Boris Johnson tried circumvent democracy. But brave souls in the Tory party saved democracy with great costs to themselves. They were expelled because of their rebellion. History books will remember them. <\/p>\n
Update on 7. Sep 2019<\/p>\n
Here you can read what one of the protagonists of the rebellion to save democracy felt. <\/p>\n
Expelled MP warns PM\u2019s approach will leave deep scars and alienate traditional Tories<\/strong><\/p>\n Boris Johnson\u2019s divisive strategy risks turning the Conservatives into a \u201cFarage-lite\u201d party that will alienate millions of traditional Conservative voters, the former justice secretary David Gauke has warned.<\/p>\n Speaking after he and 20 colleagues lost the Conservative whip this week for supporting legislation aimed at preventing a no-deal Brexit, Gauke said voters in his South West Hertfordshire constituency were baffled by the purge.<\/p>\n \u201cMiddle-class commuters in Rickmansworth and Berkhamsted are wondering whether the Conservative party is the party that they have traditionally supported. And they certainly don\u2019t want to support a Farage-lite party,\u201d he told the Guardian.<\/p>\n \u201cIf the Conservative party hasn\u2019t got room for Ken Clarke and Philip Hammond and 19 others, there is also a message there to millions of people who vote Conservative, that it\u2019s not a party for them. If you go down a divisive route, the scars will be very deep.\u201d<\/p>\n Less than three months ago, Gauke was the justice secretary and lord chancellor: an ancient title that carries the right to wear ceremonial gold-embroidered robes. By the end of this week he was holed up in a shabby House of Commons office, watching the Old Trafford cricket Test on TV.<\/p>\n In contrast with Hammond\u2019s barely concealed fury, Gauke said he felt \u201cimmensely sad\u201d about the chain of events that led to his expulsion from the party he joined in fresher\u2019s week at university 29 years ago. But his condemnation of the prime minister was no less devastating for its laid-back delivery.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t like the idea of being chucked out of parliament, chucked out of the party, for basically doing the bleeding obvious: trying to stop an absolutely damaging policy, that a responsible political party should be opposing vigorously,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cBoris Johnson was elected on a strategy that went down well with members, but was inevitably going to collide with reality and unravel. And it\u2019s happened more quickly than it might have done, for reasons for which he and his team are responsible.\u201d<\/p>\n In particular, he said, he had concerns about the role of Johnson\u2019s chief strategist, Dominic Cummings. \u201cIn the end, the buck stops with the PM. But it does seem to me that Mr Cummings is extraordinarily influential, and it is his strategy, he is the driving force.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s out of control, and Boris needs to take back control, to coin a phrase.\u201d<\/p>\n Gauke resigned from Theresa May\u2019s cabinet in her final days as prime minister rather than give Johnson the satisfaction of firing him.<\/p>\n Even as a cabinet minister he had taken delight in trolling the Brexit wing of his party, styling himself as the slayer of Brexit \u201cunicorns\u201d. On his summer break, he posted on Twitter a picture of himself posing with a unicorn inflatable.<\/p>\n Despite his concerns, Gauke returned minded to give the new prime minister the benefit of the doubt, rather than support measures to block a no-deal Brexit immediately.<\/p>\n But Johnson\u2019s decision to shut down parliament, and his combative approach, made the rebels feel they were being \u201cgoaded\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cI think the proroguing of parliament, the comments about not necessarily abiding by legislation, and then the threat of withdrawing the whip didn\u2019t deter anybody. And there was a distinct sense that this was all part of a deliberate plan, that they were trying to goad us,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cHe was deliberately picking a fight, because he wanted the Conservative party to win over all the votes of the Brexit party, and to do that he essentially had to rebadge the Conservative party as the Brexit party.\u201d<\/p>\n Johnson has repeatedly insisted he is working hard to secure a new Brexit deal without the \u201canti-democratic\u201d Northern Irish backstop. But Gauke said he had seen little evidence of progress when he was invited to No 10 earlier this week as Johnson and the Brexit negotiator, David Frost, made a last-ditch attempt to win over the rebels.<\/p>\n \u201cAll the evidence I am hearing from Whitehall is the cupboard is bare,\u201d he said. \u201cOne of the things we were told at the meeting on Tuesday by David Frost is that we haven\u2019t submitted our proposals up until now, because if we did, we think they would just be rejected out of hand.<\/p>\n I think history will judge that those of us who stepped in this week have done something pretty damn useful<\/p>\n \n\u201cHe went on to say, to be fair, that once we\u2019ve shown that parliament can\u2019t step in the way, then we think we\u2019re going to get a better reception. But you can\u2019t simultaneously say: \u2018We\u2019re making very, very good progress, but they haven\u2019t even seen our proposals yet\u2019. So they\u2019re just taking a punt that somehow all will be fine.\u201d<\/p>\n Gauke has been scrambling to understand the implications of losing the Conservative whip, which Downing Street has insisted will prevent him from standing for the party at the next general election, whenever it comes.<\/p>\n Along with other rebels, he is exploring whether there are any grounds for a legal challenge to the decision. If that fails, he has not ruled out standing as an independent candidate.<\/p>\n \u201cI can see nothing incompatible about being a Conservative MP and not wanting to crash the country into a brick wall, but it appears that that is no longer the case.\u201d<\/p>\n As an extraordinary week in Westminster drew to a close, Gauke said he had no regrets about his membership of what has become known as the \u201cGaukeward squad\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cI feel a greater sense of purpose and determination to achieve something significant than I\u2019ve ever had the opportunity to before,\u201d he said. \u201cThis might be the end of my political career, but I think I\u2019m doing it for all the right reasons, and I think history will judge that those of us who stepped in this week have done something pretty damn useful.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019d rather do something positive rather than preventing something bad. But I\u2019m utterly convinced that I\u2019ve been doing the right thing \u2013 and that\u2019s not a bad feeling to have.\u201d<\/p>\n Source: Guardian<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"