I was delighted when Robert Jenrick defected to Reform last week. “What a ****,” I thought. “The Conservatives are better off without him.”

The defection of Andrew Rosindell, on the other hand, is slightly different. In my opinion Rosindell is a decent man whose career to date would suggest he is far less ruthlessly ambitious than Jenrick. Politically he has also been pretty consistent, remaining true to his Thatcherite beliefs. Nor has he flip-flopped on issues such as Brexit.

I therefore feel sad about his defection because it strikes me that while the Tories are better off without grandstanding politicians like Jenrick, the party can ill afford to lose committed conservatives like Andrew Rosindell.

Nevertheless, I do have a strong aversion to MPs who defect, especially those who do so mid parliament without resigning and triggering a by-election. (For the record I believe that, if Jenrick and Rosindell put themselves up for re-election, the latter would win comfortably but Jenrick would lose. That’s just my hunch.)

Meanwhile it is widely anticipated that crossbench peer and former Labour MP Kate Hoey (now Baroness Hoey of Lylehill and Rathlin) will shortly be unveiled by Reform as yet another new recruit, which I don’t think will come as much of a surprise given that she was (and is) fiercely pro Brexit.

*Andrew Rosindell MP speaking to The Spectator’s William Atkinson at the 2025 Forest annual lunch*

Funnily enough, Rosindell and Hoey were both guests at Forest’s annual lunch at Boisdale of Belgravia last year. A few weeks later Andrew and I were speakers at ‘The Future of Liberty’, a small conference organised by Students for Liberty, and it turned out that Andrew’s invitation was a direct result of the Forest lunch because we sat him next to SfL UK chairman Josh Cheshire who took the opportunity to invite him to speak.

I wrote about the event and in the light of recent developments my words now seem quite prescient:

The final speaker, Conservative MP Andrew Rosindell, declared himself a “patriot” and called for those on the “right of centre” to join forces to defeat the current Labour government or face many more years, possibly decades, in opposition.
A true conservative (in my view) he stopped short of saying he might join Reform, but he didn’t rule it out either, which demonstrates to me (a lifelong Conservative voter) the dire straits the party is in.
It also made me reconsider how I might vote in future because I think Andrew’s underlying point was right – the fate of the country is more important than any one party.

As it happens, I know exactly how I intend to vote at the next general election and it won’t be for Reform because I really can’t be doing with what Kemi Badenoch rightly calls the ongoing “psychodrama” that has infected British politics since Brexit, and arguably before that.

Like many Conservative voters (past and present) I’ve had significant issues with every Tory government since Margaret Thatcher was removed from office, but every defection to Reform makes me more determined to support Kemi Badenoch because she currently strikes me as one of the few politicians with genuine (and sensible!) convictions, unlike Nigel Farage who presents more as a pantomime dame than the politician Britain needs to get us out of our current mess.

The only thing that would make me change my mind is if Kemi adopted the crazy but entirely predictable suggestion by Matthew Parris in The Times today that she should distance the Conservative Party from Reform by embracing ‘one nation’ (sic) Conservatism including Remainers such as Kenneth Clarke, Michael Heseltine, David Gauke and Dominic Grieve who Parris insists were ‘all driven away by [Boris] Johnson’. Er, no, Matthew. If that were to happen the Tories could kiss goodbye to my vote and, I suspect, millions more.

PS. By chance I am attending a small drinks party this evening and one of the other guests is … Andrew Rosindell. Chatham House rules may apply but if not, and there is any gossip worth reporting, I’ll let you know!

Update: Sir Robert Buckland, Secretary of State for Justice from 2019 to 2021, has seemingly endorsed Matthew Parris’ comments. He’s on tonight’s guest list too. Could be interesting!

Another day, another defection

The passenger

Speaker’s corner