A ‘poor choice of words’ isn’t the problem – it’s a poor choice of MPs

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Lee Anderson is ‘a humanoid XL bully, kept and indulged to say the unsayable’ (UK Parliament/AFP/Getty)

Oliver Dowden, while no one would mistake him for an intellectual heavy hitter, trotted out the same tired excuse that is now the norm in our political system of no consequences. Lee Anderson’s comments were, he said, a “poor choice of words”.

The “poor choice of words” bin must be getting rather full now. After all, Suella Braverman already made similarly distasteful comments regarding homelessness as a “lifestyle choice”, and Tory darling Boris Johnson has a long list of racist comments, from Muslim “letter boxes” to African “piccaninnies”.

Go a little further back and there was Ben Bradley, who, while serving under Theresa May, said benefits claimants should have vasectomies.

Liz Truss is currently in the US praising none other than Donald Trump. That would be the same Truss who claims she wasn’t given a fair chance, after tanking the British economy during her 49-day premiership.

One cannot help thinking it’s not a poor choice of words that is the problem, but a poor choice of MPs.

Amanda Baker

Edinburgh

Not right, but hard-right

Defending his unambiguously racist claims that Muslims “control” London, the former deputy chair of the Conservative Party Anderson insists that “when you’re right, you should never apologise”.

Anderson was the MP who told asylum-seekers last summer that if they didn’t want to be locked up on the Bibby Stockholm detention barge then they should “f*** off back to France”.

Anderson isn’t right about Muslims or asylum seekers – he, like very many Tory MPs these days, is just hatefully hard-right.

Quite frankly, it’s Anderson who should “f**k off”.

Sasha Simic

London

These useful idiots

There is a core element of the Tory party who are shameless in their support of Anderson and Braverman in their racist and highly divisive pronouncements.

Anderson, in particular, seems to be viewed as a route into the so-called red wall, working-class populace whom, because the Tories really have no idea, they assume are fixated on Brexit and perceived threats from immigrant populations. The Tories are unable to fully commit to removing Anderson, instead, they keep him as their “useful idiot”. A humanoid XL bully kept and indulged to say the unsayable when they think it will attract their generalised fiction of the working classes.

In fact, Anderson is the pub bore that people will move half a dozen bar stools away from, rather than engage with his limited grasp of the issues facing society.

Braverman and he are useful for the Tories... and useful to remind the rest of the electorate of what a moral and political failure this government represents. It may succeed in turning away the majority of the electorate who find their ethos disgusting.

We need an early election and the return of a Labour government who, we know, will have a mountainous challenge in undoing the critical damage done by 14 years of failed Tory ideology.

Kate Hall

Leeds

How low can you go?

Simply mentioning the name of Truss runs a shudder through my body, I practically recoil in horror.

Truss has, with great speed, become a thorn in the Tory side, which I don’t mind at all. But she is now deliberately embarrassing Britain. The right-wing people that she is cuddling up to and her praise of Trump in particular show just how low she would have sunk to if she had been allowed to continue as PM.

Anybody in the Tory party who genuinely believed that she could have been a competent, innovative PM ought to have their heads tested. Truss, like Nigel Farage, seeks the limelight and is no doubt paid for her bewildering views on how to right her perceived wrongs of the world.

Like Farage, Truss ought to disappear into the sunset and never be heard of again. Hopefully, she will lose at the upcoming election or, better still, resign sooner. Please stop embarrassing the Britain that you tried so hard to wreck.

Keith Poole

Basingstoke