An accidental MP

by Bell, Martin

"'Frankly, it would have been easier to lose. At the back of my mind I had worked out a little concession speech which would have congratulated Neil Hamilton, paid tribute to my supporters and claimed some credit in so safe a seat for turning a procession into an election.' Tired of warfare, tired of the BBC, Martin Bell was looking for new challenges and failing to find them. He was then suggested as a candidate for Neil Hamilton's parliamentary constituency of Tatton - the fourth safest Conservative seat in the country." "After the most unusual and quixotic campaign of recent memory, Martin Bell was elected to Parliament by a landslide as an Independent - a species thought to have been extinct since 1950." "An Accidental MP is an account of that campaign and the fascinating years in Parliament that followed - constituency work, committee work and trying to find an independent place in the traditional structures of the House of Commons. It is a unique perspective on democracy, the rol