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Imagine being fired from your job, being replaced in an instant by someone who has been trashing you for weeks, and now imagine it happening on live television.
Paul Sweeney, the former Labour MP for Glasgow North East, knows the “devastating” pain of being sacked by his constituents while friends and family watch.
He remembers tucked in under his covers on election night in November 2019 as the exit polls came in: BBC projections showed Labour facing a heavy defeat in England to the Conservatives and in Scotland to the SNP.
“I went back to my apartment, got into bed fully dressed, pulled the duvet over my head and started scrolling through negative news on Twitter,” he says. I“Deep down, I knew [my seat] Lost.”
Ms Sweeney was on the verge of losing to the SNP’s Anne McLoughlin by just over 2,500 votes. “Going into the polling station was a terrifying experience. I felt like I was being taken to the Coliseum to be fed to the lions. It was brutal.”
“When the results come out, I just grin and try not to look depressed, I feel like I’ve been publicly humiliated. Gladiator – The Emperor is blaming you.”
The reality of an upcoming general election is that MPs defending their seats will likely lose and ultimately lose their jobs. But there is little public sympathy for defeated politicians. Indeed, high-profile defeats are savoured with jubilation and are part of the sacred ritual of election night.
His shock defeat of Michael Portillo in 1997 was voted the third favourite moment of the 20th century by Channel 4 viewers. Observer Readers assumed the former Conservative minister would enjoy a second life making a TV show about train travel.
Prominent Conservatives such as Jacob Rees-Mogg, Jeremy Hunt and Grant Shapps know that current opinion polls mean there is a real risk of a “Portillo moment” in the early hours of 5 July.
Dozens of MPs – most likely Conservative and SNP politicians – will soon have to figure out what to do with their lives after the camera crews have withdrawn.
“The end of 22 years of my life.”
Former Conservative justice secretary Dominic Grieve knows what it’s like to be a “big monster” swept across the waves by political upheaval.
An ardent Europhile and one of the key figures to leave the Conservative Party over his support for Brexit, he stood as an independent in Beaconsfield in 2019. He lost to Boris Johnson’s party by more than 15,000 votes.
“I knew the end was near, but these are difficult times,” Grieve said. I.
“It was the end of 22 years of my life. I’m pretty exhausted by this outcome. It’s going to take time to recover.”
Grieve spent months walking the Camino de Santiago, a pilgrimage route through northern Spain, to “shake off the political cobwebs” and discover the joys of spending more time with his family.
“Suddenly his wife said, ‘Oh, my husband is back.’ She was so happy after such an intense life through politics.”
Mr Grieve feels fortunate to be able to return to the practice of law as a barrister.
“I’ve been pretty lucky,” the 68-year-old says.
“It can ruin your career. If you’re a young MP you might be able to bounce back and do something else. But if you’re mid-career it can be disastrous. You get in trouble for trying to do something else.”
“I have 10 pounds left.”
Sweeney struggled financially and mentally after his heartbreaking defeat in 2019. The 30-year-old had only two months’ salary to fall back on, so in May 2020 he started claiming for Universal Credit.
“It was a pretty dark time. I suffered from anxiety and depression,” he recalls.
“I think it was unusual for a work coach to have access to a former member of parliament. [on universal credit]But many people are only a few months away from being in that position.”
Sweeney interviewed several times for business development roles in the shipbuilding industry. “I was probably a bit arrogant in thinking, ‘Oh, an ex-Congressman will be happy with me,’ but they didn’t care.”
Politics would prove to be his salvation during the most hellish of times. He ran for Labour in the May 2021 Holyrood election and became the Glasgow County Councillor. “I think I had about £10 left on the day I was elected,” he says.
Defeat is about to get a little sweeter: parliamentary authorities have decided to double severance pay, so MPs expelled this summer will receive four months’ pay instead of two, totalling around £20,000.
“I knew I was going to lose.”
Anna Soubry says it was a “relief” to leave politics when she lost her seat in 2019. But the former MP acknowledges she was lucky that both her daughters were old enough to have their own careers and had paid off her mortgage when her forced career change happened.
Mr Soubry, a former Conservative member who left the party to lead the anti-Brexit Leave group Change UK, came third in Broxtowe, more than 20,000 votes behind the Conservatives.
“I knew I was going to lose, but the magnitude of the loss hurt,” she said. I“It was a huge relief. My last few years as an MP had been very difficult. I was very unhappy. So I had no qualms about leaving Parliament. And I have never regretted leaving Parliament.”
Like Grieve, Soubry returned to his old life as a lawyer and spent the immediate aftermath of his election defeat helping staff find jobs.
Staff for the outgoing councillors will also be busy in their final days reaching out to constituents to see if they want to hand over current issues to their new representative. Old materials will have to be shredded. “I’ve been going around with some casework files. [to new MP Darren Henry] “That goes for me too,” Saubry said.
While her own departure was smooth, the former minister knows many MPs who were “devastated” by their defeat.
“They lose their status, their whole world falls apart. But it’s a game you choose to play in. You have to know you might not last five years.”
“Tattooed my brain”
Former Liberal Democrat councillor Tom Blake will never forget the figures that were tallied on election night in 2019, when he lost his Carshalton and Warrington seat to the Conservative candidate by just 629 votes.
“That number is etched in my brain,” the former House deputy speaker said. I.
“The day after the results came out I had to go and publish the results of a local Christmas card competition. It was a very strange experience, but it’s better to be out there than hiding.”
Blake found time to learn how to cook for his family and lived on his redundancy pay until he took up the role of director of the Unlock Democracy campaign group in October 2020.
But he said losing his salary, currently worth £91,000, would be a major concern for many MPs who stand to lose their seats this summer.
“Do you try to do something that’s fun or do you feel the need to do something that’s financially rewarding? I decided to look for something fun in campaign organizing, and I’m enjoying it just as much as I am being an MP.”
‘That’s life’
Gavin Barwell, the former Conservative MP who became Theresa May’s chief of staff in Downing Street just days after losing his Croydon Central seat to Labour in 2017, admits his transition has been unusually painless.
“It was disappointing because I loved being my hometown MP,” he says. I.
“I went home exhausted and slept for a few hours. I woke up on Friday afternoon to a flood of messages from friends saying, ‘I’m so sorry’. I thought, ‘What am I going to do?'”
“About 12 hours later, the Prime Minister called me and offered me a fantastic job. I never thought that would happen. Never in a million years would I think that would happen.”
Lord Barwell, who later became a peer, said those without ministerial experience could struggle to find new roles in the private or public sector.
He believes all political parties should show more “responsibility” in helping defeated MPs find work: “In a way MPs are like their own little company, but to some extent the party put them there, so there is a duty of care.”
Grieve disagrees, saying severance pay is “extremely reasonable” and most party members have an “informal network of members” who can help them find work.
But he acknowledges there were many difficult moments along the way: “When I left Parliament at the end, I was able to watch the swearing-in of the new MPs on the TV monitors. But that’s life, I guess.”
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