A CAMPAIGN to oust under fire Julie Kirkbride as the sitting Tory MP for Bromsgrove, following serious allegations over her second home expenses, is gathering pace.

A public meeting, to which the 48-year old MP has been invited to speak, is set to take place on Sunday. Following the launch of the Julie Must Go campaign on May 20, activists in front of the TV cameras, took to the High Street on Saturday urging shoppers to sign a petition calling for her resignation.

In a little over three hours 1,200 people had signed.

The campaign has now been widened to include the villages of Stoke Prior, Hagley and elsewhere in the district. Later on Saturday the number signing had reached more than 3,500.

Yesterday morning (Tuesday) the Facebook group had clocked up close on 1,000 members. Miss Kirkbride meanwhile maintains the campaign is being organised by her political opponents Louise Marnell, from Sidemoor, who chairs the campaign, said that they were delighted at Saturday’s response from the public and revealed that disenchanted voters elsewhere in Britain are looking to Bromsgrove with a view to setting up similar campaigns.

Denying that they are conducting a witch hunt or vendetta, Louise said: “It is called democracy. This is civic responsibility in action. The people of Bromsgrove have given birth to mechanisms for making politicians accountable. Bromsgrove has set an example for the whole country to follow, the tide has turned and is unstoppable.”

Campaign leaders are now urging constituents to attend a mass public meeting in Sanders Park at 2pm on Sunday, May 31, to which Miss Kirkbride has been invited to speak in order to give her side of the story, which has received extensive media coverage.

Campaigners plan to present her with the petition on the day.

However, if she does not attend, they will hand it in to Bromsgrove Conservative Association offices in Worcester Road at noon on Monday, June 1.

Miss Kirkbride yesterday (Tuesday) declared that she will not be present on Sunday as she has a prior engagement.

She added that she will not hold her own public meeting as she is ‘currently concentrating on the forthcoming county council elections and that campaign.’