It seems that the fruits of high office haven’t changed Nadine Dorries. The Culture Secretary, who took up her brief eight weeks ago, last night hit out at Laura Kuenssberg on Twitter after the BBC’s political editor reported receiving a text from a Tory MP at the 1922 committee which said Boris Johnson ‘looked weak and sounded weak’ and that his ‘authority is evaporating.’ Dorries responded angrily, declaring:
Laura, I very much like and respect you, but we both know, that text is ridiculous, although nowhere near as ridiculous as the person – obviously totally desperate for your attention – who sent it.
Shortly thereafter the tweet was deleted but not before numerous screenshots went viral. Dorries is well-known as a vocal critic of the Beeb, once claiming that eating ostrich anus on I’m a Celebrity was ‘more pleasant than talking to [the BBC]’ and arguing that the broadcaster ‘excludes people from working class backgrounds.’ She also believes its current licence fee and ‘aggressive persecution’ of non-payers ‘would be more in keeping in a soviet style country,’ lambasted BBC management for providing ‘cover for despicable paedo Saville’ and dubbed the Corporation a ‘biased left wing organisation which is seriously failing in its political representation.’
Still, the Culture Secretary’s decision to attack a reporter’s coverage so directly has caused some considerable unease in Tory circles. While other MPs like Conservative backbencher Tom Hunt also ridiculed the claims cited in Kuenssberg’s tweet, Dorries has responsibility for the BBC in her remit, amid fears in both government and the government of another war of words between ministers and the state broadcaster. The intervention comes as the BBC are trying to appoint Kuenssberg’s successor amid some reports that the new hire will need to be ‘acceptable’ to No. 10.
Dorries’s intervention of course comes just a day after Health Secretary Sajid Javid urged a Twitter user to ‘show some respect for the NHS.’ Is this the start of a more bolshie Cabinet presence on social media? Sleaze, rows and now British beef going viral – it really is back to the nineties.
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