Michael Fabricant’s face during Keir Starmer’s heartbreaking Commons address might be all you need to know
Boris Johnson today apologised ‘unreservedly’ in his first appearance before MPs since receiving a fixed penalty notice for breaking lockdown rules in Downing Street at the height of the pandemic.
Johnson said it ‘did not occur to me then or subsequently that a gathering in the cabinet room, just before a vital meeting on Covid strategy, could amount to a breach of the rules’.
Keir Starmer’s response was withering. Here’s a little bit of what he had to say.
“The public have made up their mind, they don’t believe a word the prime minister says,” Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer says
“For all those unfamiliar with the prime minister’s career, this isn’t some fixable glitch in the system… it’s what he does”https://t.co/hIx6lWqcJo pic.twitter.com/piZYLFfvpS
— BBC Politics (@BBCPolitics) April 19, 2022
But perhaps the most moving moment in Starmer’s speech was the story he told of a man who was unable to hold his wife’s hand as she died from Covid.
It is an incredibly emotional listen. But the look on Conservative MP Michael Fabricant’s face part way through it prompted an altogether different sort of emotion.
Silence across the House as @Keir_Starmer relates John's story, who could not hold his wife's hand as she died from Covid.
"Doesn't the PM realise that John would have given the world to hold his dying wife's hand, even just for 9 minutes?" pic.twitter.com/BA6tOXdhcP
— Best for Britain (@BestForBritain) April 19, 2022
And just in case you missed it.
What honestly is there to smile about? pic.twitter.com/WzapxIngUq
— Tim Walker (@ThatTimWalker) April 19, 2022
And again.
Fabricant appears to be smirking at his mates even as Starmer tells the heartbreaking story of John Robinson.
Nice. pic.twitter.com/qeuTb4WwXB— Ian Hyland (@HylandIan) April 19, 2022
There’s always the chance that it wasn’t what it looks like of course. Maybe it was just wind.
But it naturally didn’t go unnoticed on Twitter.
https://twitter.com/LemSip27/status/1516451351563280390?s=20&t=oahIf6wrSX2AKllA59AM5Q
It looks like his brain has escaped, and forgot to close the door behind it pic.twitter.com/Vf2g7kbHKR
— Russ Jones (@RussInCheshire) April 19, 2022
Starmer verbalised the anger we all feel, eviscerating the guilty faces opposite as he calls on them to find their decency and remove Johnson. A brilliant response.
Fabricant smiling as Starmer spoke about John Robinson mourning his wife was an absolute fucking disgrace.
— Supertanskiii (@supertanskiii) April 19, 2022
Even Fabricant’s wig is trying to disassociate itself from him.
— David Preece (@davidpreece12) April 19, 2022
@Mike_Fabricant this is your expression as you listened to the tragic story @Keir_Starmer told about my fellow constituent John Robinson having tragically lost his wife during the pandemic and adhering fully to the rules. #Lichfield will wake up and you’ll be gone soon enough pic.twitter.com/Tf65GxeM4u
— Rich (@Richiemuso) April 19, 2022
And finally, this evergreen.
I still struggle to believe that Michael Fabricant is a real person.
— Katy (@KatyJayne101) April 13, 2022
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Mishal Husain’s 7-word takedown of this Cabinet minister over Partygate was A++
