Rishi Sunak: Boris Johnson and two other MPs have resigned
In a tumultuous 24 hours for the Conservative Party MP Nigel Adams announced on Saturday that he was following the lead of former Prime Minister and former Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries.
In a tweet, Mr Adams said: “Yesterday the Selby Conservatives picked an excellent new parliamentary candidate.
“I informed the Secretary of State today that I will be stepping down as a Member of Parliament with immediate effect.
“It’s been an honor to represent the area I grew up (and educated) in.”
Mr Adams and Ms Dorries had been nominated for peerage as part of Mr Johnson’s retirement honors, but neither were included in the list released on Friday.
There was speculation Downing Street wanted to remove their names to avoid a by-election, although No 10 said Mr Sunak was not involved in drawing up the final list.
The Prime Minister has not yet commented on Mr Johnson’s departure.
READ MORE: Boris Johnson called his resignation as MP a ‘coward’.
While the Tories have a comfortable majority of 20,000 votes in Selby and Ainsty, Mr Adams’ decision to leave immediately rather than wait until the next election means the Tories will have to fight on three fronts.
Mr Johnson left Westminster in sensational fashion on Friday as he launched a savage attack on the Commons Privileges Committee inquiry into whether he misled MPs with his assurances about parties at Downing Street during the coronavirus lockdowns Had led.
Yesterday the Selby Conservatives picked an excellent new parliamentary candidate.
I informed the chief secretary today that I will resign as a Member of Parliament with immediate effect.
It was an honor to represent the field in which I was raised, educated and educated.
1/2
— Nigel Adams MP 🇬🇧 (@nadams) June 10, 2023
In a 1,000-word statement, he said the seven-member panel, led by veteran Labor MP Harriet Harman but with a Conservative majority, was on a “witch hunt”, likening it to a “kangaroo court”.
Mr Johnson said he was “stunned and appalled” that he was “expelled in an anti-democratic manner” by an inquiry he claimed aimed from the outset to “find me guilty regardless of the facts”. became.
He denied lying to MPs and said he “corrected the recordings as soon as possible” after receiving information about lockdown gatherings in No 10.
READ MORE: Take our Boris Johnson poll – was the last time we saw him in politics?
The former Tory leader’s seat in Uxbridge and South Ruislip was already among the Labor Party’s top 100 targets in the next election, even before Mr Johnson’s resignation.
The Liberal Democrats have said they could potentially cause a stir in Mrs Dorries’ former constituency, Mid Bedfordshire.
The TalkTV host said on Friday that she does not plan to call for a by-election but resigned shortly before Mr Johnson’s roll of honor was released.
In the 2019 general election, Labor finished second in Selby.
This came as Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey ruled out a pact with Sir Keir Starmer’s Labor Party to encourage tactical voting to ensure by-election victories.
“There will be no pacts and no deals,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
