnic and female quota. That might seem to be a good thing, although Patel brings her own baggage with her; as a former Referendum Party activist she is a stark reminder that perhaps the Tory Party grassroots have no intention of deserting the eurosceptic and right-wing bunker in which they sheltered from electoral victory for so long!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Brokenshire is the MP for Hornchurch. He was elected in 2005 but his seat is being disbanded due to boundary changes. Hornchurch is in North East London. He is not the sitting MP for Witham as Witham is a new seat which will be created at the next election in Essex.

Anonymous said...

An accurate, if somewhat pedantic, point. I did hear an interesting comment about Brokenshire this evening though. I used to know him vaguely, way back in my activist days, and he was a pleasant enough, mild mannered chap of moderate convictions. My informant this evening claims that becoming an MP has been the death of him, as he has adopted an arrogant, pompous character that is winning him few friends - hence, possibly, his failure at Witham. It is always worth bearing in mind the adage, as my friend reminded me this evening, that it is as well to be nice to people on the way up in the hope they may be nice to you on the way down!

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