Robert Kilroy-Silk MP - Principled Eurosceptic and Rebel

The attacks against the character and supposed opportunism of the leader of the new Veritas party are entirely disproved by the report, linked here, with its detailedsurvey into the voting records of his period as an MP. The following is a brief extract:-

....As the table shows, these 53 (rebellious -ed) votes ranged across many different areas of policy.

Kilroy-Silk’s first ever rebellious vote occurred on the issue of Europe: in April 1974, he voted against the Second Reading of the Channel Tunnel Bill, his only rebellious vote of the short March-October Labour Government.

He also voted against direct elections to the European Parliament on no less than six occasions (plus opposing the two Second Reading votes of the twice-introduced European Assembly Elections Bill, which were both subject to a Labour free vote) and voted in favour of greater scrutiny of European Commission documents by Westminster’s Standing Committees.

In April 1975, he was also one of 145 Labour MPs who voted against a Government motion (on a free vote, but against frontbench advice) supporting Britain’s continued membership of the Common Market, following Foreign Secretary Jim Callaghan’s ‘renegotiation’ of the terms of membership.