Penny Mordant's bid for leadership is surely over

[ChristinaXYZ]

Her obfuscation over her views on the trans issue in a long and rather disingenuous twitter thread earlier has brought a "senior Whitehall official," incensed by the perceived duplicity, out to say this:

"A senior Whitehall official gets in touch about Mordaunt and the maternity bill. “She fought AGAINST the change to ‘women’. The way she’s trying to rewrite history to suit her is despicable. While she’s supposedly campaigning on character and values. can’t believe the hypocrisy”

twitter.com/ShippersUnbound/status/1546158477738971138

We all could see when it was happening it was only the steadfastness of the Lords that got the words woman and mother back in to the legislation.

On top of the that she used footage of the late Jo Cox rather cynically earlier too in a bout of self-promotion.

She has no judgement at all and her relationship with the truth seems rather strained. As the first comment in the thread says this is surely her Andrea Leadsom moment.

Penny Mordaunt should step-down before she does any more damage.

Thanks @vera99 😊. Feeling my age today and that cheered me up. I'm still younger than the average Conservative member!

Danny La Rue for younger members was a cross-dressing superstar on prime-time TV in the 60s and 70s TV with 'her' own show where sexuality was a forbidden word and never talked about and until 1967 illegal between consenting males.

Is it usual for someone in politics to be emotionally committed to a certain cause just because a family member is?

I would expect better of those who are elected to serve their constituents. That they should be able to separate the personal from what is best for the country, and sometimes agree to disagree with a family member.

The average age for a Tory member according to Full Fact is 57 (the same as Labour) and if even it was 72 they'd have been born in 1950 so 17 when being gay was decriminalised. Think of how progressive kids of the same age are thought to be now. Possibly just old enough to get involved in the campaign to make it legal or at least in favour when asked, part of the counter culture, helping to drive new revolutionary trends.

Mordaunt is still just behind Sunak in the betting odds, Truss is close behind we will know quickly what MPs think, in a straight choice between Sunak and Mordaunt she could well win for lots of reasons.

Some of the runners are pretty terrifying with the potential to be worse than Johnson in terms of their political impact, if not lack of decency.
I’d take the compulsive liar and cheat Johnson over virtually all of them, though Mordant, Hunt, Truss are the worst.
Sunak and Javid are arguably the least worst of the bunch. With them it will just be business as normal, with the Tory Party serving the interests of a tiny global elite at the expense of the vast majority of the country.

There is a debate about the age Bow Group - a Conservative think tank that came up with the original estimate and still stands by its original internal methodology.

fullfact.org/news/how-old-average-conservative-party-member/

Truss lacks decency? In what specific ways?

Why the divisive race baiting nonsense? The conservatives may not be to your taste but why slander the whole membership. Like James Cleverly said when he gave the fox bashing lawyer an 'earful' on twitter - the Tory cabinet is the most diverse of any of the parties. the Conservative Home poll had Kemi Badenoch 2nd in popularity - here's hoping she gets through.

Yes, I live in a true blue area mostly white, and there is a lot more disdain for wishy washy liberal id pol than there is racism about the candidates. And yes, dis the Tories for many things, but they genuinely have a diverse cabinet that is not seen as diverse for diverse sake by rank and file. Get Mordaunt tarred as a woke liar, and that will lose her far more points than being Asian. Sunak will struggle more because of being such a big part of BJs gov, I think.

This made me laugh.
Sorry as I know who the next Tory leader will be is very important, not just to the UK but to us in Ireland also because of the Northern Ireland protocol.
But it's nice to have a wee chuckle.

Hansard Monday 1 March 2021 6.00 pm

Penny Mordaunt

The amendments we are accepting today are legitimate and understandable, and critically they are also legally sound, but let me say in supporting them from this Dispatch Box that transmen are men and transwomen are women and great care has been taken in the drafting and accepting of these amendments to ensure that that message has got across.

Penny Mordaunt - what is inside is already clearly written on the box.

Penny Mordaunt: does exactly what it says on the bin.

Hahahahahaha, she’s quoting Benjamin Butterworth now!

”"I would say, as far as the Labour Party is concerned, Penny Mordaunt is their worst nightmare." @BenjaminButter Senior Reporter, theipaper”

twitter.com/pennymordaunt/status/1546762855420235776?s=21&t=-9nuYXfbeaLci58u3iSf6w

Maybe he is right, I have no idea, but quoting Butterworth? 😂

Not exactly the way to convince the Tory party that she’s not a TRA.

The Tories are certainly a lot less racist than they were in the 90s when Alan Clark said many influential members were appalled at the prospect of a Jewish Foreign Secretary. But they were OK with a Jewish Chancellor. No I don't get it either. His diaries are steeped in racism , antisemitism and homophobia.

May no longer be a majority of Tories . But it's out there still.
Ps Danny la Rue was from Cork. Things you never needed to know...

The majority of voters aren’t racist but I’d say there’s still a good few million closet racists (to a greater or lesser degree of racism) in the UK. Sadly, I think any of the non-white candidates would lose maybe half a million in a general election based on that alone - particularly as they’ll be up against Starmer, a fairly bog standard safe pair of hands centrist.

A Mordaunt vs Starmer match up would be interesting as they both come across as having similar qualities: serious, competent, intelligent, bland. It would then be a straight fight between the prospect of a right wing Tory government vs a Centrist Labour one. No idea who would win.

You’d usually fancy Labour in the above scenario, but the country has moved significantly to the right the last half century, and a win for a military loving “no nonsense” type young Brexiter Tory might be the next progression of the right’s dominance. In many way she’s what the Tories love to imagine they are - no nonsense patriots (as opposed to what they actually are - dancing puppets for the interests of a tiny financial elite both at home and abroad).

David Davis is supporting her and he’s always been gender critical. Odd.

David Davies is the gender-critical MP, who spoke up years ago when others wouldn't.

I don't think David Davis has been known to express an opinion on the subject.

Shocked how little credit some of you give the great British public. As though millions would never vote for someone purely because they are not white, regardless of any other distinguishing feature or policy. Stop demonising democratic voters, please

I know a lot of Tory party members and in all the discussion of who should be the next leader not a single person has mentioned ethnicity.

And there is a lot of support for kemi and Suella at the membership level.
If either of those could get through to the membership they'd be in with a chance.

I apologise for my comment above, which I have asked to be deleted. I was shown a short form with three dots, and it was only when I posted I saw your full comment. Mortified! 🤐

Presumably because of the hugely racist trope that Jews are good with money?

I do think we've moved a long way from the 90s in terms of both what people find it acceptable to say, and also what they actually think. Far far from perfect, but significantly less bad.