The Conservative ship is sinking – and MPs from Matt Hancock to Sajid Javid would rather make more money than face the opposition benches
The stampede of Tory MPs has only just begun. Yesterday the 15th was Matt Hancock, just after Sajid Javid, with more expected to flee electoral Armageddon at the last minute. A crop of older Tory retirees have served their time, but there are also young quitters – the likes of Chloe Smith, William Wragg and Dehenna Davison. Another high flier flitting off is Rishi Sunak’s net zero tsar Chris Skidmore, 41, not concerned enough about the climate to seek a seat again.
This seems to be their message: who wants to be an MP if you can’t be in the cabinet? No one in their right mind wastes years on the losers’ benches. Politics is for winners, or get the hell out to make money and have fun. Of course there are Conservative MPs serious about getting things done. But too many treat the Commons as the next prize to win, the place to be, not a democratic vocation but just another career choice, like the bar or the City. George Osborne and David Cameron oozed that laconic sense of parliament as their winners’ birthright. Asked why he had wanted to be prime minister, Cameron drawled: “Because I thought I’d be good at it.” He wasn’t. He and Osborne are to blame for the shocking state we’re in, their austerity and their arrogant presumption they’d win a Brexit referendum.
