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Veteran Tory MP Sir Christopher Chope is the honorary member of Jurassic Park, known as one of the most infamous dinosaurs in the House of Commons.

In 2021, The Guardian quoted an unnamed Conservative minister as stating: “He has been a Jurassic disgrace for many years… The man should retire…”

The blow was prompted by Sir Christopher’s objection to the suspension of former minister Owen Paterson, who was accused of a “flagrant” breach of lobbying rules.

But that was just one of countless examples of this die-hard Thatcherite’s dinosaur tendencies. He is known as the worst offender for blocking popular and widely supported private members’ bills.

A man of fame…

Now 77, after a spell as leader of Wandsworth council in south-west London, then the jewel in the crown of Tory local government, he became MP for Southampton Itchen during Margaret Thatcher’s 1983 landslide.

After a spell as junior minister, he lost that seat in 1992, but returned to the House of Commons in 1997 as MP for Christchurch, and after serving as an opposition front bencher, he later earned his reputation for prominence as a backbencher.

In 2013, for example, he referred to House of Commons dining room staff as “servants.” He became a leading climate change skeptic, was a hard Brexiteer and voted against gay marriage.

He supported the reintroduction of the death penalty, conscription, the privatization of the BBC and the public banning of the burqa.

But his most controversial acts have been blocking private members’ bills, including pardoning Alan Turing, banning wild animals in circuses, upskirting, protecting police dogs and horses, protecting girls from female genital mutilation, and criminalizing kidnapping cats.

…but now of modernity?

Yet last month the Conservatives nominated him to membership of the new Modernization Committee, set up by the government to “update procedures and improve standards” in the House of Commons.

The Tories justified the move by pointing to House of Commons Leader Lucy Powell saying she wanted “a wide range of views” on the committee.

Sir Christopher being on the committee was probably not what she had in mind.