Guido can reveal George Eustice is the latest MP to announce they will not be standing at the next general election. In an email to members of the Camborne and Redruth Conservative association, association chair Geoff Penhaligon confirmed the news, with Eustice himself saying it has been “a difficult decision”:
“Dear Member,
It is with a very heavy heart and deep sadness that I have to inform you that I have just received the following Email from George. George will be a great loss to this Constituency and to Cornwall as a whole, during his time as a Member of Parliament for CRCA he has achieved a lot and improved the lives of many. Having spoken at length to him about this he will still continue to serve us right up until the next General Election.
There will now be a procedure to follow in finding a new Candidate to represent us at the next General Election, this will take a while but I have already started to make enquiries and will keep you all updated. But in the meantime we must all put on a united front and be proud of what this Association has achieved…”
Eustice is the sixteenth Tory MP to announce they’re calling it quits before the election…
The latest forecast from UK Polling Report gives an idea of the electoral challenge he faced at the general election:
Read Eustice’s letter to his constituency assoication below:
In Monday’s debate on the Australia/New Zealand Trade Deal debate, George Eustice, sometime Secretary of State for the Environment, made some very unusual observations from the backbenches:
The first step is to recognise that the Australia trade deal is not actually a very good deal for the UK… the truth of the matter is that the UK gave away far too much for far too little in return.
And the responsibility for this, he concluded (see below) lay with one of the most senior officials – and now the most senior official – in the Department of International Trade.
Never has Guido heard of a more determined, more personal assault on a civil servant from the floor of the Commons…
It’s an unfortunate coincidence that the name of the storm battering the UK, Eunice, shares such a similarity with the name of the man who’ll be in the spotlight once the skies have cleared, DEFRA secretary George Eustice. It turns out plenty of MPs have failed to spot the difference. Scrolling through Twitter no fewer than three MPs have managed to cock up without realising:
Storm Eustice has now been upgraded to a red warning for Friday morning.
— Ruth Jones MP (@RuthNewportWest) February 17, 2022
If you are able to work from home tomorrow, I would strongly advise that. Tonight, if you can, secure anything around or outside your house, as it could be blown around tomorrow.https://t.co/TZrokwBqCh
⚠️Storm Eustice⚠️
— Stephanie Peacock (@Steph_Peacock) February 18, 2022
We currently have a yellow weather warning in place from the Met Office.
This means that the weather may cause damage to trees and buildings, will affect travel, and may cause some power cuts and potentially injuries, so please do take care.
For the latest updates on Storm Eustice and the impact on #Redditch & #Worcestershire make sure to follow our brilliant local newspapers @Redd_Advertiser and @RedStand and tune into @bbchw.
— Rachel Maclean MP (@redditchrachel) February 18, 2022
BEIS minister George Freeman also made the error, though managed to correct himself unprompted:
Still, MPs don’t have whole subediting teams to spellcheck their tweets. Hopefully no national news outlets would publish such an error…
To be absolutely clear: while George Eustice may be responsible for the environment, he cannot be held responsible for tearing apart the O2…
As nearly 120 world leaders touched down in Scotland yesterday for COP26, the sight of private jets hitting the tarmac and presidential convoys of 20 Cadillacs has raised a few questions – and even more eyebrows – over the proactivity of those lecturing us this week. Pressed on the apparent hypocrisy by Nick Ferrari, George Eustice pushed back on the suggestions:
“It’s always possible to see it in those terms… I take a slightly bigger picture view on this, which is we’re only going to tackle this challenge if we get governments around the world to make the right commitments and take the necessary steps to hit them…that does require people to travel…I don’t accept that we lecture people what to do…”
If the clock really is about to strike midnight on climate change, an armada of gas-guzzling cars, helicopters, and jets streaming into Glasgow isn’t the best way to prove you take it seriously…