Tory MP Lee Anderson becomes the next Nadine Dorries with one brutal Twitter mistake

Lee Anderson, the Conservative MP for Ashfield in Nottinghamshire, clearly hasn’t learned from former culture secretary Nadine Dorries’ mistake earlier this week, as one tweet attacking a constituent’s “one Twitter follower” soon blew up in his face.

Mr Anderson - who has previously come under fire for claiming food bank users “cannot cook properly”, been reported to the police for transphobic remarks about Labour’s Eddie Izzard, and accused of “condescension” over his cost of living ‘advice’ – made the comment after one Twitter user responded to his tweet about Labour policy.

On Wednesday, the Tory politician shared a Guardian headline about Sir Keir Starmer’s party’s plans to “overhaul routes into work for sick or long-term unemployed [people]” and added: “Oh the irony.

“Just imagine if I had said this. What do you think the front page headline would have said?

“’Nasty out of touch Tory forces the disabled and long-term doleys into workhouses.’ Can you think of one?”

To this, full-time senior care worker Chris Delaney replied: “Tory MP, worried about his re-election prospects, takes any opportunity to slate the opposition?”

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Rather than present a compelling argument for holding Labour to account over its election promises, Mr Anderson instead clapped back by tweeting: “You have one Twitter follower in five years. Hardly an influencer are you when even your friends refuse to follow you – assuming you have friends.”

Reader, this soon aged terribly.

At the time of writing, Mr Delaney now has more than 47,600 followers on the social media platform, trumping Mr Anderson’s 44,300 followers.

One Twitter user who led the rallying cry for a rather sweet embarrassment for Mr Anderson was blogger Simon Harris, who shared the interaction on his profile and added: “Tory MP Lee Anderson thinks Chris’ views and opinions are worthless because he has one follower. Wouldn’t it be a terrible shame if [Chris] ended up overtaking Mr Anderson on here because loads of us followed him?

“It would be awful, wouldn’t it? Just terrible.”

Another account thanked Mr Anderson for his tweet, as “without your spiteful post I wouldn’t have found [Chris]”.

A third responded sarcastically: “Great way to talk to a constituent. Especially one who now has 20,000 followers and counting.

“Bullying and abuse aren't a great look from an MP; they may not help you on the jobs market after the next election either.

Commenting on the sudden boost in followers, Mr Delaney tweeted on Friday: “Sorry [Lee Anderson] turns out I have more friends than you now but don’t worry you’ll always have that one you staged an interview with.”

He attached a YouTube video of a report by journalist Michael Crick on Mr Anderson during the 2019 election campaign trail, in which it was revealed the Tory MP had called up a mate on the phone to set-up a doorstep chat.

Mr Anderson could be heard saying: “Make out you know who I am, but you know I’m the candidate, but not a friend, alright?”

Awkward.

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