To ask if you have even known a member of the government

[Alexiaridesagain]

And what are they like in real life by senior I mean
-Boris
-Priti Patel
-Rishi Sunak
-Dominic Cummings
-gavin Williamson
-Micheal Gove
-etc

@thistimelastweek 🤣🤣😂😂

@Dee1975 I think rees-mogg's greatest issue is that he genuinely has no concept of how the other half live. He doesn't seem to be able to see that perspective because he has no experience of it. I don't think a lot of his faults are anything other than complete obliviousness of an average life.

I've met and worked a fair few over the last decade. Nick Clegg, Justine Greening and Chris Skidmore are the stand out good all rounders. Friendly, decent, good at their jobs and hard workers. Though Skidmore dropped more than a few marks for endorsing Boris

@Dee1975

I’ve met Jacob Rees-mogg on a few occasions and I find him a really nice, decent down to earth man. I think he is very misunderstood and gets a lot of unnecessary criticism - he is an easy target for ‘anti Tory’ voters

The man who admits to having never changed a nappy? Yes I'm sure we've all got it wrong

How on earth does any father (other than absentees) not change a nappy?

My Dad worked security for Tony Blair and Gordon Brown.

Apparently Tony and Cherie were lovely. Would often offer cake and tea, speak to you, ask how you were, knew names etc... Gordon apparently an arse who would ignore like you didn't exist.

My husband knows David Cameron (aloof) , John Prescott (alright) , Alex Salmond, (not nice) Vince Cable (nice) and a medley of civil servants.

I also worked closely with a labour MP once who was the most vile man I've ever come across. He was every single politician stereotype. Absolutely horrid person.

Not exactly but back in the 80s, when by-elections were massive and not just an afterthought on Newsnight, we had one in our constituency. My family were very politically active and our house was a satellite committee room for one of the parties in our town.

I would open the front door and it could be the press or a senior MP or just my brother having forgotten his key. Honestly never knew who was going to be in the front room addressing envelopes or chatting to my mum in the kitchen as she kept the great and good of the party fed and watered. It was a very exciting few weeks.

@Alexiaridesagain why? Who do you know?

I’ve heard the same about Priti Patel @TheSpottedZebra and this is from a staunch lifelong Tory voter.

I met Iain Duncan-Smith at a few events. He was really nice and not at all how I expected him to be.

Met lots of all parties, through work. Many are in the jobs they have because they are charismatic, hardworking, confident and talented (whether I'd have voted for them or not). Think Margaret Beckett, Lord Deben, Ed Davey, Justine Greening, Ken Clarke, Al Gore, Peter Melchett, Vince Cable. Others were lucky or well connected tits, who can't possibly be in their roles on merit (Liz Truss, Peter Lilley, Bill Wiggin etc). Its commonplace to flag politicians off and I do think we have a pretty desperate standard at the moment, but the majority I've met have wanted to do a good job, even if I didnt agree with them what a good job entailed.

Norman Tebbit. He was perfectly friendly but didn't appear very interesting.

Ken Clarke did a talk at my university - he was an excellent speaker and very charismatic. Seemed pretty down to earth and polite as well.

Trudy Harrison. Not a fan!

Not me, my sons, Gavin Williamson went to the same school, same age

Not senior but David Gauke lives in our town. Can't say I agreed with all of his Brexit decisions, but a nice and decent man. I have no issues with his cricket umpiring either (if that's of any relevance).
Less relevant still is bumping into Edwina Currie in the ladies loos. No sign of John Major furkling in the cubicles.

I met Alok Sharma when he was Secretary of State for the DWP.
I was there with my boss, who's an MP.

We were bringing up some ridiculous injustice that had happened to a constituent.
Alok had brought along a top DWP civil servant and I ended up battling it out with him like we were a couple of benefit geek pokemon.
Mr Sharma was as you'd expect: very polished and confident. - - but not as good on benefit regs as me--

I also once saw George Osbourne ice skating. He was surprisingly charming when my kids asked for a photo. I admired him for skating on a busy day before Christmas at Somerset House as he was dreadful at skating and was willing to look ridiculous so his daughter could skate.

I'm in a fb group with Kirsty Blackman and she is honest, principled and hard-working. My politics differ from hers but I admire her integrity

Those of you who are being all mysterious and enigmatic.... I demand that you spill!!🧐

Unfortunately the only MP my family knew socially was exposed as a paedophile. He was horrible in person, away from the cameras.

*I've said this on here before, as I never miss an opportunity to slag her off, but I used to work with Priti Patel, ages ago.

She was awful. Lied to avoid having to do any work. Would jab a knife into anyone else, to avoid work, or avoid blame. Totally untrustworthy. Really didn't shine out at all.

I am baffled that she has risen so high. I can only conclude that all her thoughts and energy were directed to her political career.*
A close friend of mine has met Priti Patel several times through her work. She agreed with your assessment and said the woman could not string a coherent sentence together if her life depended upon it.

bold fail, sorry

Someone I used to work with had a relationship with Andrea Leadsom when he was a student 😳🤢

Have met and worked with Rees Mogg. Like PP said, very polite and very intelligent. At least he was polite to me and to others in the room. When we talked about constituents he was utterly contemptuous. I can't agree with PP who days that the man is misunderstood. The man is, in my opinion, completely amoral, he's just polite and we'll spoken with it.
I went to school with a lot of Fundamentalist Christians and he reminded me a lot of them and there families. They were, by and large, intolerant and came out with some heinous things (not all of which were religious. There was one boy whose great grandfather had been a Dutch Nazi and seemed quite happy to keep up the tradition). But, because they were very well spoken, often courteous, generally intelligent, at least academically, they got away with a hell of a lot.