The 23rd annual Threadneedle/ Spectator Parliamentarian of the Year lunch took place last Thursday at Claridge’s. The prizes were presented by the Rt Hon. David Cameron MP, Leader of the Opposition. Welcoming Mr Cameron, Matthew d’Ancona, the editor of The Spectator, observed that, in less than a year as Conservative leader, he had dislodged Beckham as the most popular Dave in the country, shown his fellow Tories that a glacier is not just a kind of mint, and taught the political world that green is more than the colour of envy.
NEWCOMER OF THE YEAR
Julia Goldsworthy MP
The judges faced a difficult task selecting one MP from the intake of 2005 — which, in the words of Sinatra, was a very good year. The winner unseated a Labour incumbent to become the youngest MP in England, and has already risen to a senior position on the Lib Dem front bench. At a traumatic time for her party, which led to the resignation of a leader still popular with his membership and the public, she dared to ask difficult and painful questions at precisely the moment of her career when one would have expected unprincipled reticence.
INQUISITOR OF THE YEAR
Angus MacNeil MP
When the winner began his dogged pursuit of the loans for honours affair and took his complaint to Scotland Yard, few thought it would amount to much more than another doomed lunge by the Scottish National Party for headlines.
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