MP ANDREW Bridgen has lost the Conservative Party whip after having “crossed a line” in his criticism of the Covid-19 vaccine, Chief Whip Simon Hart said.
The MP had used his Twitter account early on Wednesday morning to claim a consultant cardiologist told him that illness linked to Covid vaccines were the “biggest crime against humanity since the Holocaust”.
The MP for North West Leicestershire, who is currently suspended from the Commons over lobbying breaches, has been campaigning for a pause to Covid vaccinations, claiming they cause heart problems.
Previous vaccine claims
It comes just a week after a Tory MP colleague accused Bridgen of spreading “nonsense” about vaccinations.
Michael Fabricant said he was “deeply disappointed” after Bridgen posted the unfounded claim that the jags are actually a “gene therapy”.
“mRNA vaccines leading to bespoke treatments for previously incurable cancers and other diseases should not be held back,” the MP told Bridgen.
“mRNA Covid vaccines like those manufactured by Pfizer and Moderna have saved the #UK from the mass deaths still occurring in China,” Fabricant added.
Meanwhile journalist Matthew Street said Bridgen was “one of the sources of misinformation that his own government and the NHS are obliged to combat”.
In Parliament in December, he claimed that a senior British Heart Foundation figure was involved in “covering up clear data that reveals that the mRNA vaccine increases inflammation of the heart arteries” – something the charity “categorically” denied.
According to a study in the British Medical Journal, heart problems linked to the vaccines are “very rare or possibly rare”.
The charity hit back hard against Bridgen’s claims, with a spokesperson saying: “The scientific consensus is that the benefits of Covid-19 vaccination, including a reduced risk of severe illness or death, far outweigh the very small risk of rare side effects like myocarditis or pericarditis for the vast majority of people, especially as people get older.
“Scientific evidence shows that Covid-19 itself is much more likely to cause myocarditis than the vaccine is, and people who are vaccinated have a much lower risk of getting other serious complications caused by Covid-19.
“We employ a small leadership team of senior scientists and cardiologists to oversee and administer our research funding programmes, who also continue to undertake some of their own research. We can categorically say that nobody within this leadership team has acted in the way claimed by Mr Bridgen.”
Who are his supporters?
Despite heavy criticism over his repeated claims, Bridgen has won support from the likes of GB News's Neil Oliver. He has made repeated appearances on the right-wing news channel.
"What is being alleged about the so-called vaccines is of monumental importance. What Bridgen and Malhotra have claimed ought to be the biggest story in the country, in the world," former Coast presenter Oliver said in a recent appearance.
🚨 Part two… ‘If our MPs don’t care enough about harms to population, it’s time we reminded the whole demanded lot of them we are still here.’ Neil Oliver hits out at the lack of MPs attending Parliament to hear Andrew Bridgen’s call for an mRNA Covid vaccine halt. pic.twitter.com/iFjItKC0Tz
— GB News (@GBNEWS) December 17, 2022
Mark Dolan, a fellow presenter at GB News, platformed Bridgen as recently as last week on his show. Laurence Fox has also interviewed the MP on his efforts to have the vaccine roll-out suspended.
Who is Andrew Bridgen?
In 2013, he caused controversy when he said that good MPs were being turned away from Westminster because of the poor pay. He boasted that he was one of the few MPs willing to speak publicly about the low pay of MPs – which was £66,396 at the time.
In 2022, Bridgen was found by a High Court judge to have lied under oath about his family business.
During his time in Parliament, Bridgen has backed to efforts to remove David Cameron, Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss from office.
On January 9, MPs agreed to suspend him after he was found to have displayed a “very cavalier” attitude to the rules in a series of lobbying breaches.
The backbencher should have told ministers and officials about his relationship with Cheshire-based firm Mere Plantations as he made multiple representations.
Bridgen also called into question the integrity of standards commissioner Kathryn Stone on the basis of “wholly unsubstantiated and false allegations”, the standards committee found.
He appealed against the recommendation to suspend him, but Parliament’s Independent Expert Panel dismissed it “on all grounds”.
