A SCOTTSH Tory told party critics to ‘get a f****** grip’ in a leaked WhatsApp exchange.
Andrew Bowie, the Conservative MP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine is one of a number of senior Tories that have warned against another round of infighting after former Cabinet minister Simon Clarke called for Rishi Sunak to be replaced as leader to avoid a Conservative “massacre” at the general election.
“Get a fucking grip,” he wrote in a WhatsApp group shared with party colleagues after Clarke’s Telegraph column went live, according to The Times.
Bowie added: “Can we, for more than five minutes, dispense with the civil war and leadership speculation.”
Home Secretary James Cleverly, meanwhile, said it would be “foolish” to have further dissent within the party, arguing that it would leave the door open to Labour’s Keir Starmer.
He told reporters: “I know Simon very well, I like him and respect him. I could not disagree with him more on this particular issue.”
Cleverly (below) added: “If we were to do something as foolish as have an internal argument at this stage, all it would do is open the door for Keir Starmer, and Keir Starmer has no plan, would undo all the good work, take us right back to square one.”
Former defence secretary Ben Wallace dismissed Clarke’s call to oust Sunak, saying “division and another PM would lead to the certain loss of power”.
Clarke was a key ally of former prime minister Liz Truss, and was among 11 Conservative MPs who voted against the Prime Minister’s Rwanda Bill at its third reading earlier this month, despite Sunak seeing off a wider Tory rebellion.
Labour’s Pat McFadden said the Conservatives have formed a “circular firing squad”, adding: “There are many good reasons for getting rid of this clapped-out Conservative Government, and liberating the British people from endless bouts of Tory infighting is certainly one of them.”
Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper branded the Tory infighting “utterly ludicrous” and said voters are “sick and tired of this never-ending Conservative Party soap opera”.
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