Rishi Sunak Has Accused Nadine Dorries Of Failing To Do Her Job As An MP

Rishi Sunak has accused Nadine Dorries of failing to properly do her job as an MP after she abandoned her pledge to quit the Commons “with immediate effect”.

The prime minister said voters in her Mid Bedfordshire constituency “aren’t being properly represented”.

Dorries dramatically announced in June she was resigning from parliament  after she was denied a seat in the House of Lords.

But the former culture secretary and close ally of Boris Johnson has yet to formally stand down.

She has not spoken in the Commons chamber since June 7, 2022.

In an interview with LBC this morning, Sunak said: “People deserve to have an MP who represents them wherever they are.

“Making sure your MP is engaging with you, representing you, whether that’s speaking in parliament or being present in their constituencies doing surgeries answering your letters.

“That’s the job of an MP and all MPs should be held to that standard. At the moment people aren’t being properly represented.”

There is no love lost between the pair, with Dorries recently accusing “posh” Sunak of blocking her peerage, something the prime minister has strongly denied.

Last week Dorries’ local council also demanded she step down, as people in her constituency were being denied “effective representation” in parliament.

A by-election in the seat, which Dorries has held since 2005, can not be triggered until she takes the formal step of resigning. 

The Conservatives have held Mid Bedfordshire since 1931. But a poll by Opinium in July suggested Labour could overturn Dorries’ 24,664 majority.