UK General Discussion

[Cassius]

Michael Fabricant, Vice Chair of the Conservative Party was asked to resign today, refused, then was sacked. Most likely due to his calling for Maria Miller to resign on Twitter and vocal anti-HS2 views (a-la Justine Greening moving from the transport brief).

Fabricant always creeped me out. He looks like a shrivelled up Boris Johnson.

Then again it was probably a bad idea to appoint a self-described "maverick" to a leadership role. Maverick politicians are normally best suited to minor parties, the backbenches and crap reality TV. Watch as an unleashed Fabricant seeks the oxygen of media exposure to revenge himself on the party establishment.

Nigel Evans found not guilty, therefore no Ribble Valley by-election.

Will he be reinstated as Deputy Speaker?

Yeah, he's a.. character, shall we say. I do find him quite an amusing fellow, he hosted our University freshers event and went down a treat.

To the second question, unlikely.

Nigel Evans found not guilty, therefore no Ribble Valley by-election.

Not just that. The evidence against him like wet tissue. It should have never gone to court.

If the Guardian article on the case is accurate I'd have to agree.  What were the police and CPS doing?

I read the article too, seems Sarah Wollaston played a big role in getting the police involved. Never really been fond of her.

Also, Norman Tebbit calls for Martin McGuinness to be assassinated.

Well, it would be a rather just dessert for him I must say.

[Cassius]

His name is Nigel for heaven's sake.

Nigel isn't a particularly posh name. Quentin, maybe. But not Nigel...

[Cassius]

His name is Nigel for heaven's sake.

Nigel isn't a particularly posh name. Quentin, maybe. But not Nigel...

Nigel's less posh than Edward or Nicholas.

Meh, I've always thought of Edward as just being a rather ordinary name (albeit one whose popularity seems to have declined), but yeah, Nigel's certainly less posh than Nicholas. Although, to be honest, whether a name is posh or not really depends on who it applies to...

[Cassius]

ICM isn't that highly regarded as a pollster is it (or am I thinking of Ipsos)? But, anyway, if that poll is somewhat accurate, then that's obviously not a particularly good sign for Labour (although, this is only one poll, and we could well get another poll that puts Labour a few points ahead), especially since over the last year or so they've become bogged down at around 35-37. Still, it's not exactly brilliant news for the Tories either.

[Cassius]

Yes well, what else can they say.

[Cassius]

Good riddance.

[Cassius]

Douglas Carswell (MP for Clacton), defects to UKIP and resigns his seat to fight the ensuing by-election.

Sorry to be childish, but...

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QwKgIjOiKVc

[Cassius]

Douglas Carswell (MP for Clacton), defects to UKIP and resigns his seat to fight the ensuing by-election.

Sorry to be childish, but...

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QwKgIjOiKVc

Carswell should win re-election easily, according to two polls:

http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/archives/8950
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/archives/8955

True (although bear in mind that those are constituency polls, which aren't always the best), but my point was that I never actually thought that a sitting Conservative M.P would defect to UKIP, and even if I had, I would never have thought it would be Carswell (the only one I could possibly have seen defecting was Nadine Dorries )