Liar, liar, (Superman) pants on fire

I begin this post with a certain air of reluctance and resignation, because, I’m afraid - and apologies to my long-term readers who’ve heard his name far too many times - it concerns Andrew bl--dy Bridgen again.

For the admirably unanointed, who sensibly don’t pay much attention to fringe political figures (or lunatic fringe in this instance, but more on that later), Andrew Bridgen is an ex-Tory MP who supposedly had an awakening during covid - after first enthusiastically voting for both lockdowns and mandatory vaccinations - got kicked of the Tory party for comparing vaccines to the holocaust, and - so the story goes - joined “the resistance” instead.

Well, in a very loose and vague manner of speaking. He actually joined actor Laurence Fox’s spoof political party, ‘Reclaim’, which doesn’t take members or stand candidates (apart from three establishment celebrities, including the former editor of Loaded), nor allow any mechanism by which Fox can be voted out as leader, thereby making this ‘freedom’ party a de facto dictatorship.

The Reclaim Party is exclusively bankrolled by businessman, Jeremy Hosking, who has funnelled several million pounds into the largely inert operation since its inception in 2020, whilst the generous Mr Hosking is also a bankroller of Bridgen, and has lent his “mate“ over £4 million since 2020, in order to help settle a ferocious dispute Bridgen is having with his brother over turnips.

So, as you can see, these are very serious people.

If Bridgen’s misdemeanours amounted to nothing more than cosplaying as a crusading revolutionary in a fake party, whilst having raucous family rows about root vegetables, I wouldn’t have paid him much attention.

However, the nefarious nature of Bridgen’s activities came far more sharply into focus when, shortly after joining the Reclaim party (which he has subsequently left, reportedly due to a row over a car), he decided he needed £250,000 from the general public in order to sue someone for being mean to him on Twitter.

As that someone happened to be (former UK health secretary) Matt Hancock, and as public contempt for Hancock was at the time so high, Bridgen very successfully managed to relieve the public of a large percentage of this desired total: his fundraiser on the deeply dodgy Democracy 3.0 site, which is still open and accepting donations, currently sits at £173,432.

After falling out with the Reclaim team, whose Reclaim The Media company owns the Democracy 3.0 site, Bridgen subsequently began a second fundraiser, which is also still open for donations, and where he has currently raised over £72,000.

When I initially learned of Bridgen’s intentions to relieve the public of vast sums of money for a personal defamation suit, I felt obliged to raise the alarm about what I saw him doing, and why, and so, in May 2023, I sent him the following open letter (which he has publicly confirmed he has read).

In relation to the proposed defamation case, I said:

“Mr. Bridgen, I find your publicly stated efforts to “sue Matt Hancock for defamation” to be troubling. Naturally, I would like to be able to support everyone who is courageous enough to speak out against the harms done by the Covid injection, yet I singularly fail to see how raising £250,000 from the public for a defamation claim, as your fundraiser aims to do, is the best, most efficient, effective, or ethical way of doing this.

As I can only assume your legal team has advised you, suing someone for defamation is rarely straightforward or easy, and that a statement may be untrue or upsetting, does not necessarily make it defamatory. Many offensive statements are covered in law by the “honest opinion“ defence. If an insulting comment is presented as an honest opinion, then it rarely qualifies as defamation, even if untrue.

It is highly likely that, if this reaches court, Matt Hancock will invoke the “honest opinion” defence - that he will claim he honestly believes you are dangerous and disgusting and an anti-Semite - and that the law should not prevent him from expressing this opinion.

In fact, much as I deeply dislike Mr. Hancock as a person and as a politician, I agree with him on this: he should be allowed to freely express how he feels about you, just as you should be allowed to freely express how you feel about vaccines. Your fundraiser alleges to be about “protecting free speech”, but isn’t it merely seeking to suppress Mr. Hancock’s?

To quote from The Bad Law Project, who I believe sent your initial complaint to Mr. Hancock:

“Free speech includes not only the inoffensive but the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative … Freedom only to speak inoffensively is not worth having ... ”

So, were you to be successful in your lawsuit to stop Matt Hancock asserting offensive opinions, this would set a terrifying precedent: that offensive opinions are now illegal; that we cannot call an MP “dangerous and disgusting” (as I think most would agree many are) without risking being sued. That is not a precedent we ever want to see set. The whole point of free speech laws is that they apply to people we oppose saying things we don’t like. If they only applied to people we agree with saying nice things, they would be meaningless.

Please let me be very clear here: I believe that Mr. Hancock is guilty of serious crimes against humanity and should be tried before a judge and jury and, if found guilty, sent to prison for the rest of his life.

Yet that is not what “suing him for defamation” seeks to achieve, and I believe that public comprehension of the law and lawsuits is generally rather low (understandably so, because the law is often complex and opaque), meaning that many donating to you have not properly comprehended what you are actually fundraising for.

Not to send Hancock to prison.

Not to have him expelled from the Commons.

Simply a minor “slap on the wrist” for saying mean words - a penalty that, if he receives, could set a legal precedent and thus have the devastating corollary of curtailing free speech for everyone else, too (persons far less able to financially absorb the “hit” of paying damages than the very wealthy Hancock is).

I believe that public contempt for Hancock is so high, and people are so desperate to see Hancock properly held to account, that they have seen a drive alleging to “punish Matt Hancock” and immediately thrown money at it, failing to understand what it is that they are actually financing - and I believe that it is likely that you know this.

Could you therefore please confirm why you are crowdfunding for what is ultimately a rather frivolous campaign, that you in any case have a very slim chance of winning?”

---

Despite my letter being read and shared by many hundreds of people, all keen to hear Mr Bridgen’s answers to these rather urgent questions, and despite his declaring on a public video call that he could indeed answer them, three years later, he has not.

Hence, I was entirely unsurprised by the news I read in the papers yesterday that Bridgen has lost his defamation claim and Matt Hancock has won.

The Telegraph reports:

“Matt Hancock has won a Covid vaccine libel claim brought against him by a former Tory colleague.

The former health secretary became embroiled in legal action with Andrew Bridgen, the former Conservative MP, after Mr Hancock accused him of spreading “anti-Semitic” and “anti-scientific” conspiracy theories on social media.

Posting on X in January 2023, Mr Bridgen shared a link to an article about the side effects of Covid-19 vaccines, and said: “As one consultant cardiologist said to me this is the biggest crime against humanity since the Holocaust.”

Hours later, Mr Hancock wrote on X that “disgusting and dangerous antisemitic, anti-vax, anti-scientific conspiracy theories spouted by a sitting MP this morning are unacceptable and have absolutely no place in our society”.

This led Mr Bridgen to sue for libel, saying that people would believe him to be anti-Semitic.

In April last year, Mrs Justice Collins Rice, a High Court judge, ruled the case could go to trial, refusing Mr Hancock’s attempt to end the claim.

Mr Hancock then appealed against this decision at the Court of Appeal earlier this year.

On Wednesday, three judges ruled in Mr Hancock’s favour and granted him a summary judgment – a legal step which ends the claim without a trial...

In a statement following the decision, Mr Hancock said: “This judgment confirms what should have been obvious: this case should never have been brought.

“The judgment is a clear finding in defence of free speech. The court has concluded that the case against me has no prospect of success.

“This decision matters. People must be free to state their own opinions without fear of libel action.

“I was right to call out what I clearly saw were anti-vax and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, and this judgment reaffirms that right.”

---

This mirrors exactly what I said in my letter to Bridgen three years ago: that his attempts to sue Hancock for defamation were not about protecting free speech, but rather about suppressing it, whilst not in any way holding Hancock accountable for his behaviour throughout the covid debacle.

As I explained to Bridgen in the letter, and as he would already have been abundantly aware, even if Hancock had been found guilty, all that would have happened is his being issued a fine and a telling off: perhaps a demand he issue a public apology for any reputational damage done to Bridgen.

That’s it. No prison sentence. No termination of employment. Nothing more than a minor inconvenience which, for someone as wealthy as Hancock (estimated net worth, around £5 million), would be more or less akin to paying a parking fine. Indeed, the sum Bridgen was seeking from Hancock - £100,000 - is considerably less than the amount Bridgen himself has already raised in donations.

Bridgen nevertheless claimed that the possibility of such a victory, however remote, was worth pursuing, because he would then give the damages paid by Hancock “to the vaccine injured”.

Yet as he has lost (which was always by far the most likely outcome), he has unsuccessfully gambled with huge sums of other people’s money, and the vaccine injured have got nothing.

Hancock, meanwhile, has received £40,000 of this money, which Bridgen was ordered to pay to him at an earlier point in the trial, and this likely eventuality was also something I cautioned about in my letter. I said:

“If you lose your case (as you likely will), where will all the £250,000 you have raised end up?

Mr. Hancock has already publicly confirmed that, if he wins, he will seek to recover “all costs” (including loss of earnings?), so we know for a start a sizeable chunk will end up with him. Does the donating public understand this and is it not your duty to make this clear to them before they part with their money?“

In the aftermath of his crushing and entirely predictable defeat, Bridgen is, of course, claiming subterfuge: that he was stitched up and the courts are corrupt, which begs the question of why he is now seeking to spend even more time - and more to the point, other people’s money - protesting in them.

In a highly theatrical video clip, replete with lots of frowns, sighs, and long pauses to show he’s really serious, Bridgen promises to “put his big boy pants on” - his ‘Superman knickers’, no less - and “keep fighting”.

What this means is that he will require even more money from the general public in addition to the more than £244,000 he has already had.

In his recent video (and the hammy over-acting is just about worth five minutes of your time), Bridgen once again pleads poverty and reminds the viewer what he has supposedly sacrificed for the cause, claiming to have lost lots of money, and his wife, who he says left him.

This flies in the face of the facts, which are that Bridgen possesses (as described by the aforementioned wife) a “go-to multi-millionaire” in the shape of Jeremy Hosking, who gave Bridgen more than £4 million between 2020 and 2023, whilst, according to a 2024 interview given to The Times newspaper, Bridgen’s wife did not leave him, but was rather “abandoned” by him, along with their young child, thus rendering them homeless.

Bridgen disputes these claims, and whilst neither party can be trusted to be a completely reliable narrator where it comes to acrimonious relationship breakdown, it remains a matter of recorded fact that Bridgen has had access to the millions of Jeremy Hosking in the recent past, and so claims of poverty and destitution on his part are, at best, highly exaggerated, if not wholly fabricated.

On the subject of fabrication, Bridgen has already been exposed as an accomplished liar, who lied to a high court judge under oath, and was branded by that judge so dishonest, that nothing he says can be taken at face value. The judge also labelled him abusive, aggressive, and arrogant.

It was the fallout from this case, and the huge sums Bridgen was left owing in legal fees, that coincided with his “awakening”, and bailing out by multi-millionaire Jeremy Hosking, so a cynic (or a conspiracist) might conclude that, far from suddenly discovering a moral compass, Bridgen was, is, and always has been primarily motivated by money, and so, when he was offered a princely sum by Mr Hosking in return for cosplaying as a crusading ‘conspiracy theorist’ hero (replete with Superman underwear), he eagerly accepted.

This theory is further strengthened by the fact that - despite having access to the millions of Hosking - Bridgen insists the general public must pay for his frivolous, futile quest to sue Matt Hancock for saying mean words.

Bridgen is an actor and a conman, and he is simply manipulating, distracting, and draining the truth movement of time, energy, and resources, in order to lead it to relentless dead ends, because that is what controlled opposition figures are tasked with doing.

As I wrote in an article entitled ‘The Conspiracy Tax‘:

“Just like the National Lottery promises easy riches, but in reality makes poor people poorer (so it’s a tax on the poor), these high-profile, MSM-promoted, controlled opposition characters going to court promising to “expose the truth” and “get justice”, are in reality simply giving your money to the enemy.

We should all know better than to ever fund such cases because we all know that the courts are completely corrupt.

These are the same courts, after all, that openly order the execution of children, overruling the wishes of their families and experts around the world who offer to treat them.

Do we therefore expect anyone, especially a “state dissident”, to get a fair trial in these places? ...

So, put simply, these high-profile court cases involving conspiracy theorists are nothing but wealth transfers from people who believe they are challenging the state by calling out hoaxed events, to that very state and its bad actors...

That’s a key purpose of these high-profile show trials. To trick conspiracists into bankrolling the very state actors they are trying to expose.

Remember the Simon Dolan debacle... This wealthy businessman took nearly half a million pounds from the public to “take the government to court” over lockdown, and got absolutely nowhere. A lot of very rich establishment lawyers got a lot richer though.

And it’s all by design, because whilst illegitimate actors hoover up whatever spare money conspiracists may have, they succeed in keeping real grassroots opposition movements, which desperately need funding to have any real impact, starved of resources and therefore unable to have any real sway.”

Andrew Bridgen has taken more than £244,000 from the public for his pointless show trial, that he has now lost, which means all the money has been lost too.

Imagine what impact that kind of funding could have had if invested in genuine projects?

We could have billboards in major cities warning of vaccine dangers; we could arrange nationwide screenings of key documentaries; we could facilitate huge leafletting campaigns disseminating vital information to thousands of households. Or the money could have - as Bridgen cynically promised it would be, if he won his case - given straight to those dealing with severe vaccine injury to help them heal and rebuild their lives.

Instead, we have hammy acting from a cosplaying conman talking about his underwear, and a handful of rich lawyers who have got richer.

And, of course, a smug Matt Hancock jubilantly celebrating his success.

This whole trial has been a cynical, mocking trick, performative political theatre from two former colleagues, with the purpose of keeping the “truth movement” inactive and neutralised. We are relentlessly given these grand promises from showboating, self-appointed heroes that “justice is coming”, “trust the plan”, etc., which are ultimately just the same kind of empty promises politicians give in the run up to an election, only to abandon them once they’re in power.

The reality is that no superhero is coming to save us (particularly not one who spent more than a decade as a Tory MP), and if we want change, we’ve got to get active and make it happen ourselves.

We can’t control actors on the world stage or compete with the vast resources they have at their disposal, but we can exert influence at the local level and in the real world, by sharing information, networking and supporting each other, and creating the kind of communities we want to live in, regardless of what the corrupted and captured are up to on-screen.

The reason lockdowns were enacted, the reason the world’s governments went to such great lengths to separate us from each other and stop us from congregating together in the real world, is that they know that’s where our real power lies. Not on Zoom calls, not in perennially monitored and manipulated online exchanges, and not in captured courtrooms, but in the offline, uncontrolled, real world.

Instead of donating more money to wealthy ex-Tory MPs for pointless show trials they’ve already lost, we should instead invest in areas that can really make a difference - supporting local independent businesses; printing leaflets sharing information; organising meet-ups and events; even just taking a friend out for a drink (there’s a reason the overlords are so hellbent on collapsing pubs in particular). All these things are far more revolutionary and impactful than outsourcing our power to people like Andrew Bridgen - no matter what kind of pants he’s wearing.

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