Thrashed

Everything’s going fine with Cameron’s Nu Labour… except for all the wrong stuff.

This has to be the wrongest of the lot…

The news that Louise Mensch is to stand down, causing a by-election in her marginal seat of Corby, is a shock but not totally unexpected.

BBC quality journalism; the tax-funded discoverers of the not totally unexpected shock.

‘Shock’ in journalese usually means a total surprise, rather than a sudden sensation or jolt.

Mrs Mensch has announced that she is finding it increasingly difficult to juggle her family responsibilities with her political career; something that she has spoken to us about in the past.

Start spreading the news, I’m leaving today…

She is to move to New York with her three children to join husband, Metallica…

That would be the one fine thing. I like Metallica.

…manager, Peter Mensch.

She said: "I am completely devastated.

I imagine that a great number of people in Corby, including its brand-new Conservative majority, share her pain and are repeating her words verbatim tonight.

 It's been unbelievably difficult to manage family life. We have been trying to find a way forward with the Prime Minister's office but I just can't spend as much time with my children as I want to."

Hoo-boy, I can’t wait to read what James writes about this one..

She had been allowed to go back to the constituency on Thursdays and Fridays in a special concession from the PM but it hadn't proved enough of a help.

I am completely devastated - it's been unbelievably difficult to manage family life.”The Prime Minister, hinting that she was in line for promotion,…

..Presumably because he can spot utter dedication to the Conservative cause when he sees it…

 … said he only accepted her resignation "with enormous regret".

He thanked her, adding: "You're a truly inspiring Member of Parliament,…

I imagine there’s just so much inspiration about in Corby right now.

….championing your constituency of Corby with flair and energy over the past two and half years,

…but now, not so much….

…while also serving with great distinction on the House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee."

When Louise Bagshawe (as she was then) was first elected, I asked her about her political ambitions.

"I don't want to be a minister," she told me. "I think David Cameron and George Osborne are doing a fantastic job of it already."

So she’s an acute judge of character and political acumen as well as a…

Oh, never mind.

Nevertheless, her profile rose, with appearances on programmes like Have I Got News for You?

And she embraced social media in a way that very few MPs had ever done before.

With 100,000 followers on Twitter she's now launched her own site.

Okay, it’s just possible that I, and other conservative bloggers, might be suffering from a little traffic envy here.

But we’re amateurs, creating the atmosphere and keeping the faith – we didn’t take the job from someone who might just possibly have stuck around all the way to the next General election and beyond.

Published work in Catholic newspaper The Tablet aged 14

Became Young Poet of the Year at 18

Read Anglo-Saxon and Norse at Oxford University

Worked for record company EMI as a press officer and later moved to a marketing job at Sony

Published first novel Career Girls in 1995

Joined the Conservative party at age of 14

Won Corby seat in 2010 general election

But it was on the Culture Media and Sport Committee that she really showed her mettle as part of the investigation into the phone hacking scandal.

Because sticking it (however rightly) to the only media company in the world that allows conservatives to speak their minds largely uninterrupted by anchormen’s sneering and outraged fellow leftist guests is just about the best mark of integrity you can make.

Except possibly staying the course for a whole parliamentary term.

Before entering Parliament she was already a best selling "chick lit" author.

She was put on the 'A' list of candidates by David Cameron, which meant she was fast tracked into Parliament.

And it’s a triumph.

Nevertheless, taking the seat of Corby, which had been held by Labour for 13 years, was no mean feat. With a majority of only 1,895, this is a marginal seat.

The Conservatives have already told us that they won't relish fighting a mid term by-election.

At least our reserves of British understatement haven't run dry.

It's likely to be held in November, in tandem with the Police Commissioner elections.

Labour have their candidate, former MP's son Andy Sawford,…

Nice to see the hereditary principle triumphing again (see David Dimbelby’s upcoming epic expose of nepotism in Regency England)  

… already in place and are good to go.

The battle for Corby begins here.

And at least with this from Wikipedia it’s easy to see that Cameron, the master of puppets himself,  can’t have stumbled upon any red flags before he parachuted her in:

With parents who were active in the Party, Mensch had joined the Conservative Party when she was 14. But because of her religious background and the changing society she became increasingly critical of the Established Church of England and flirted with anti-monarchy groups. Consequently in 1996 she switched to the Labour Party, saying that she believed Tony Blair to be "socially liberal but an economic Tory" and secretly Catholic. By 1997 she had returned to the Conservatives, helped her mother, Daphne, win a seat in East Sussex County Council from the Liberal Democratsand campaigned in the 1997, 2001 and 2005 general elections. In 2001, Mensch co-founded the Oxonian Society with Joseph Pascal and Princess Badiya bint El Hassan of Jordan.

And most of all this lays to rest forever, along with such outdated  ideas as nationalism, equality before the law, parliamentary sovereignty and the Conservative principle of trust the people, the false idea that metropolitan elite chick lit authors married to foreign millionaires from the sober world of rock music lack the bottom to represent and govern the people with dedication. And in Corby, it’s not as if they aren’t accustomed to having their dreams crushed by both main parties.

I can’t help but think that the gloating from the Left about this will be a little, um, constrained, however.