A Conservative parliamentary election candidate has scorned a man for claiming he was working class at the same time as visiting a Costa Coffee shop.
Anthony Calvert, Tory contender for the marginal seat of Wakefield, West Yorkshire, tweeted about a previous encounter with a voter last week.
‘Man reconises me at #Wakefield Westgate [train station]. “These f*ckin Tories, always looking 2 trample on t’working class, like me”. Man walks into Costa,’ he wrote.
The missive was picked up after Calvert’s official selection, provoking a fierce response on social media.
And to add further embarrassment, Calvert was found to have once complained about the wait for coffee at luxury London hotel The Grosvenor, which he compared to another posh establishment nearby.
‘First class service and charm,’ he wrote of The Goring hotel. ‘10 mins waiting 4 coffee in Grosvenor (sic).’
Far from being a luxury preserve of wealthy neighbourhoods, Costa has made a point of establishing shops anywhere and everywhere, as a store locator map on its website proves.
And what’s more, Wakefield itself is home to three fully-fledged Costa shops and a couple of its vending machines.
The Yorkshire town is a marginal seat currently held by Labour’s Mary Creagh who will defend a 2,613 majority in June.
Creagh said Calvert’s “sneering tweet” proved she was the best choice for Wakefield.
Costa Coffee has yet to comment.
Coffee culture
Calvert’s comments about Costa come after Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said last month that an elite in “Islington... drink cappuccinos every day”.
Asked if he could represent working people as well as those well-off in north London, Corbyn said he was very proud to represent the constituency.
“It’s true, in Islington there are people who drink cappuccino every day,” he said, drawing laughs from the assembled crowd, before he adding that Islington was not immune from crippling social inequality.