Thread by @shaunjlawson

Compare the absolute contempt so many Tory MPs have for their constituents now with what Hugh Dykes and John Wilkinson wrote to me when I was 18 and looking for work in Parliament.

Both handwritten. Both hugely encouraging and engaging. Dykes' note was especially lovely.

https://twitter.com/jacquesgilmore/status/1469353630880997380

Wilkinson, incidentally, was one of the rebel Tories under John Major. Yet he was dignified, humane, decent basically - including when I interrogated him Paxman-style when he came to speak at my school.

Dykes, meanwhile, was a Heseltine-style VERY pro-European Tory.

Both good constituency MPs. Both gentlemen. Even if their politics were very different from mine.

People always insist that PR would 'break the constituency link'. Folks: it's ALREADY been broken. MPs like in the OP couldn't give a toss. Ditto most Tories and some Labour too.

Speaking of politicians who came to speak to my school:

- Rhodes Boyson pre-Ali G. A raving idiot, who thought Haberdashers' results were all down to the teaching, and had absolutely nothing to do with it selecting the brightest pupils in North-West London at age 11. 🙄🙄🙄

- Douglas Hurd, the chap I'd actually wanted to win the 1990 leadership contest and had always respected. Except he had no answer whatever when I stood up from the audience and angrily challenged him on sanctions against Iraq.

"Saddam doesn't care one jot about his people! How dare you justify doing this to them when it has no impact on him?"

The Headmaster had to move things swiftly on, because old Mr Whippy was floundering.

- Lastly, Bob Hawke. A legendary leader and bloke.

As I mentioned on here some time back, he was the first person I'd ever heard who stated that China would become the most powerful country in the world - and his forecast was it'd happen by 2025-2030.

A visionary, he was. No Aussie leader since has held a candle to him.