Lee Anderson and Brendan Clarke-Smith have resigned as deputy chairs of the Conservative party after defying Rishi Sunak by backing rightwing challenges to harden up his Rwanda deportation bill.
The two senior “red wall” MPs led a rebellion of 60 Tories to vote for a series of rightwing amendments, inflicting a damaging blow to the prime minister’s authority in the biggest revolt of his leadership.
The second came as 58 Conservative rightwingers backed an amendment, clause 19, from Robert Jenrick, the former immigration minister, aimed at severely limiting individual asylum seekers’ ability to appeal against being put on a flight to Rwanda.
Alex Chalk, the lord chancellor and justice secretary, had earlier announced plans to expand court capacity and recruit new judges to fast-track asylum appeals in an attempt to win over rightwing Tory MPs deciding whether to rebel over the bill.
Anderson, a former Labour councillor who earned a reputation as an aggressive Tory attack dog and culture warrior, and who is paid £100,000 a year as a presenter on GB News, had warned government whips that he would vote for the rebel amendments.
Earlier, Boris Johnson backed calls by Conservative rebels to harden the Rwanda deportation bill in a direct intervention on the side of those defying his successor.
The original article contains 1,126 words, the summary contains 211 words. Saved 81%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Lee Anderson and Brendan Clarke-Smith have resigned as deputy chairs of the Conservative party after defying Rishi Sunak by backing rightwing challenges to harden up his Rwanda deportation bill.
The two senior “red wall” MPs led a rebellion of 60 Tories to vote for a series of rightwing amendments, inflicting a damaging blow to the prime minister’s authority in the biggest revolt of his leadership.
The second came as 58 Conservative rightwingers backed an amendment, clause 19, from Robert Jenrick, the former immigration minister, aimed at severely limiting individual asylum seekers’ ability to appeal against being put on a flight to Rwanda.
Alex Chalk, the lord chancellor and justice secretary, had earlier announced plans to expand court capacity and recruit new judges to fast-track asylum appeals in an attempt to win over rightwing Tory MPs deciding whether to rebel over the bill.
Anderson, a former Labour councillor who earned a reputation as an aggressive Tory attack dog and culture warrior, and who is paid £100,000 a year as a presenter on GB News, had warned government whips that he would vote for the rebel amendments.
Earlier, Boris Johnson backed calls by Conservative rebels to harden the Rwanda deportation bill in a direct intervention on the side of those defying his successor.
The original article contains 1,126 words, the summary contains 211 words. Saved 81%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!