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Courtesy of the Times
In these dramatic times at Westminster, there are dim forces at work. None dimmer than Andrew Bridgen, the Tory MP for North West Leicestershire. You won’t have heard of him, but he is the backbench brains of the operation that has been telling journalists for weeks that the 48th letter to trigger a vote of no confidence in the prime minister is in, or about to go in, or will be once he has finished writing it. These people want to run the country, and they can’t run a stationery cupboard. My concern is that he thought he could write all 48 himself. Have you seen the price of stamps?
Only last week he claimed that Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 Committee, could destroy the letters to save May. Bridgen wanted “to see whether he has recently bought a deluxe shredding machine”. Because Bridgen is the sort of assassin who puts his weapon on expenses.
If May is ousted nobody would be more surprised than Bridgen himself, having led unsuccessful efforts to unseat David Cameron, John Bercow and Keith Vaz. His track record for predictions is like my track record for giving up alcohol. And both involve talking nonsense. Before the Tory party conference, Bridgen was quoted in one paper predicting May would be “booed” during her speech, and in another paper that she would face an “empty hall”. Booed by an empty hall? How does that work?
But then he’s not what you would call a details man. He’s one of those who thinks a trade deal could be struck “in an afternoon”. He’s also big on violent imagery: wanting to stab Cameron “in the front so I can see the expression on his face”, and saying that May had rolled a rock “over her own head”. On Thursday he rushed on to BBC Breakfast to dismiss her deal as “even worse” than Chequers. So you’ve read it, asked the presenter. “No . . . I haven’t.”Last month he claimed on TV that the “good people” of Ireland will also want to leave the EU once they see Northern Ireland’s post-Brexit “land of milk and honey”. Which I think is all we’ll have to eat then. And in a hilariously bad radio interview he boasted: “As an English person I have the right to go over to Ireland. I believe I can ask for a passport, can’t I?” No Andrew, you can’t. No passport, blue or otherwise. In recent months he has spoken to the press on the burka, the Archbishop of Canterbury, drugs, midwifery, immigration, a National Trust memorial to executed gay men, the Scottish tax system, aid for India, gagging orders, bonuses, university credit cards, uninvestigated burglaries and the BBC 6 Music presenter Cerys Matthews.
He spends his days loitering near journalists in parliament’s Portcullis House, dispensing what is known in the trade as “utter rubbish”. His ubiquity has earned him daft monikers, including “the Midlands Machiavelli”, the “dean of dissent”, and the “pre-washed potato magnate”, which refers to his vegetable prep business rather than his looks. It is why he is known by unkind Tory colleagues as “spud-u-hate” and “thick as mash”.
You might keep an eye out for him in future, but that won’t be the full picture. Sometimes his quotes are attributed to a “senior Tory MP” — which means it really is total cobblers if even Bridgen won’t put his name to it.