Alexander Chancellor

Long life | 14 July 2016

Andrea Leadsom got it wrong: Winston Churchill, Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair were all embarrassed by their offspring

issue 16 July 2016

When you are recovering from a stroke, you spend much of the time asleep. But when you are not sleeping, you are told that the most important thing you have to do is avoid stress. All doctors agree that stress is the main impediment to recovery. But how can you possibly protect yourself against it? The causes of stress can creep up on you from anywhere without warning, and there is nothing you can do about it; and lately I have been bombarded by shocks.

I was one of the ignorant for whom the victory of Brexit in the referendum was itself a shock, but this also set in train a whole bunch of further assaults on the nervous system. There was the resignation of David Cameron, followed by Boris Johnson’s sudden withdrawal from the contest to be his successor, which was brought about by his treacherous replacement Michael Gove who was joined in the race by my own local MP in South Northamptonshire, Andrea Leadsom.

Mrs Leadsom had been little known nationally until she became an articulate advocate of Brexit during the referendum campaign, but I had been well disposed towards her.

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