Would you Adam and Eve it? It was a stunt
News that Dave Cameron last week added another 100 names to his A list of favourite parliamentary candidates comes at a prescient moment. For I was told yesterday in no uncertain terms that the most controversial face on the menu of trendy Tories, Adam Rickitt, a former Coronation Street actor and gay pin-up, is not really a prospective runner at all. Having failed to be selected for Michael Howard’s seat of Folkstone and Hythe, sources close to Rickitt tell me that he is not interested any more.
If any further proof is needed of the mess that surrounds Cameron’s A list, I have learned that Rickitt has never met Dave and is not even a member of the Conservative party. ‘He is not running for Parliament,’ confirms the young thespian’s spokesman when I call.
‘The Tory party originally approached us and said they were looking to increase the profile of their candidates and so Adam said, as he’s a Tory supporter, it’s fine to put him on the list and then the whole thing got blown out of all proportion. But he is an actor, not a politician. He’s only a Tory in that he votes for them, and he told me he is not a party member.’
Rickitt’s spokesman declines to elaborate on what went on between the actor and Conservative high command, which has led to the media and the population at large believing that he wants to be a candidate, but party sources suggest that it’s all been a bit of a stunt.
‘It got rather out of control, to the extent that the party’s old guard has become quite cross,’ says one. ‘Fairly senior MPs have started briefing against the A list now and Dave is in serious trouble if people like Rickitt himself are disowning it, too.’
