'Jacob is extremely intelligent and compassionate'

Conservative Minister, Jacob Rees-Mogg, has apologised, after saying that if he'd been caught up in the Grenfell Tower fire, he would have ignored advice and fled the building.

In an LBC radio interview he said that would have been "the common sense thing to do". A group representing Grenfell survivors and bereaved families said the remarks were "beyond disrespectful".

But is this argument about a lot more than the stay put policy? Does it play to the idea - putting it bluntly - that posh Tories sneer at ordinary people?

A friend of Jacob Rees-Mogg, Conservative Parliamentary Candidate for North West Leicestershire Andrew Bridgen, told Evan Davis he was was "extremely intelligent and compassionate", but his comments were "uncharacteristically clumsy".

(Photo: Conservative MP Andrew Bridgen Credit: Getty Images)