Tory Minister Mike Freer Quits Politics Over Safety Fears

Conservative minister Mike Freer has announced he is quitting Westminster politics following a series of death threats and an attack on his office last month.

The MP said he has received “several serious threats to my personal safety” since being elected to represent Finchley and Golders Green in north London in 2010.

The 63-year-old justice minster has said previously he narrowly missed a meeting with Ali Harbi Ali, who murdered fellow Tory MP David Amess, at his constituency office, and has since worn a stab vest at public events in the area.

The MP has said he was first targetted by a group called Muslims Against Crusades in 2011, who said the stabbing of Labour MP Stephen Timms should be “piercing reminder” to politicians that “their presence is no longer welcome in any Muslim area”.

He told The Daily Mail a suspected arson attack at the constituency office in December was “the last straw”.

In a statement posted on X, Freer said the events had “weighed heavily on me and my husband, Angelo”, and that “serious incidents are alongside the many ‘low level’ incidents”.

The MP, who has pro-Israel views and represents a heavily Jewish constituency, said: “No MP can operate effectively without the support of their spouse and wider family. Sadly the serious incidents place intolerable stress on them too.”

Freer is among a series of Tory MPs who have announced their intention not to stand at the next election, which is expected this year.

In the last decade, Amess and Labour MP Jo Cox were both murdered in their constituencies, and Timms survived being stabbed by an al Qaeda sympathiser in 2010.

“There comes a point when the threats to your personal safety become too much,” Freer said in the interview with the Mail.