Simon Hoare, MP for North Dorset, is a quite a conundrum on the Conservative backbenches. Yes, he generally votes with the government, but more recently he’s been quite the rebel: most notably, voting to give parliament a vote on all new trade deals, voting to ensure our food and animal welfare standards are retained in trade deals and voting to have the option to block trade deals with countries on human rights grounds.
But it is on his Twitter feed that he really shines as a beacon of hope for any remaining ‘one-nation’ Tory voters. He really, really goes for it. Here he is on Johnson’s latest ludicrous ‘dead-cat’ proposal to direct a load of taxpayer cash to an insane project which I am going to call the Crony Funnel Smuggle Tunnel. This absolutely batsh*t crazy and insultingly stupid ‘proposal’ is that a tunnel between Scotland and Northern Ireland would somehow solve the Brexit border fiasco. A border is a border is a border! Underwater. In the air. Wherever! And that’s not to mention the utter impracticality of it all.
The Telegraph, of course, LOVED the idea;
Unsurprisingly, this prompted a whole host of sane and sensible people pointing out the plain-as-the-nose-on-your-face flaws.
Simon joined the grown-ups, retweeting a sobering summary of the latest BoJo nonsense, with one of the most gloriously on-the-money series of tweets he has yet to share with his followers:
He went on to add a very down to earth observation:
Actually, we at WCB should be grateful for this government’s endless supply of material on which to write and this one, like so many others, will be what gives us the kick up the backside we need to add ‘Corruption’ ; ‘Dead Cats’ and ‘Insanities’ to our list of topics on the www.westcountryvoices.co.uk website.
Here are a few more of the epic responses:
Jan Bird@pictureladyjanReplying to @Simon4NDorset:
The whole idea is bonkers. Trumpian levels of delusion. Borders don’t disappear because they go underwater. That we’re spending ANYTHING on a feasibility study for something so ludicrous is just further proof of this government’s obsession with eye-wateringly expensive symbolism.
And this bit of brilliance:
Or this zinger, referencing Johnson’s garden bridge disaster:
Ian Stephenson@dctsystemsReplying to @Simon4NDorsetHow about hydroponic grown flowers lining the tunnel? Then we could charge people to walk through, and hire it out for events. I’m calling it the garden tunnel. Now if you can just give me £50m for a feasibility study, I get rich, and you get 10yrs bragging before I report back.
The state of affairs in Northern Ireland is very serious. The people of Northern Ireland voted to remain precisely to avoid the problems that Brexit would bring. They, like the fishermen, the hauliers, the performers, the exporters, the…you get it…everybody in this country bar the tax avoiders, hedge fund managers, the billionaire media barons and the right wing, ‘free’-trade thinktanks …are all suffering because of the Brexiters with their insane lack of attention to detail and their cult of English exceptionalism.
Surely there are more Conservative MPs who will take a stand with Simon against this madness? Surely!
