Brexiteer Nadine Dorries has been given a job in government for the first time since she was elected in 2005.
Dorries is no stranger to controversy since she appeared on ITV’s I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here in 2012.
She was was briefly suspended from the Conservative Party for failing to inform whips that she was taking time off from the job for the show.
More recently she has compared Theresa May to Adolf Hitler, she claimed that the Irish border issue ‘does not exist’ and slammed the Brexit deal for not giving us enough influence in Europe.
She is also accused of telling former TNE columnist Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to ‘be nice or go home’.
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She joins the government as a junior health minister, despite regressive views, like cal ling for abortion time limits to be cut from 24 weeks to 20 weeks.
The internet typically responded with scorn.
Remain commentator Ian Dunt said: “Nadine Dorries becomes a minister at the Department of Health. The clown car is complete.”
Former Jeremy Corbyn staffer Matt Zarb-Cousin said: “Boris Johnson just made anti-abortion Nadine Dorries health minister. Add that to a pro-capital punishment home secretary, a foreign secretary who doesn’t believe in economic & social rights, and an international trade secretary who thinks we’re all the worst idlers in the world!”
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Author Michael Rosen wrote: “Do we as radio, tv and newspaper presenters and journalists express great concern that Nadine Dorries, who once used the ‘you can go back home’ racist slur against our colleague, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, is now in government?”
Columnist Andrew Adonis tweeted: “I cannot conceive how any civil servant could work for Nadine Dorries. On the shortlist of people most unfit to hold government office ever.”
Another said: “There have been quite a few ‘Do I really live in a country where…?’ moments over the past few years, but it is going to be hard to top ‘Do I really live in a country where Nadine Dorries is a government minister?'”