Boris Johnson fanboy and former Downing Street aide to Theresa May is trying to clean up his act ahead of parliamentary selections
Tory councillor Mario Creatura, for many years the “gobby factotum” to Gavin Barwell when he was a Conservative MP and later when they worked in Downing Street, looks like he’s preparing to quit Croydon altogether.
Erased: Mario Creatura was a big fan of adulterer, liar and crook Boris Johnson, Until yesterday
After more than two-and-a-half years, Boris Johnson fanboy Creatura has finally removed from his Twitter account his “pinned” tweet that commemorated how, in December 2019 when the Tories were sweeping all before them as their party leader conned huge swathes of the country over Brexit, he was an abject failure as a parliamentary candidate, unable to win back Croydon Central for the Tories.
Creatura’s pinned tweet included an image of him smarming up to Johnson – something which even in the Conservative Party no longer carries the positive connotations that the Coulsdon Town councillor might have once imagined.
Croydon Tory insiders suggest that Creatura has wiped Johnson off the top of his Twitter account to avoid any unwanted negative associations, as the Westminster wannabe gets himself ready to appeal to local party members when they get round to selecting their parliamentary candidates.
Erased: After two-and-a-half years, Creatura has finally removed his pinned tweet, as all reminders of association with Blo-Jo are gradually removed
But that won’t be in Croydon.
Croydon Tories still blame Creatura for not only failing to win back Croydon Central, but also for the electoral disaster suffered a month earlier, in November 2019, after he drafted in the crooked cult church, SPAC Nation, installing one of their young pastors as a candidate in the Fairfield council ward by-election.
SPAC Nation’s dodgy practices, including multiple cases of fraud and serious allegations of abuse, came to light in the middle of that campaign, following Inside Croydon reports.
Overnight, Creatura’s parliamentary campaign came unstuck, too, as he immediately lost the dozens of willing leaflet-deliverers he had got on-side from SPAC Nation.
On Blo-Jo’s big election day, Labour’s Sarah Jones polled more than 50per cent of the vote in the hitherto marginal constituency of Croydon Central, as Creatura’s candidacy saw a 3per cent swing against the Conservatives.
The former rising star of Croydon Conservatives has spent the last couple of years being given the non-job at the Town Hall as Jason Perry’s chief whip, the equivalent of being told to sit on the naughty step, and not to be trusted with any of the cabinet briefs.
Because of boundary changes expected to be confirmed next year, Croydon seems likely to get a fourth parliamentary seat (the borough will “acquire” bits of election territory from neighbouring authorities in the re-jig). But it seems Creatura won’t be seeking selection to contest any of them.
Last night, Creatura was alongside Mayor Perry at the first “in-person” annual meeting since 2019 of the Coulsdon West Residents’ Association. A Coulsdon councillor since 2014, Creatura has never actually lived in the area he has represented.
And now he has his three-bedroom detached family house in Addiscombe up for sale (for a cool £725,000).
Any move out of Croydon should not affect his status as a Town Hall councillor, unless or until he chooses to stand down.
More likely, Creatura will see through the four-year term collecting his £23,813.80 per year “special” allowances, to supplement the no-doubt generous salary he gets as a director at Dentons Global Advisors – “an independent strategic advisory firm that provides integrated, multidisciplinary counsel and support for clients facing complex challenges that span legal, reputational, financial, geopolitical, regulatory and governance dimensions”, since you ask.
The smart money is that Creatura is sniffing around the safe Tory territory of Reigate, where veteran MP Crispin Blunt announced in May that he would be standing down at the next General Election.
Close to power: Mario Creatua (second row, behind Blo-Jo) at the 2019 party conference in Manchester when introducing SPAC Nation’s Jayde Edwards (left) as a Conservative candidate
For the members of that particular Conservative association, or any others where the “former
- Tory Creatura accused of homophobic and racist prejudice
- Businesses furious over Tory’s Christmas lights blame game
- Coulsdon councillors distance themselves from plotter Morgan
- Parliamentary standards commissioner rebukes MP Barwell
- Tory leader Perry shows ruthless streak by sacking Creatura
- Creatura shows his contempt for public by backing Cummings
- ‘It’s like Rotherham’: MP Reed calls for urgent action on SPAC
- Creatura accused of breaking privacy rules over video
- The Creatura Files (Pt 1): Tories breaking data laws (again)
- Tory leadership rivals express contempt for Barwell’s team
- Prime Minister’s SPAD accused of using data scraping dark arts
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So Creatura is cutting and running from the mundanity of local politics for a career in global reputation management and risk. Blimey don’t know what due diligence this offshoot of the biggest legal company in the world has done, but perhaps the strategy is that they have hired someone who has made every political mistake in the book and so he has the solid experience, never to repeat them all over again, Don’t really know if they have a done full psychological profile though, so despite all the big talk, smoozing and contacts (which don’t look so good today) we all know in Croydon that there is a massive ego and a short fuse to light to see the tetchiness and hubris, which inevitably lead to poor judgement and just plain wrong headedness in the public sphere no matter how big his bitcoin collection is about to become.