Cleverly gets roasted for #IDanielBlake arrogance

Tory MP James Cleverly was recently voted by the readers of a Tory magazine as one of the party’s top social media performers – which says rather more, given his history, about the paucity of Tory social media skills than anything.

So it was as unsurprising as it was appalling when Cleverly responded with trademark Tory arrogance to a tweet by Labour front-bencher Rebecca Long-Bailey asking people to watch the towering Ken Loach masterwork I, Daniel Blake:

It’s hard – very, very hard – to imagine a plainer demonstration of the Tories’ utter detachment and callousness regarding the terrible suffering they have inflicted on the poor and vulnerable of this country.

So terrible is that suffering that UN Special Rapporteur Philip Alston, only two months ago, described as telling those in horrendous hardship ‘you’re on your own’. Alston went on to say that the Tories could fix most of the problems overnight and at very little cost if they wanted to.

Entirely correctly, Cleverly was roasted for his astonishing arrogance. Long-Bailey’s fellow front-bencher Laura Pidcock pulled no punches:

So condescending & out of touch. This film is much closer to fact than fiction in the world the rest of us inhabit, James. Reminder that ‘I, Daniel Blake’ is on at 9.45, BBC Two, tonight. Don’t miss it. #IDanielBlakeBBC2 https://t.co/CENLE2ntP2

— Laura Pidcock (@LauraPidcock) January 5, 2019

But it wasn’t only MPs who confronted Cleverly with the consequences of his party’s policies – policies described in recent Lancaster University research as ‘social murder‘:

pic.twitter.com/5ygB1hfoFP

— Anita🌹 (@a_nitak) January 5, 2019

Cleverly was right – in an utterly sick way – that the film does not reflect reality: according to the UN, it does not go far enough and reality is worse than what it reflects:

The OHCHR report shows reality to be more severe and punitive than the film might suggest – https://t.co/EUOBid9uDY

— Shelley Bones #SaveLivesDon'tVoteTory (@dembones3) January 5, 2019

Tweet after tragic, outraged tweet – literally thousands of them – confronted Cleverly with the reality his condescending idiocy ignored or castigated him for the consequences of Tory government:

But the greatest tragedy is that none of them were likely to move a Tory MP, let alone change his or her mind.

James Cleverly was contacted for comment.

SKWAWKBOX comment:

Many Tory Twitter humiliations have a large dose of humour to them, as the Tories demonstrate their incompetence on social media or their foolishness.

But there was no humour in this. The country is run by sociopaths – and only a change of government will prevent a further huge toll in deaths, despair and suffering, even among our children and most vulnerable adults.

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