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.

She was Minister of Defence for about five minutes. There’s a reason.

Apparently her twin brother was once engaged to David Paisley of the ribbons…?!! I couldn’t believe that was real, but I’ve seen what appear to be several screenshots on Twitter from his own feed confirming it!

Because Johnson became PM and sacked her. Gavin Williams was her predecessor - the guy who fucked up everything he touched, particularly education.

Did you see her Twitter thread a few days ago? Would have made Pinocchio blush.

Latest ConHome poll:
order-order.com/2022/07/16/double-digit-membership-poll-lead-for-insurgent-kemi/

She was Defence Secretary for two months.

Mordaunt appears to have the largest support amongst Conservative members of all the candidates. That means that, if she gets to the last stage against Sunak (or whoever else), yes, there's a very strong chance she'll be the next Prime Minister.

As for the importance of this issue well, let's face it, it really is trivial next to those of the cost of living crisis, Brexit, inflation, and climate change (to name just a few). Those matters are are going to affect women infinitely more, and for the worse, than the transgender v GC issue ever will. They already have done. And I think most women are very clear on that. Women aren't going to give a damn about the toilets in the shopping centre if they don't even have the money to go to the shopping centre anyway.

It's not about toilets. The consequences range much further than that. But feel free to hold firm to the blinkers you wear to make reality fit with your worldview.

Is Brexit really something where different candidates will do really different things at this point? No one is going to undo it - not even Starmer would be trying something like that.

Tory grassroots seem to have changed their minds:

conservativehome.com/2022/07/16/our-next-tory-leader-badenoch-opens-up-a-double-digit-lead-truss-mordaunt-and-sunak-are-bunched-together-second-third-and-fourth/

"Mordaunt’s ship is becalmed. Last Tuesday, she held 19 per cent of the vote. Today, her share has dropped by a point – and she is no longer top of the ballot or even second in it.
Badenoch was doing suggestively well last Tuesday, and today she is doing even better. Then, she was on the same percentage as Mordaunt, and a mere eight votes behind. Now, she is on 31 per cent, thus opening up an eleven point lead.
Liz Truss rises to push Mordaunt into third place, up from eleven per cent to 20 per cent. Sunak is fourth on 19 per cent, nine votes behind Mordaunt. Tugendhat is fifth on eleven per cent.
...
All in all, the more the panel has chewed over Mordaunt, the more its doubts have grown; and the more it’s seen of Badenoch, the more it’s liked her."

That is interesting re grassroots stuff. The other poll put up on here was basically the reverse of that.

One difference will be who is answering, I assume the general 1000 poll was just anyone and that is reflected in Tom T towards top as non Cons voters tend to like him more - and vice versa Badenoch which makes sense.

I think it’s quite hard to know at this point as MPs still play a role iirc and that’s a horse race still

As for the importance of this issue well, let's face it, it really is trivial next to those of the cost of living crisis, Brexit, inflation, and climate change

It has the potential to cause a lot of safeguarding nightmares for women and children. Governments and the press might try to suppress the issues and ignore the victims like they have around many other coverups, but the victims will still be there.

If you think this is all about toilets, you don't understand the implications of what she was trying to do.

The issue about TW for Penny Mordaunt is about probity and transparency, and one of the main reasons Boris was rightly pushed out as prime minister. To repeat that mistake would be disastrous.

she is telling lies, being pushed back on those lies, then telling half truths and being pushed back on those. Sounds very familiar …..

It's also about her ability to understand the issues and the consequence of her actions.

She released a statement calling it a 'side issue'. I'm not sure if she meant trans rights vs women's rights is a side issue, or the rewriting of what she believed. But either way, it demonstrates her inability to see the wider picture and think through consequences and how easily she can dismiss other people's concerns.

If you have a Tory MP, write to them and tell them what you think of Mordaunt. As candidates drop, a lot of support is mobile. Help to move it in the right direction.
the point about truth is an important one. Even if they don’t care about the issue itself, they will understand that integrity and consistency are important now

Exactly. Her team are desperately trying to move the conversation on from this issue. It may not be, for many, as desperately urgent as the cost of living crisis, climate control and nhs etc, but it is very important for lots of women and it is symptomatic of someone not willing to be clear about what she believes in.

if she has changed her views fine. However all her statements about “I am a biological women” are weaselly words, crafted to hide the fact that she still (in my opinion) still supports self ID

From the point of viewing of winning the leadership, I think she's right to call it a side issue. I know quite a few party members and they are all absolutely baffled by the amount of time being spent discussing the trans issue and what a woman is, given where the country is in terms of cost of living, health etc. It is a huge turn off, especially as the point which the candidates all seem to want to make (re importance of biological sex not gender identity) is one which members largely take for granted anyway.

Of course, you could argue that the members should be more alert to these issues but at the moment they aren't, and they aren't going to become so between now and the vote.

Reminds me a bit of a Labour local council candidate on my doorstep who only wanted to talk about Israel/Palestine. Obviously an important issue but in the context of the council elections just completely baffling. If you want people to vote for you, you need to talk about their concerns, not yours.

As a Tory party member I agree many members don’t yet understand where things are on the issue and take it for granted that biological sex is the ordering principle.
there’s still time to make them aware.
have you seen the latest polling of members? It’s encouraging. Worth lobbying your mp, if you’re in a Tory seat.

I don’t think it’s a vote swinger issue, many won’t care or know much about it

One positive I take from that is it being on the agenda with change happening even without the accompanying votes.

Where we are is pretty bad but it could get much worse without the attention on it.

Tully as a member who do you like?

(Only if you want to say)

“The trans issue and what a woman is”

so dismissive. Your last sentence goes on about how if you want people to vote for you then you have to know and recognise who those voters are. If Penny Mordaunt cannot say what a woman is then she’s already lost potential voters. I’m not voting for anyone who doesn’t recognise adult human females in society.

because if you don’t understand that, everything else that follows is meaningless.

kemi for me

Sadly a lot of the British public are somewhere between mildly racist and openly racist. The fact that the Daily Mail is the largest selling daily newspaper is testament to this. The main reasons people gave as to why they voted Brexit was immigration (followed by sovereignty which often leads to nationalism and is a bedfellow of racism). Racism is alive and well and is used by the Tories as a vote winner always a good distraction. Look at the Rwandan policy, different treatments of Ukrainian and Afghani refugees. If you don't think racism is alive and well have a quick read of the comment section of any football article discussing racism.

@Velvettia I'm reporting the views of the party members I know, not giving my own views. They absolutely are dismissive of it because they think the whole debate is mad and have no awareness of the real life implications. Perhaps read posts more carefully before responding aggressively.