Yahoo News Senior Welsh Tory criticises fellow Conservative MPs after losing his seat
Senior Tory MP Robert Buckland was damning of many of his fellow Conservatives MPs after losing his seat in Swindon where was first elected as the Member of Parliament in 2010. Llanelli-born Mr Buckland has held a number of cabinet roles including as Welsh Secretary.
He spoke to the media after losing his seat with the exit poll suggesting he will be just the first of many Tory big beasts to find themselves out of a job. The exit poll forecast Labour would have a majority of 170 seats and the Tories left with just 131 MPs.
Mr Buckland, the former MP for Swindon South, said it undoubtedly require a "long time" for the party to recuperate. When Kay Burley, presenter at Sky News, questioned him about the loss of his seat to Heidi Alexander, a prior Labour MP and present candidate, he retorted: "That's politics.... Kay." For the latest analysis of the biggest stories, sign up to the Wales Matters newsletter here
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H said, "I've lost before", adding, "I'm used to what defeat looks like". "My political life is not over," Mr Buckland asserted. "I've got causes close to my heart that I will be fighting for just as hard outside Parliament as I have inside."
In an interview with Laura Kuenssberg on the BBC he called on his party not to descend into a circus. He said: "I'm fed up with performance art politics. I've watched colleagues strike poses and write inflammatory op-eds instead of doing the job that they were elected to do. I've had enough of it. I want the Conservative Party to get back to the ethos of doing stuff well and being competent and not pretending to please the media.
"If we can get back to that then I think we've got more than a fighting chance at the next election but we need to do it quickly. And we need to wake up now.
"I think we've seen at this election astonishing ill discipline within the party. To see articles being written before a vote has been cast about the party heading for defeat and what the prognosis should be has been spectacularly unprofessional and ill disciplined. That's not the party I joined or have been an active member of for 40 years. I expect more from colleagues. And I expect colleagues in senior office to get a grip of their brief and portfolio and understand that politics is about hard choices. It's about doing the detail. The Prime Minister understands that.
"What is also missing is a narrative. What are saying, particularly to younger voters. What are we offering to younger voters about owning a home and having a share in the future of our country. Where has our ambition gone for the country. The Conservative Party is more than just a dessicated management machine. We should be representing with passion the hopes of the next generation."
Sir Robert told BBC Wales: "The truth is, we couldn't stop the tide here. When you look at the nature and scale of this defeat, it was clearly a clarion call for change and also frustration for many voters that key issues they cared about were not being addressed.
"The problem for the Conservative Party is we didn't find the language or the narrative in order to represent the aspirations, not just of people of the older generation vital though that is, but younger people and their wish to achieve a home of their own. The Conservative Party is going to have to rediscover that and go back to the drawing board."
He warned his colleagues about "veering off to an extreme" because that would let Labour in for many years. "The country deserves better than that," he said.
Asked who the next leader of the party would be, he said he had no idea. "I hope the party doesn't get obsessed in personalities," he said.
