A petition calling on MP Jacqui Smith to leave her Redditch constituency is close to attracting the same amount of names as her parliamentary majority.
The disgraced former Home Secretary held on to her seat in the 2005 general election from Tory candidate Karen Lumley by just 2,716 votes – the smallest majority of any cabinet member at the time. Scott Preston, head of the Jacqui Out Now campaign, says the petition he launched two weeks ago has now received more than 2,000 names and is expected to reach the majority mark by the end of this week.
Mrs Smith resigned as Home Secretary ahead of a cabinet reshuffle last week but has vowed to stay on as Redditch MP.
Her resignation came after she was caught up in the parliamentary expenses scandal, where she claimed thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ cash in second home allowance for her Redditch property. She also repaid £10 after her husband claimed for watching two adult films on expenses.
Mr Preston, 31, said the fight to remove Mrs Smith would continue until she stands down and that she had become ‘an electoral liability’ after Labour lost 12 seats in the Worcestershire County Council elections last week to hold only three of the 57 serving councillors. “She can’t hold on for much longer now,” he said.
“Nobody is going to support her. We have had activists from the Labour Party saying they are fed up.”
