Guido Fawked - Tory Bullying Hypocrisy

As the row over alleged bullying within the Tory Party and its youth wing rumbles on, and Ray Johnson, whose son Elliott apparently took his own life, has demanded that the internal inquiry will not be good enough and all material should be turned over to the Metropolitan Police, one most unexpected source has decided to publicise the matter, albeit arriving rather late in the day.

Feared and principled. Allegedly

There perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog have told their readers “CCHQ insiders and young Tory activists believe that a police investigation is inevitable - particularly given that the names of the original complainants against Mark Clarke were leaked to Mark Clarke from within CCHQ - leading to him exerting intense pressure on the very people who had accused him of wrongdoing”.

And there’s more: “Ray Johnson accuses Emma Pidding - now Baroness Pidding - of being complicit with Clarke. With tragic consequences”. This might, on the face of it, seem like a most public-spirited gesture by the Fawkes folks, but the reality is that what we are seeing is the most brazen hypocrisy - and that would be brazen even by the Fawkes rabble’s lamentably low standards.

Why so? The reasoning is all too straightforward. When Clarke was adopted as Tory candidate to fight Sadiq Khan in Tooting, they were there, eagerly relaying the news. Then, when Clarke kicked off the so-called Trade Union Reform Campaign (TURC), which has become effectively moribund, The Great Guido eagerly disseminated the news of the enterprise that also featured Clarke’s pal André Walker.

It also, let us not forget, involved disgraced and now former Tory MP Aidan Burley, he of Nazi uniform stag party infamy, as well as Staines’ former tame gofer, the odious flannelled fool Henry Cole. More support from the Fawkes blog for Mark Clarke then came when he contested a by-election for the Farringdon Within ward of the City Of London, although the attack was focused on his opponent Bryn Phillips.

The knocking copy aimed at Phillips was incessant (see HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE), although for some reason, Clarke’s name was left off the posts. It was left to the Fawkes friends at the Young Britons’ Foundation to let slip the reason for the attack. Donal Blaney and his pals went one further than the Fawkes crowd - they shortlisted Clarke for an award! That would have looked nice alongside the one they already gave him.

But now it seems that Staines and his entourage are considering throwing Mark Clarke under the bus, demonstrating that loyalty may be one of those flexible concepts, just as Staines sympathised with Burley over his decision to quit as an MP, while praising Simon Walters of the Mail On Sunday, whose dogged pursuit had finally driven Burley’s resignation. What high principles The Great Guido has on display.

The stench of hypocrisy is unmistakable. Another fine mess, once again.