The MP Andrew Bridgen has announced he is joining Laurence Fox’s Reclaim party after being kicked out of the Conservative party for comparing Covid vaccines to the Holocaust.
The member for North West Leicestershire announced the move, which makes him Reclaim’s first MP, at an event on Wednesday morning where he said he had felt like a prisoner while following the Tory whip.
“Now I have reclaimed my freedom,” he said, predicting that other MPs would follow him to Reclaim. “This is just the beginning,” he said.
He also revealed he had submitted a defamation claim against Matt Hancock to the high court, involving a tweet in which the former health secretary accused Bridgen of spouting “antisemitic, anti-vax, anti-scientific conspiracy theories” over the vaccine.
A spokesperson for Hancock said the former minister would defend the action, which they described as “a pathetic publicity stunt”.
“The claim has no credible basis and when Matt wins the case, he will also seek to recover all costs. Vaccines save lives, and Matt will always defend science and progress against unfounded conspiracy theories that put people’s health at risk.”
Bridgen was condemned for saying at the press conference: “It’s almost as if our parliament is working for another master, because it certainly is not serving the people of this country.”
The charity Hope Not Hate said: “These words are conspiracy-laden, fuelling ideas of shadowy elites controlling politics from afar.”
Bridgen has been in parliament since 2010 and has sat as an independent since his much-condemned vaccine comment in January, which followed an apparent embrace of wider Covid conspiracy theories.
He was suspended for a tweet that linked to an article from ZeroHedge, a libertarian and conspiracy theory website, that purported to show health risks from Covid vaccines. Bridgen wrote: “As one consultant cardiologist said to me this is the biggest crime against humanity since the holocaust.”
Reclaim has styled itself as champion of free speech and has become allied with activists campaigning against Covid vaccines and low traffic zones.
On Wednesday, Bridgen resisted calls for a byelection. Amanda Hack, a Leicestershire councillor and Labour’s candidate in North West Leicestershire, said: “If he wants to try his luck as Britain’s first ever Reclaim MP, that’s fine but the choice should not be down to him.”
The Liberal Democrat deputy leader, Daisy Cooper, also called for a byelection, saying: “Andrew Bridgen and his misinformation have absolutely no place in the House of Commons and now his defection to a failed fringe political party cements it.”
