Thread by @docrussjackson

No evidence of a very concerning, intolerant, antidemocratic, anti-free-speech, increasingly authoritarian hard-right Government here. 🧐

As hardly anyone has heard of him, who is Stuart Anderson?

https://twitter.com/Stuart4WolvesSW/status/1498395912586072070

In 2005, Anderson co-founded Anubis Associates, offering courses in close protection training, "operational protection" for corporate VIPs, and "discreet personal protection" and consultancy services for petrochemical groups, financial institutions & stadiums. How did that go?

Anubis Associates collapsed in 2012. Anderson describes himself as having gone from a "paper millionaire" to being in receipt of food parcels within a month.

At the time of its collapse, Anubis Associates owed £271,000 in unpaid tax.

Administrators noted that Anderson, a director and major shareholder, had received £54,000 in illegal dividends "based on forecasted profits for a future period" that never materialised.

Ordered to repay the money in full, Anderson only offered £2,000.

However, within a week of the collapse of his previous company, Anderson founded another start-up based on personal security, eTravelSafety, of which he was "currently operating as CEO" at the time of the 2019 United Kingdom general election, according to his LinkedIn page.

In December 2019, @PrivateEyeNews Eye reported that despite Anderson's professed enthusiasm for Brexit, his company had received £500,000 from the Midlands Engine Investment Fund, a government fund which receives its financial backing from the European Union!

£79 million would come from the European Development Fund, £123 million from the European Investment Bank, & whatever the next government decided should happen to EU-funded programmes such as the Midlands Engine Investment Fund, eTravelSafety was guaranteed its share of EU money.

He claims to have first developed an interest in a political career around 2005, but did not act on it for another nine years, when, after discussing it with his wife, he bought a book called Politics For Dummies and googled "how to become an MP".

He voted for the Conservative Party in 2015, because in Hereford "you don't vote for Labour" and claimed there was no one else running. In fact, several other party candidates stood in Hereford and South Herefordshire at the 2015 general election.

Anderson says he did not know anything else about the political parties, & joined the @Conservatives in 2016. He'd previously ridiculed party activists, but found that although he didn't always have the depth of knowledge required, he enjoyed speaking to voters on the doorstep.

Anderson was selected as the @Conservatives' prospective parliamentary candidate for Wolverhampton South West in December 2018, & contested the 2019 UK general election as its candidate. He won the seat by just 1,661 votes.

Following the election, he was named by The Guardian as one of the seven "most controversial" new Conservative MPs, due to his receipt of an illegal dividend as a director of a now defunct company.

theguardian.com/politics/2019/…

He says two things which have stood out to him in Parliament were influence & access, & in January 2020, Anderson appeared to have edited his own Wikipedia article to remove information about the unlawful payments he had accepted! He's a member of the Defence Select Committee!🤯

Anti-lockdown Anderson criticised his government's imposition of tier 2 local lockdown measures on Wolverhampton, saying, "As a city we are unified in the view that we don't want these new measures, as we believe they are unfair and won't make a difference".

In October 2020, Anderson of course voted against an opposition day motion calling on the government to continue funding free school meals for 1.4 million disadvantaged children over the school holidays until Easter 2021 during the #COVID19 pandemic.

Anderson said he opposed the motion, as he believed it was "the role of the wider welfare system to help families that require extra support" outside school term. He said that the government had temporarily increased Universal Credit by £20 a week until April 2021.

Following the vote, empty plates were left outside his constituency office in protest.

The following month, thanks to Marcus Rashford in particular, the government U-turned on the grotesque policy.

During the #DowningStreetParties controversy, "uber-loyalist" Anderson backed Spaffer, saying, "As a soldier I understand supporting people not just when they're going through good times but when they're going through bad times. The PM has been loyal to me & I am loyal to him".

Expenses claims by Anderson notable enough to have attracted media comment include £60 on Grammarly software, & £4,108 for accommodation, including rent, constituency home Council Tax, gas & electricity for his constituency home, & staying in a London hotel to attend Parliament.