Conservative MP Dan Poulter defects to Labour in the latest blow to Rishi Sunak – as ex-health minister says he found it ‘increasingly difficult to look his NHS colleagues in the eye’ while being a Tory

Conservative MP Dan Poulter has defected to Labour in the latest blow to Rishi Sunak’s government. 

The ex-health minister, who works part time as a doctor, said he found it ‘increasingly difficult to look his NHS colleagues in the eye’ while being a Tory. 

He claimed the Conservatives were no prioritising public services, adding that the part no longer had a ‘compassionate view about supporting the more disadvantaged in society’. 

He told The BBC: ‘I found it increasingly difficult to look my NHS colleagues in the eye, my patients in the eye, and my constituents in the eye with good conscience.’

‘The difficulty for the Conservative Party is that the party I was elected into valued public services… it had a compassionate view about supporting the more disadvantaged in society.

‘I think the Conservative Party today is in a very different place.’

Conservative MP Dan Poulter who announced he has defected to Labour in the latest blow to Rishi Sunak ‘s government

The MP confirmed he will sit as a Labour MP until the General Election, when he will then stand down from his role. 

Mr Poulter won a 23,391 majority in his constituency of Central Suffolk and North Ipswich in the 2019 General Election.