The former cabinet minister Sayeeda Warsi has resigned the Conservative whip, saying the party had moved too far to the right from when she was in government.
In a post on X, Warsi said: “It is with a heavy heart that I have today informed my whip and decided for now to no longer take the Conservative whip. This is a sad day for me. I am a Conservative and remain so but sadly the current party are far removed from the party I joined and served in Cabinet.
“My decision is a reflection of how far right my party has moved and the hypocrisy and double standards in its treatment of different communities. A timely reminder of the issues that I raise in my book Muslims Don’t Matter.”
After Warsi’s resignation, the Tories said the party had launched an investigation into the peer as a result of tweets about a court case where a protester had held a sign using derogatory languages about Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman, suggesting they were “coconuts”.
The protester who held up the sign, Marieha Hussain, was found not guilty of a racially aggravated public order offence on 13 September for her placard of Sunak and Braverman under a coconut tree. The prosecutor had suggested it was a racial slur meaning “you may be brown on the outside, but you are white on the inside”.
After Hussain’s acquittal, Warsi had posted a picture on X of herself drinking from a coconut and wished her “many congratulations”.
A Conservative party spokesperson said: “Complaints were received regarding divisive language allegedly used by Baroness Sayeeda Warsi. Baroness Warsi was informed an investigation was about to begin earlier this week.
“We have a responsibility to ensure that all complaints are investigated without prejudice.”
After the news about the party investigation, Warsi posted on X: “A court of law found Marieha Hussain not guilty. Whatever Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman think of that decision, that is the rule of law and they are not above the law.
“I was subsequently asked to delete my public support for Marieha – I refused to do so … The case was due to be conducted in private behind closed doors, I was not told who the complainant was and this is material considering the detail of bad faith practice the court heard about during the trial. I was also told I could not discuss the matter with others. It was effectively to be a secret retrial of the #coconuttrial … I was not prepared to accept this.
“I felt it appropriate in the circumstances to resign my whip and look forward to dealing with these issues openly and transparently in the coming weeks and months.”
Warsi, the former party chair, has been a longtime critic of the Tories, especially since Boris Johnson’s premiership, and has said in the past that the party had a problem with Islamophobia.