Tag Archives: conservative party

“They’re all mad, swivel-eyed loons”: a top Tory on the Tories

By Stephen Tall | Sat 18th May 2013 - 12:15 pm

Here’s the remark attributed to ‘a member of the Prime Minister’s inner circle’ according to the Telegraph:

“There’s really no problem,” the Conservative figure said about the parliamentary turmoil. “The MPs just have to do it because the associations tell them to, and the associations are all mad swivel-eyed loons.”

There is an obvious point here (and it’s the reason why whoever said it will soon be resigned): don’t diss your own supporters. ‘Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican,’ was Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment. It was as …

Posted in News | Also tagged featured and tim farron | 12 Comments

A Tory-Ukip pact? Up to you, guys. But you do know there’s an easier way, right?

By Stephen Tall | Mon 6th May 2013 - 3:35 pm

Ukip’s spectacular showing at last week’s local elections has got the Tories spooked. The full realisation is sinking in that this may not be a one-off eruption of popular protest.

Nigel Farage’s band of modern-life-is-rubbish disciples will likely top next year’s Euro polls. Such momentum may propel them towards a double-digit general election performance in 2015. If so, the Tories’ hope of a majority is dead: Ed Miliband will become prime minister as leader of the largest single party.

Though the local elections were scarcely a bundle of laughs for …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged ConservativeHome, featured, nigel farage, tim bale and ukip | 47 Comments

Nick Clegg MP writes… The Labour and Tory exodus

By Nick Clegg MP | Mon 29th April 2013 - 12:50 pm

Something is happening on the centre ground of British politics. An exodus. The Conservative leadership is being lured to the right. Ed Miliband is pulling his party to the left. Only the Liberal Democrats are holding firm.

That creates an opportunity for our party. Over the last twenty years the centre has become a crowded place. First New Labour pitched up, determined to demonstrate a new found credibility on the economy. Then followed a detoxified Conservative Party, hugging hoodies and frolicking with huskies. Yet now – in what, in time, may prove to be a highly significant political shift – the …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged ed miliband, european convention on human rights, featured, labour party, new labour and tony blair | 80 Comments

A reply to Dan Hodges: why it’s not surprising some Tories aren’t bothered about winning in 2015

By Stephen Tall | Fri 29th March 2013 - 4:10 pm

The Telegraph’s token Labour blogger Dan Hodges has a typically punchy post today – Do the Tories actually want to win in 2015? – highlighting the fatalism of some Tory MPs who think victory next time is possible but not worth it:

Hardly worth it? What, just managing to scrape a win at the next election, just managing to govern for another five years, just managing to drive through your agenda on health care reform, welfare reform, education reform, etc?

The Conservative Party is currently in the middle of the biggest

…

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged alex massie, daily telegraph, dan hodges, featured, labour party and party membership | 9 Comments

Julian Huppert MP writes…..The Preamble, 25 years on

By Julian Huppert MP | Sun 3rd March 2013 - 3:30 pm

25 years ago, our party agreed its new constitution – and the preamble to that constitution, setting out our core values and vision.

Many of us will know some of it – ‘The Liberal Democrats exist to build and safeguard a fair, free and open society, … in which no one shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance, or conformity’.

This extract – the bit that appears on membership cards – is in my view truly poetic, and captures brilliantly what we are trying to do. We are concerned about people, and empowering them to do what they can and want to do. …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged constitution, labour party and liberal democrats | 54 Comments

George Bridges: my part in the Tories’ downfall. As a Lib Dem, I approve this message

By Stephen Tall | Wed 21st November 2012 - 8:25 am

There’s a fascinating article today in the Telegraph by George Bridges: The Tories have gone astray – and I helped. Who’s George Bridges, you ask? Here’s his summary of his political career to date:

First a researcher for the Conservative Party machine, then a tour of duty in the bunker of No 10 for the last three Major years, followed by a few years advising Michael Howard and David Cameron.

It’s a hefty 1,000-word ‘Consevatism: my part in its downfall’ mea culpa, and it’s fascinating in two ways.

First, for its call to arms for Conservatives to ignore the polling …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged george bridges | 8 Comments

Chris Heaton-Harris and the Tories’ discipline problem

By Nick Thornsby | Thu 15th November 2012 - 9:40 am

One of the increasingly notable (and in many ways remarkable) things about the coalition is the stark difference in the levels of party unity and discipline in the two parties. While Liberal Democrat MPs and members have committed – often selflessly – to the implementation of the coalition agreement, the same cannot be said of the increasingly fractious Conservative party. Old wounds over Europe have clearly not healed, and the salt of equal marriage and the prime minister’s commitment that this should be the greenest government ever are making many on the Conservative fringes increasingly uncomfortable.

Posted in News | Also tagged chris heaton-harris and featured | 1 Comment

LibLink: Menzies Campbell – Europe is the glass jaw of the Tory party. It has taken a hit

By NewsHound | Mon 5th November 2012 - 4:54 pm

In the Independent, Sir Menzies Campbell gives his perspective on the latest Tory shenanighans on Europe:

Europe is the glass jaw of the Tory party. Some of their dissidents have been heard to say that Mr Cameron should behave like Margaret Thatcher. But it was her “No, no, no” to Europe which was the straw that

Posted in LibLink | Also tagged david cameron and european union | 3 Comments

Paul Tyler writes: Progress postponed

By Paul Tyler | Wed 10th October 2012 - 12:56 pm

There was no talk this year of banning champagne at the Conservative Party Conference. Perhaps there was no danger of exuberance among delegates. As recalcitrant Tories sought one-in-the-eye against Nick Clegg by erasing Lords Reform from the Coalition Agreement, their party’s treasured redrawing of the UK electoral map was duly jettisoned too. Without a stronger second chamber to challenge the executive, it would have been wrong to reduce the size of the House of Commons, thereby increasing the proportionate dominance of the government’s ‘payroll’ within it.

Clearly, the failure of the most comprehensive attempt to reform the composition of the Lords …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged house of lords, lords reform and paul tyler | 3 Comments

“Tory membership in crisis” – Independent

By Mark Pack | Mon 30th July 2012 - 12:43 pm

Today’s Independent reports:

Three-quarters of local Conservative associations are losing activists as the party suffers a recruitment crisis which has seen membership halve since David Cameron became leader.

The latest estimates put Conservative membership at between 130,000 and 170,000, compared with almost 300,000 shortly after Mr Cameron succeeded Michael Howard…

Posted in News | Also tagged party membership | 27 Comments

Lords reform: did we really expect any better of either the Tories or Labour?

By Stephen Tall | Tue 26th June 2012 - 9:10 pm

All three main political parties fought the 2010 election promising the electorate that, if elected, they would reform the House of Lords. All three promised the same in 2005, too. And 2001. Yet in 2012 only one party is staying true to that promise: the Lib Dems. The Tories and Labour, in contrast, are happily indulging in party politics to block progress in advancing legislative democracy.

The Conservatives living up to their anti-reform name…

The Conservative Party has fought the last three elections promising to introduce a mainly/wholly elected second chamber to replace the current House of Patronage. They signed up …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged benedict brogan, coalition agreement, ed miliband, featured, house of lords, labour party, LabourList, lords reform and mark ferguson | 25 Comments

Europe Day Special: Avoiding the slippery slopes towards euroscepticism

By Sir Graham Watson MEP and Andrew Wigley | Wed 9th May 2012 - 11:56 am

Today is Europe Day. The Treaty of Rome, the EU’s founding treaty was signed 55 years ago; post war Europe sought a new strategy to end old enmities and forge shared prosperity through economic growth. However one measures the achievements of those goals, the conclusion has to be the European Union has delivered on both counts.

For those of us who believe in the EU’s objectives and feel that Britain should be leading in Europe, these are turbulent times.

Restoring faith in a political structure which may appear removed from the citizen, and rebuilding an economic framework which has been proven inadequate …

Posted in Europe / International and Op-eds | Also tagged eu, europe, europe day, euroscepticism and ukip | 10 Comments

When did the Tories stop supporting Lords reform?

By Stephen Tall | Wed 9th May 2012 - 8:45 am

From all the debate and angst within the Tory party over the issue of House of Lords reform you’d imagine the plan to inject an element of democracy into the UK parliament had been foisted on David Cameron by sneakily obsessive Liberal Democrats.

Yet the reality is somewhat different. The Coalition Government’s pledge to overhaul the revising chamber (after Labour’s successive, botched failures) built on Tory promises to the electorate over a decade or more — recognising perhaps that such reform is in fact in their own interests.

Here’s what the Tory manifesto said as far back as 2001:

In

…

Posted in News | Also tagged coalition agreement, constitutional reform, house of lords and lords reform | 12 Comments

Dear Conservative MPs, Re House of Lords reform here’s what your manifesto & the Coalition Agreement say

By Stephen Tall | Fri 20th April 2012 - 9:35 am

It’s almost enough to make you feel sorry for Conservative MPs — it appears some of them have only just read their own party’s manifesto and the Coalition Agreement they signed up to. That can be the only explanation for the sudden fit of vapours which have apparently afflicted three of their number over the issue of House of Lords reform.

So as a reminder to them, and as a service to their Tory colleagues, here’s a reminder of the Conservative Party’s promise to the people back in 2010 in its manifesto:

We will work to build a consensus for a

…

Posted in News | Also tagged coalition agreement, house of lords and parliamentary reform | 11 Comments

The Tories’ and Labour’s collective tax omnishambles

By Stephen Tall | Wed 18th April 2012 - 8:55 pm

Labour is against reducing the 50p top-rate tax to 45p for those earning more than £150,000. What could be clearer? As it happens, quite a lot could be clearer.

First, the omnishambles…

Given how widely predicted George Osborne’s decision to reduce the top-rate was you would have thought Labour would have anticipated it and worked out their line. They failed to — as Mark Pack noted here, Labour’s Shadow Business Secretary Chuka Umunna contradicted himself within 24 hours, while Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls declined to declare his hand.

When Labour did …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged featured, george osborne, labour party, nick clegg, tax cuts (Lib Dem) and taxes | 3 Comments

Opinion: we can not allow ourselves to be used as scapegoats by the Tories

By Issan Ghazni | Wed 18th April 2012 - 3:25 pm

It was an amazing coincidence that Lady Warsi’s interview on BBC2′s Newsnight spoke so lamentably about the state of the coalition the evening before YouGov put the Tories 11 points behind Labour. The Conservative Party chairman without hesitation accused us of being immature and failing to accept collective responsibility within the coalition.

Patrick Wintour’s article in yesterday’s Guardian highlights the despicable manner in which Lady Warsi, as a cabinet member showed no loyalty to her coalition partners by putting the boot in as soon as the going got tough and the Tories started struggling in the opinion polls.

The whole episode …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged fraser nelson, guardian, human rights, nick clegg, patrick wintour, sayeeda warsi, tim farron and vince cable | 7 Comments

LibLink: Chris Rennard – David Cameron wants nothing less than Tory hegemony

By Paul Walter | Mon 27th February 2012 - 12:54 pm

On the Guardian’s Comment is Free, Chris Rennard warns that Libdems should beware becoming part of a grand plan to secure permanent Conservative domination:

Thirteen years of opposition were especially painful for those Tories who formed their political opinions in the years when Margaret Thatcher appeared to reign supreme. Opposition from 1997 was humiliating and served to increase the fiercely competitive instincts of the Cameron circle. Time in opposition helped them to plan to try and ensure that, if Labour let them win back power, they would never lose again – even with historically low levels of support for the

…

Posted in LibLink | Also tagged liberal democrats | 9 Comments

10 things you might not have known about party political funding over the last decade

By Stephen Tall | Sat 25th February 2012 - 6:55 pm

The Electoral Commission website is a data-mine of information for those interested in all aspects of party political funding.

For those who’d rather not get their hands dirty doing the mining themselves, below you’ll find 10 interesting (in my opinion) facts I discovered there.

But for those of you interested in excavating further, I’ve uploaded Google spreadsheets of the three main parties’ donations received between 2001 and 2011 (incl.):

Liberal Democrat donations, 2001-11;

Labour party donations, 2001-11;

Conservative party donations, 2001-11.

And here are those 10 interesting facts I promised you…

1) In total, the Lib Dems raised £33,742,984 in donations from 2001-11. This compares with £173,742,956 for the Labour Party, and £182,418,146 for the Conservatives.

Posted in News | Also tagged donations, donations (Lib Dem), featured, fundraising and labour party | 15 Comments

Liberal Unionism in 2012

By William Hobhouse | Fri 13th January 2012 - 4:00 pm

There’s no escaping history in our party, and current debates of nationalism, unionism and secession should prompt Liberal Democrats to delve back into the Gladstonian past.

The Liberal Party split over the Union. Gladstone favoured Home Rule for Ireland, Liberal Unionists didn’t, and ultimately joined the Conservative Party. This cemented the Conservative Party as the party of the Union, and it is a position the Conservative Party still holds.

The purpose of this article is, however, to challenge the Conservative Party’s stranglehold over being British.

The existing Conservative argument goes that a Conservative Britain is a Britainthat stands proud and takes no nonsense …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged european union, home rule, scottish independence and snp | 26 Comments

Haggis, Neeps and Liberalism special: Dramatic independence referendum duel in London and Edinburgh

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 11th January 2012 - 3:58 pm

It’s been a torrid few days in Scottish politics.

Since the SNP won an overall majority in the Holyrood elections last year, there has been much talk of the independence referendum they pledged to have in the second half of their term. They have been tight-lipped on their plans.

There has been uncertainty on the legality of such a referendum. Even respected legal blogger Lallands Peat Worrier, himself an SNP supporter, has expressed that the terms of the Scotland Act may not allow it. And amid all the bluster of this blog post from senior SNP strategist Stephen Noon is …

Posted in News and Scotland | Also tagged alex salmond, david cameron, haggis neeps liberalism, labour party, Michael Moore, nick clegg, Scottish independence referendum and snp | 17 Comments

Opinion: The Tory Party has mutated. It is for us to say Europe is our hope for the future

By Antony Hook | Tue 20th December 2011 - 12:53 pm

David Cameron’s renunciation of a Treaty not even yet fully negotiated was the culmination of a process that began around 1992.

In 1992 a small group of Tory ultras, “the Maastricht Rebels”, began fighting their party’s traditional pro-Europeanism. It has taken 19 years to make their fringe views a normal Conservative Party and conservative press position. 1992 has led to 2011 like a river flows to the sea.

Anti-Europeanism’s hold on a major political movement has caused a poorly informed anti-Europeanism to take hold among many of our fellow citizens in the UK, as it has among some of …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged european union | 25 Comments

Nick Clegg – Europe: Britain is stronger, better, greater when we lead

By Helen Duffett | Mon 12th December 2011 - 3:17 pm

Nick Clegg has emailed party members this afternoon, following the EU summit last Thursday:

Support for Europe has always been a cornerstone of what our party stands for. Recent days have been tough for pro-Europeans in our country, but I am clear that it is in Britain’s national interest to remain at the heart of Europe.

As I have made clear since Friday, I am bitterly disappointed by the outcome of last weeks summit, which ended with the UK in a minority of one. There is now a real danger that over time the UK will be isolated and marginalised within the

…

Posted in Europe / International and News | Also tagged european union and nick clegg | 22 Comments

Tim Farron MP writes… EU referendum: the Conservatives are not acting out of patriotism

By Tim Farron MP | Mon 24th October 2011 - 12:53 pm

This is not likely to win me any votes, but I am proudly pro-Europe and in favour of our continued membership of the EU. That doesn’t make me an apologist for every aspect of the EU: the EU could definitely operate more transparently, efficiently and effectively, and we as Liberal Democrats should say so more often and with more conviction.

Nevertheless, our main challenge has to be to win hearts and minds in favour of our broader membership of the EU, and reverse the completely poisonous anti-European narrative. So many of those who were so indignant this summer about Mr Murdoch’s …

Posted in Europe / International and Op-eds | Also tagged av referendum, European referendum and rupert murdoch | 36 Comments

What do you think was the second most important reason why people didn’t vote Tory in the Cotswolds?

By Mark Pack | Fri 14th October 2011 - 5:50 pm

Between us, Stephen Tall (he of the Oxford Comma cartoon) and myself (purveyor of news about commas in election law and academic research), appear to be carving out a niche in political punctuation coverage.

I fear it is all going to end in tears when someone puts our own punctuation habits under the microscope, but before it does I have exciting, related news to report.

I have blogged before about the fall-out amongst Cotswold Conservatives following their big losses to the Liberal Democrats in May’s local elections, including their fear that they are seen as “toffs legislating for …

Posted in News | Also tagged cotswold district council and stephen tall | 3 Comments

Bromley Council pulls a controversial novelty with a lollipop lady petition

By Mark Pack | Wed 12th October 2011 - 1:50 pm

Tsk, tsk, Bromley Conservatives.

There is a council by-election campaign underway in Shortlands ward, Bromley where the excellent Anuja Prashar is the Liberal Democrat candidate. (So excellent, I’ll forgive her for organising a raffle once that broke all my Lib Dem raffle rules.) She has been campaigning against council plans to axe the lollipop ladies at two local schools and, as part of that, presented a petition signed by 283 residents to the council.

And then things started being done differently…

For the first time, Bromley Council decided to respond personally and directly to all the signatories on a petition, posting out …

Posted in Local government and London | Also tagged anuja prashar, bromley council and colin smith | 2 Comments

After the Coalition: A Conservative agenda for Britain

By Mark Pack | Tue 11th October 2011 - 10:25 am

Collections of policy essays from new or junior MPs rarely have much of an impact or shelf-life in British politics, but however fallible their predictions for the future they can be illuminating about the current state of the authors’ party and its broad ideological direction.

So it is with After the Coalition which is very different in tone and hope for the future from last year’s Which Way’s Up? by Nick Boles. The contrast is there in the sub-titles for the two books. Boles had “The future for coalition Britain” whilst the five authors behind this volume have gone for …

Posted in Books | Also tagged dominic raab, elizabeth truss, featured, Kwasi Kwarteng, nick boles and Priti Patel | 9 Comments

A very unusual use for a Conservative Party membership card

By Mark Pack | Sun 7th August 2011 - 9:54 am

Take a young man, alcohol, a police station, a Conservative Party membership card, a police-issue balaclava and a cup of tea, and what do you get? Why, this story of course (with further details from here).

Hat-tip: Richard Clare

Posted in News | 5 Comments

Anonymous Tory MP launches broadside against “hypocritical, immature, manipulative” David Cameron

By Stephen Tall | Sun 26th June 2011 - 10:15 am

There’s a quite extraordinary broadside against David Cameron’s leadership in today’s Mail – written it appears by a current Conservative MP who chooses to remain anonymous — accusing him of “cynically manipulating” the party’s candidates’ list to stuff its green benches with “friends who went to the same school or moved in the same social circle”.

Here’s a flavour:

Speeches Cameron made before the Election about a new politics gave us great hope. But before too long, the less appealing side to his character became clear as he displayed an immature tendency to poke fun at certain individuals or groups

…

Posted in News | Also tagged daily mail, mark pritchard and tim montgomerie | 11 Comments

Do CCHQ staff have to bring their own toilet paper in to work?

By Mark Pack | Thu 2nd June 2011 - 8:34 pm

I only ask, you see, because earlier today the Conservative Party’s press team decided to highlight the fact that a Labour MP, Chuka Umunna, claimed £43.12 for “soap, toilet roll etc”.

Toilet paper Well, the claim was for his office where staff work. So quite why would someone want to pick on an employer providing toilet roll (and soap! yes, soap! the sheer luxury!) for his staff?

But perhaps that’s how CCHQ works and the staff there are so used to having to bring their own toilet paper …

Posted in News | Also tagged chuka umunna and mps expenses | 4 Comments

Opinion: Big society or big community?

By Emma Bagley | Sat 16th April 2011 - 12:07 pm

We seem to be stuck in a warp of niceties at the moment. In the bad old days the Tory party was the nasty party. Thatcher flexed her muscles and in a previous downturn we all had to get on our bikes. Yet today we seem to get a different flavour of conservatism. It’s all big society, low interest rates and a penny off fuel duty. What is going on?

I’ll let you into a secret. The Lib Dems may have a little something to do with this. We seem …

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged big society, bloggers takeover, guest editor and paul walter | 4 Comments

Stephen Tall asks: "Did Nate Silver write in vain?"

Nick Clegg: "Of course the EU has to change"

"Mad, swivel-eyed loons": a top Tory on the Tories

Ed Davey: Helping consumers to get cheaper energy bills

Tag Archives: conservative party

“They’re all mad, swivel-eyed loons”: a top Tory on the Tories

A Tory-Ukip pact? Up to you, guys. But you do know there’s an easier way, right?

Nick Clegg MP writes… The Labour and Tory exodus

A reply to Dan Hodges: why it’s not surprising some Tories aren’t bothered about winning in 2015

Julian Huppert MP writes…..The Preamble, 25 years on

George Bridges: my part in the Tories’ downfall. As a Lib Dem, I approve this message

Chris Heaton-Harris and the Tories’ discipline problem

LibLink: Menzies Campbell – Europe is the glass jaw of the Tory party. It has taken a hit

Paul Tyler writes: Progress postponed

“Tory membership in crisis” – Independent

Lords reform: did we really expect any better of either the Tories or Labour?

The Conservatives living up to their anti-reform name…

Europe Day Special: Avoiding the slippery slopes towards euroscepticism

When did the Tories stop supporting Lords reform?

Dear Conservative MPs, Re House of Lords reform here’s what your manifesto & the Coalition Agreement say

The Tories’ and Labour’s collective tax omnishambles

First, the omnishambles…

Opinion: we can not allow ourselves to be used as scapegoats by the Tories

LibLink: Chris Rennard – David Cameron wants nothing less than Tory hegemony

10 things you might not have known about party political funding over the last decade

Liberal Unionism in 2012

Haggis, Neeps and Liberalism special: Dramatic independence referendum duel in London and Edinburgh

Opinion: The Tory Party has mutated. It is for us to say Europe is our hope for the future

Nick Clegg – Europe: Britain is stronger, better, greater when we lead

Tim Farron MP writes… EU referendum: the Conservatives are not acting out of patriotism

What do you think was the second most important reason why people didn’t vote Tory in the Cotswolds?

Bromley Council pulls a controversial novelty with a lollipop lady petition

After the Coalition: A Conservative agenda for Britain

A very unusual use for a Conservative Party membership card

Anonymous Tory MP launches broadside against “hypocritical, immature, manipulative” David Cameron

Do CCHQ staff have to bring their own toilet paper in to work?

Opinion: Big society or big community?

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Stephen Tall asks: "Did Nate Silver write in vain?"

Nick Clegg: "Of course the EU has to change"

"Mad, swivel-eyed loons": a top Tory on the Tories

Ed Davey: Helping consumers to get cheaper energy bills

Tag Archives: conservative party

The Conservatives living up to their anti-reform name…

First, the omnishambles…

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