Cheer up Boris: at least there’s one MP having a worse time than you. It’s not been a great February so far for Craig Whittaker. The Tory MP for Calder Valley was just about the only member of the government to lose his job as a Whip last week in Boris Johnson’s mini-reshuffle. The Prime Minister has so many enemies at the moment that he’s reluctant to banish anyone to the backbenches but after nearly five years of loyal service, Whittaker departed as part of an overhaul of the Whips’ Office which saw Chris Heaton-Harris become chief and Chris Pincher named his deputy. In a statement, Whittaker told local press that he was leaving for ‘personal reasons’ and that he remained ‘100 per cent supportive of the government.’
Now though, it seems that Whittaker’s week has gone from bad to worse. Just five days after he departed as a Whip, Kathryn Stone, the parliamentary commissioner for standards, quietly launched an investigation into the recently-axed frontbencher.
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