Tory peer suspended from party whip after backing Lib Dems in EU elections

Another senior Conservative peer has been suspended from the party whip for pledging to vote Liberal Democrat in the European elections, after the punishment was imposed on the former deputy prime minister Michael Heseltine. Andrew Cooper, the founder of pollster Populus who was David Cameron’s director of strategy in Downing Street, tweeted: “I have come to the same conclusion as Michael Heseltine, for exactly the same reasons – and will be voting Lib Dem in Thursday’s European parliament elections.”