Tory stalwart and Boris Johnson loyalist Nadine Dorries announced her resignation from the U.K. House of Commons on Sunday “with immediate effect” while simultaneously attacking Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, whom she accused of abandoning “the fundamental principles of Conservatism.”
The Treasury confirmed that it had been notified of the Mid Bedfordshire MP’s decision to formally step down; Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is expected to appoint Dorries to the historical position of Steward and Bailiff of the Three Hundreds of Chiltern next week, allowing the Tories to call a by-election.
Dorries first announced her intention to quit in June, but after she was left off Johnson’s honors list and not given a seat in the House of Lords, she opted to remain in the Commons. In recent weeks calls had grown for her to quit, and the Liberal Democrats were set to put forward a bill for her suspension when parliament reconvenes on September 4.
The MP pre-empted that move in her resignation letter to Sunak, published by the Mail on Sunday, in which she questioned what the prime minister had accomplished during the past year. She said the country had been reduced to being run by a “zombie parliament” incapable of accomplishing anything meaningful.
The former minister charged Sunak with abandoning deprived communities and failing to protect U.K.-based companies while flashing a “gleaming smile in your Prada shoes and Savile Row suit.”
She additionally attacked Sunak for allowing draft legislation like the Mental Health Act and the funding reform of the BBC to expire, and for walking away from the country’s commitments to “net zero, animal welfare and “net zero, animal welfare and the green issues so relevant to the planet and voters under 40.”
Dorries accused Sunak of being allied with a small cabal at the center of the Conservative Party that had worked to take down Johnson and his successor, Liz Truss, and further accused him of “demeaning his office” by personally orchestrating attacks against her, something that demonstrated “the pitifully low level [his] Government has descended to.”
She added that his determination to “put your personal ambition above the stability of the country and our economy” had favored Labour leader Keir Starmer, and ultimately “left some 200 or more of my MP colleagues to face an electoral tsunami and the loss of their livelihoods.”
“History,” she concluded, “will not judge you kindly.”