The UK Government’s new education minister Andrea Jenkyns says she stuck her middle finger up to a crowd she described as a “baying mob“, because she had reached the end of her tether
Footage on social media showed the MP making the rude gesture shortly before Boris Johnson’s resignation on Thursday.
She said that a group of protesters outside the gates were “insulting MPs… ” and that she should have shown more composure “but is only human”.
Andrea Jenkyns, the new education minister, giving the finger to the public outside Downing Street on Thursday pic.twitter.com/LhnoPoodV3
— Marina Hyde (@MarinaHyde) July 9, 2022
Tory ministers have hit out at the minister after she was filmed making the rude gesture
The Mail Online reports: Commons Leader Mark Spencer has said it is up to Ms Jenkyns to ‘justify’ her actions, whilst former science minister George Freeman slammed her conduct as ‘appalling’.
Mr Spencer, a former chief whip, added that he does not believe the gesture was ‘the right thing to do at all’.
After leaving Downing Street, Ms Jenkyns again confronted protesters, shouting: ‘He who laughs last, laughs the loudest…wait and see.’
However, her taunt was largely drowned out by a sea of boos and the Benny Hill theme tune, which had been ringing out from the speaker of notorious anti-Brexit protester Steve Bray, 53, for most of the day.
Mr Bray had earlier interrupted a live TV broadcast with the song, and was once again heard blaring out ‘Bye Bye Boris’, his modified rendition of Bay City Rollers classic, ‘Bye Bye Baby’.
Asked if Ms Jenkyns’ gesture was acceptable, Mr Spencer told BBC Breakfast: ‘No, I don’t think it is, to be honest. I don’t seek to condone that at all.
‘I mean, Andrea will have to… justify that for herself. But I do understand emotions were running pretty high and they were pretty raw on that day. But I don’t think that was the right thing to do at all.’
Pressed on whether she should retain her ministerial role, he said: ‘That’s not my decision.’
