Nadine Dorries

Nadine Dorries is an author and former culture secretary.

Thursday

Nadine Dorries

Why I gave up on the Tories

The days between my leaving the Tories and joining Reform were an odd uneven time. It was the hardest decision I have ever made – I’d been a Conservative party member for 30 years, after all. Before the announcement, only three people knew what I was planning to do. In Westminster almost everything leaks so we kept the information tight. Once I had made up my mind, Nigel Farage and I held several clandestine meetings in a secluded room in a Mayfair members’ club to decide how to break the news. I initially rather fancied defecting on the eve of the Conservative party conference, for maximum impact. But in the end we decided to drop the story in the Daily Mail on Thursday night.

Tuesday

Nadine Dorries

With Nadine Dorries

15 min listen

Nadine Dorries is one of the most recognisable Conservative politicians from the past two decades. Elected as the MP for Mid Bedfordshire in 2005, she notably clashed with David Cameron and George Osborne (who she called ‘two arrogant posh boys’) and lost the whip in 2012 when she took part in the reality show I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here. Loyal to Boris Johnson, she served in his government and rose to be Culture Secretary. She stood down in 2023 and went on to write about politics in the bestselling books The Plot and Downfall. On the podcast, Nadine tells the Spectator’s executive editor Lara Prendergast about her memories of tinned burgers and Sunday lunches as a child, working long shifts as a nurse in Warrington and what it was like spending a year in Zambia.

Saturday

Nadine Dorries

Nadine Dorries, Katy Balls, Edmund West, Sam Dalrymple, and Tanjil Rashid

32 min listen

On this week’s Spectator Out Loud: Nadine Dorries reads her diary (1:12); Katy Balls analyses the politics behind the Assisted Dying debate (5:58); Edmund West allows us a glimpse into Whitby Goth Week (11:55); reviewing Avinash Paliwal’s book India’s New East, Sam Dalrymple looks at the birth of Bangladesh (17:39); and Tanjil Rashid reveals William Morris’s debt to Islam (21:23).  Produced and presented by Patrick Gibbons.

Thursday

Nadine Dorries

Nigel told me he’s the new Boris

Last week I arrived in London from the Cotswolds just in time to witness the collective meltdown from everyone around me as it was announced that Donald Trump was the President-elect. I was delighted. Who are we to complain? The American people knew exactly what they were doing. I had been booked on to ITV’s This Morning where we were to discuss Kamala Harris’s resignation speech, a story so feeble it wouldn’t last until the 6 p.m. news. The tone in the studio was ‘poor Kamala’. I was having none of it. She fully deserved to lose. She had no coherent policies on immigration or the economy and banged on endlessly about women’s reproductive rights as though that were all women cared about.

Thursday

Nadine Dorries

Do accents still matter in politics?

14 min listen

The new MP for Kingswood has been under fire for apparently changing his accent over the course of his political career. Does this matter? And if so, what does this tell us about British politics today? Cindy Yu talks to James Heale and author and former cabinet minister, Nadine Dorries. Produced by Cindy Yu and Patrick Gibbons.

Nadine Dorries

Why I should never look at Twitter

Foreign trips can offer a sense of perspective. Heading to Saudi Arabia, I prepare for my first stint of diplomacy. While most of the world has been fixated on Ukraine, a different subject has dominated the news in Britain for the past few weeks. I wonder how, if asked, I’d explain to a Saudi minister the British media’s interest in whether an open packet of crisps and a length of mauve tinsel constitutes a party. My first problem is more practical: what clothes does a feminist pack when visiting Saudi Arabia? Ministerial briefing packs are not terribly helpful on this point. As a mother of three adult daughters, I’m not exactly a shrinking violet when it comes to defending women’s rights, and I’m not sure what to expect from the trip. I seek advice.

Saturday

Nadine Dorries

Full text: Nadine Dorries’s scathing resignation letter

Nadine Dorries has just announced that she is stepping down as an MP. Below is the full text of her blistering resignation letter to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak: Dear Prime Minister, It has been the greatest honour and privilege of my life to have served the good people of Mid Bedfordshire as their MP for 18 years and I count myself blessed to have worked in Westminster for almost a quarter of a century. Despite what some in the media and you yourself have implied, my team of caseworkers and I have continued to work for my constituents faithfully and diligently to this day.

Thursday

Nadine Dorries

The Nadine Dorries Edition

46 min listen

Nadine Dorries is the Secretary of State for the Department of Culture, Media and Sports and MP for Mid Bedfordshire. After leaving school at 16, Dorries went on to become a nurse and an entrepreneur before entering politics at the age of 49. She was a minister in the Department of Health during the pandemic, and in her current role is leading five bills at DCMS through Parliament, including the controversial Online Safety Bill. On the podcast, she talks to Katy Balls about her plans for the BBC and Channel 4, why she believes much of the criticism against her comes from those unable to accept her background, and where her red line would be in sticking up for Boris Johnson, as one of his most loyal allies.

Thursday

Nadine Dorries

Diary – 29 November 2012

As I returned to the House of Commons, it was clear I had swapped one jungle for another. For the last few weeks I have been in Australia filming I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here! and the Conservative leadership were less than impressed. In desperation to prevent me from taking part, No. 10 drew a grenade from their armoury in the form of a whip suspension. It had no impact on my decision to join the show, but did help make me one of the best-known politicians in Britain. I wonder if that is really what they were trying to achieve? When I was first approached by the show’s producers, I politely declined. I couldn’t see any benefit in travelling halfway around the world to eat camel toe for the public’s amusement.

Saturday

Nadine Dorries

The Embryology Bill, cui bono?

A guest blog from Nadine Dorries, MP.  The Human Tissue and Embryology Bill will be the show of the year in Parliament. The amendments I and others will lay down to reduce the upper limit at which abortion takes place from 24 weeks will be controversial and explosive. I had been concerned that this debate would overshadow other serious issues in the Bill, such as animal-human embryo hybrids, but then I hadn't counted on Cardinal Keith O'Brien.  Cardinal O’Brien has not always been my favourite Cardinal; I have disagreed with him in the past. However, his typically forthright views have successfully grabbed the media’s attention at a time when we needed it most—immediately prior to the introduction of the Bill.

Monday

Nadine Dorries

Abortion lobby on the back foot

On Wednesday the Health Minister, Dawn Primarolo MP (pictured), will be giving evidence to the Science and Technology Select Committee. She has already provided her answers to our assumed questions via The Independent newspaper this morning. I won't even go there with regard to how this is simply an attempt to use the media to spin a position which is now--in light of all the new evidence which the DOH are choosing to deliberately ignore--simply untenable. The desperate tricks taking place behind the scenes all have their roots in money and are nothing to do with choice. Let me explain.

Wednesday

Nadine Dorries

The Night Before

We were finally served our dinner at 10.30 last night. Thank goodness I was with the Countryside Alliance who are good fun and tolerant. It was then onto the News International reception, which is the gossip reception of the conference and the only one it is impossible to get into unless you have been invited. It was here the conference speech whispers took flight:  fascinating to watch the networking in action. One person I was with was absolutely desperate beyond the realms of normal behaviour to drop a word in Fraser Nelson's ear, and he did! Staggered home and into bed at midnight, wiped out. Blackberry wakes me at 1.15 am. 'Where are you old woman? Come to Imperial bar and celebrate last night in Blackpool'.  Reply unprintable!

Nadine Dorries

Not the way to warm up an audience

Standing in the press gallery waiting to go into the 5 Live bubble. Just finished BBC, Anglia and Sky. The BBC make up woman has made me look like the cookie monster!   Conservative conference goers are creatures of habit. They like to go into the auditorium in the morning, put their towel on a seat and then come back later for the leaders speech. Not allowed this year it seems. Everyone has been chucked out of the auditorium and made to queue outside to re-enter. The queue is twice round the Winter Gardens and it is a queue of very unhappy people. This is not a good start! Nadine Dorries, the Tory MP for Mid-Bedfordhshire, will be blogging for Coffee House during conference.

Nadine Dorries

David is ready

David looked so smart when he walked onto the stage with his hair slicked back, I thought he was going to break into a verse of Mack the Knife. He was the antithesis to Brown. Brown was big on spin, David huge on substance. Brown was stale and re-hashed, David fresh and new. He went into detail about the policies we would put in place to deliver a strong society and reverse the rapidly escalating decline we all witness when we hear about a teenager who has just been shot in the neck on a middle class housing estate. Tax breaks for marriage, welfare to work which will actually work and genuine choice and reform of the education system which will equip our children to deal with the demands of global competition in the 21st century.

Tuesday

Nadine Dorries

The quiet man roars

I am in the Hilton at a dinner hosted by the Countryside Alliance. There is someone I know on almost every table in the restaurant. Everyone is talking about the speech Iain gave tonight and absolutely everyone is talking about how the tears flooded their eyes and the hairs on the back of their neck rose. There is a lady on my table who is in tears now—she has said that her hands are still hurting from clapping and the only reason people sat down was because Iain began to look embarrassed by the length of his standing ovation. The gist of what made everyone cry was the very typical Iain sentiment:  if you love your country you have to love all of the people in your country. There are clever people in politics.

Nadine Dorries

Told you so

I have tried so hard all day. I have kept myself distracted. Fully immersed in meetings and preparing for my fringe tonight. I forced myself not to look at the comment section on my blog - and then it happened, someone noticed and now I just can't help myself. Here goes - I told you so. I said weeks ago on my own blog and yesterday on this one that Brown would  announce a withdrawal of troops  and use emotive language with words like 'our boys' to do so, as a pre election stunt to rain on our parade. And that's just what it is, a cheap political stunt; as proven by the fact that he took only broadcast media with him. No newspapers or journalists to ask awkward questions. I'm doing Simon Mayo just before David Cameron's speech tomorrow.

Nadine Dorries

Will Brown dare not go to the country?

Bumped into Baroness Peta Buscombe at the bar in the Imperial Hotel last night - Peta is the CEO of the Advertising Association. She told me that last week she had attended the Labour party conference, for business purposes only I hasten to add. I asked her how it had compared to our own conference. "No where near the number of delegates" she said."No real activists as such, a very corporate affair, focused, driven and very smart - so glad I wore my Armani" Priceless! I am about to take her to my friends on a local council estate for a cup of tea. They will love her and she will have shown them how to whip up a smoked salmon Blini from a loaf of Mothers Pride in no time! The rest of the night consisted of a dinner and a round of hot receptions.

Monday

Nadine Dorries

Gordon lends the Tories a helping hand

This is such a good week. Commentators have said that Gordon has taunted us into announcing policies that we would have preferred to leave until later in the electoral cycle, whenever that may be. If he has, then he has done us a favour. Surely electoral success owes a great deal to getting the message out in a clear, strong, simple and repetitive manner. The electorate need to understand who and what they are voting for. Following the slam dunk announcements made by George today to scrap stamp duty for first time buyers up to £250,000 and to the level at which inheritance tax is paid to £1million, we can now once again sell ourselves as the party of lower taxes.

Nadine Dorries

What I would do if I were Gordon

Everyone is very upbeat this morning, despite the fact that I have yet to speak to anyone who got to bed before three am. There is a real buzz that if Brown does call an election we have everything to fight for; especially if we close the poll gap this week following some good gritty announcements. Brown is supposed to make a statement today on Iraq. If I were him, I would be worried about the fact that Cameron is going to have a blinder of a week, and, as we all know, is going to deliver the speech of his life which will throw raw meat to the electorate in the form of fresh policies, and when the comparisons are drawn, will highlight how poor, stale and re-hashed Brown's speech was. Brown will be worried.

Sunday

Nadine Dorries

If the shoe fits

Nadine Dorries, the Tory MP for Mid-Bedfordhshire, will be blogging for Coffee House during conference. Heading for Blackpool. Slammed the boot of the car shut on far more luggage than any woman not obsessed with shoes would normally have, when my BlackBerry warbled with a couple of messages. First message was from my researcher which said "you were quoted by Andrew Pierce in the Telegraph yesterday with a sub heading - very good quote". The second was from Nick Wood of Media Intelligence Partners. Nick headed up the Conservative Press Office through the Hague, IDS and Howard years. His said, "Just arrived. Are you here yet? Get a move on!" Two things struck me as unusual.