2019 suspension of rebel Conservative MPs

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On 3 September 2019, the British Conservative Party withdrew the whip from 21 of its MPs who had supported an emergency motion to allow the House of Commons to undertake proceedings on the European Union (Withdrawal) (No. 6) Bill on 4 September.^[1] In the hours after the vote, the Chief Whip Mark Spencer informed the rebel MPs that they were no longer entitled to sit as Conservatives.^[2][3] This led to the loss of the Conservative/DUP majority in the Commons.

The suspended MPs included two former Chancellors of the Exchequer (Philip Hammond and the Father of the House, Kenneth Clarke), seven other former Cabinet members (Greg Clark, David Gauke, Justine Greening, Dominic Grieve, Oliver Letwin, Caroline Nokes and Rory Stewart), and 12 others including Nicholas Soames, grandson of Winston Churchill.^[4][5]

On 29 October 2019, 10 of the suspended MPs had the whip restored;^[6] of these, six stood down at the December 2019 election, while four contested it as Conservative candidates, all retaining their seats. Of the 11 who remained suspended, six declined to stand at the election, while five stood as independents or Liberal Democrats; all five lost their seats.

The suspension of these MPs bore resemblance to the Maastricht Rebels who had the Conservative whip removed by the governing Conservative Party during the ratification of the Maastricht Treaty in the early 1990s.