The mood amongst Tory MPs is funereal, and now Peter Bone’s suspension will inevitably trigger yet another by-election, it’s probably only going to get worse. It doesn’t help when the PM himself is publicly resigned to failure already…
Chief Whip Simon Hart has removed the Tory whip from Peter Bone. His spokesperson confirmed this afternoon:
“Following a report by the Independent Expert Panel, the Chief Whip has removed the conservative whip from Peter Bone MP.”
The IEP recommended a six-week suspension for Bone yesterday over bullying and sexual misconduct. Today’s news was inevitable…
Conservative MP for Wellingborough Peter Bone has been suspended from the Commons for six weeks for committing “many varied acts of bullying and one act of sexual misconduct” against a member of his staff in 2012 and 2013. The Independent Expert Panel stated:
“This is a serious case of misconduct. […] The bullying involved violence, shouting and swearing, mocking, belittling and humiliating behaviour, and ostracism. […]
This wilful pattern of bullying also included an unwanted incident of sexual misconduct, when the complainant was trapped in a room with the respondent in a hotel in Madrid, […]. This was a deliberate and conscious abuse of power using a sexual mechanism: indecent exposure.”
Bone claimed the findings were “without foundation“. Six weeks is well clear of the ten days necessary to trigger a recall petition and an inevitable by-election – although the standards committee also has to recommend the suspension first. Still, mark your calendars…
Read his full statement below:
Peter Bone had been a backbencher 17 years, priding himself in being as disloyal to the Tory whips as possible. Guido remembers Michael Cockerell’s Inside The Commons documentary, in which he boasted after the 2014 reshuffle:
“I see my role in Parliament: I’m not here as representing the government, I’m here to scrutinise the government and it doesn’t matter who’s in power. The new Chief Whip has been in power for about two hours and I’ve already rebelled against him.”
Not only was Bone’s appointment as deputy Leader of the House brilliant because he’s a great watch in the Commons, Boris never even had a deputy Commons leader at any point during his premiership. The appointment was just pure banter…
So from a lowly backbencher to a minister, now comes the inevitable fall in stature. Today on the order paper, Peter Bone’s first public act in the role couldn’t have gone down worse on social media:
Multiple Tory Members have now said they’ll vote for any leadership candidate that abolishes the jumped-up, left-wing whinge-a-thon of a youth ‘parliament’, which to date has done nothing except give Jeremy Corbyn a standing ovation and debase the green benches. Oh how the mighty fall, Peter…
An interesting use of parliamentary time to be sure…
If Labour’s Fabian Hamilton is the experienced expert of using taxpayer’s money to buy Apple products, Peter Bone is the trendsetter for AirPod buying. Angela Rayner and Matt Hancock were way behind him. All the way back in 2019 he used Parliamentary expenses to purchase the expensive accessories, setting back the taxpayer £159.00:
The purchase was made the year after it was revealed Bone had left his wife for his researcher 20 years younger than him. Perhaps he was trying to use cutting edge tech purchases to show he’s in touch with the youth…
