By the measure of the website The Public Whip he is jointly the 11th most rebellious Conservative MP, voting against his party 8.7 per cent of the time. (The website's measure of rebellions is a slightly generous one as it records all instances where an MP voted contrary to the majority of the party — some of these instances will not actually be on whipped votes.)
This makes him slightly more rebellious than Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless were before they defected to UKIP, but much less rebellious than the outliers Philip Hollobone, Philip Davies and Christopher Chope, who have rebelled on around a fifth of all votes.
These three are often talked of as potential defectors. By contrast, Rees-Mogg is a loyal rebel — if that is not an oxymoron. Other persistent rebels are motivated by a hatred of David Cameron and the whole Tory modernisation project. This is emphatically not the case with Rees-Mogg. Not only is he no bigot, he is a firm believer that the Tory party has to shake off any vestiges of dated and outmoded attitudes. Whatever some may think, Rees-Mogg is extraordinarily unlikely to defect to UKIP.
On the other hand, he is not prepared to vote for legislation which he believes to be wrong. Too many of his colleagues are willing to walk blindly into the division lobbies, in many cases not even knowing what they are voting on.
For some in the media, the Old Etonian Rees-Mogg fits a narrative of Tory toffs taking back the Conservative party after the Thatcher interregnum. This is doubly wrong. As I have argued in these pages before, the parliamentary party is now less toffish, indeed less Etonian, than it has ever been before. And Rees-Mogg does not fit the role — indeed his school contemporaries found him as much of an anomaly at Eton as he is on the parliamentary benches.
What Rees-Mogg is trying to do is move the Conservative party in a consistently Eurosceptic direction, indeed to persuade it to support withdrawal from the EU. As Rees-Mogg advised Cameron in the Commons chamber, "Stiffen your sinews, summon up the blood, imitate the action of a tiger. For that is how you should behave to our European partners, not like Bagpuss."
This makes him slightly more rebellious than Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless were before they defected to UKIP, but much less rebellious than the outliers Philip Hollobone, Philip Davies and Christopher Chope, who have rebelled on around a fifth of all votes.
These three are often talked of as potential defectors. By contrast, Rees-Mogg is a loyal rebel — if that is not an oxymoron. Other persistent rebels are motivated by a hatred of David Cameron and the whole Tory modernisation project. This is emphatically not the case with Rees-Mogg. Not only is he no bigot, he is a firm believer that the Tory party has to shake off any vestiges of dated and outmoded attitudes. Whatever some may think, Rees-Mogg is extraordinarily unlikely to defect to UKIP.
On the other hand, he is not prepared to vote for legislation which he believes to be wrong. Too many of his colleagues are willing to walk blindly into the division lobbies, in many cases not even knowing what they are voting on.
For some in the media, the Old Etonian Rees-Mogg fits a narrative of Tory toffs taking back the Conservative party after the Thatcher interregnum. This is doubly wrong. As I have argued in these pages before, the parliamentary party is now less toffish, indeed less Etonian, than it has ever been before. And Rees-Mogg does not fit the role — indeed his school contemporaries found him as much of an anomaly at Eton as he is on the parliamentary benches.
What Rees-Mogg is trying to do is move the Conservative party in a consistently Eurosceptic direction, indeed to persuade it to support withdrawal from the EU. As Rees-Mogg advised Cameron in the Commons chamber, "Stiffen your sinews, summon up the blood, imitate the action of a tiger. For that is how you should behave to our European partners, not like Bagpuss."
Like this article? Share, save or print using the icons below:
3:12 PM