This morning I listened to the latest Podcast from the increasingly excellent Tory Radio. Jonathan Sheppard's interview with outcast Tory MEP Roger Helmer was gripping listening. Helmer made a defiant defence of his stance calling the European Commission President Barroso to account over his acceptance of hospitality from a Greek shipowner only a matter of days before his company benefited from an EU decision. Helmer was chucked out of the Conservative Group for doing his job - holding the Executive to account. But his interview on Tory Radio has caused further ructions withtin the group of Conservative MEPs. My spies tell me that Timothy Kirkhope is hopping 
mad about Helmer's criticism of the most pro-federalist Tory MEP of them all, Christopher Beazley. Helmer reveals that Beazley only got selected at his eastern regional selection because he made himself out to be far more Eurosceptic than he actually is - which wouldn't be difficult, believe me. I can corroborate this as I remember several North Norfolk Conservatives returning from the hustings saying something similar. I don't see why Kirkhope should be so outraged by Roger Helmer's comments. And indeed, he should answer this question: why is it apparently OK for Edward Macmillan-Scott MEP to criticise David Cameron on national television (Newsnight), but not OK for Roger to criticise Beazley on a specialist pod-cast web-site? Do we have a double standard here? Of course we do. There are many other double standards related to the Conservative membership of the EPP and the sooner William Hague pulls together an alternative coalition of like minded parties the better. Hopefully then, we will have a TRUE Conservative grouping within the European Parliament - a group which will welcome back Roger Helmer into its fold. But it's a group that I suspect will have to do without the combined 'talents' of Messers Beazley, MacMillan-Scott and Jackson. To support the campaign to reinstate Roger Helmer click HERE.
2 comments:
Good point about double standards. If anyone has behaved badly, it is Beazley for pretending he was something he is not.
The Treatment meted out to RH has been nothing short of disgraceful.
His refusal to be cowed by the forces of inertia and mediocrity is a credit to himself and the wider Conservative party for selecting him in the first place.
There's not that many I could say that about.Wish there were more like him
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