Keeping the faith

March 2, 2010 — admin

Time for a decisive, DC - what's it to be?

It all seems as though it could go terribly wrong after a YouGov poll found that the PM was on course to claim another five years in power, something unimaginable even four weeks ago. DC gave his speech on Sunday in Brighton to a generally good reception but couldn’t avoid a look about him that was rather too close to someone living out their nightmares. I thought it was a solid speech and nothing more – designed to steady the ship and motivate the crew rather than inspire a nation through new discovery. But I remain confident that Cameron the performer will outshine either of his rivals whenever he gets the chance.

What he needs to start to do is give people a reason to vote Conservative – something I’ve been telling the party locally for a number of months now. Gordon Brown remains our biggest asset and I have no doubt that whatever the polls say, he will not win the election. But that doesn’t mean a Conservative victory – as the Times put it, it is isn’t that people don’t think DC is capable of being a good PM, it is that they don’t understand why he wants to do the job.

I know that DC feels the desire to reform our country, he is deeply interested in social justice, cares hugely about health and education and wants to address Britain’s copious social problems. He wants to foster an economy that allows people to reach their potential and steer a dignified course on the world stage. Why? Because it’s the British Way – fair play, compassion, reward for the successful and support for the struggling. I think the term “patriotic duty” was taken out of context by the press but it wasn’t the most wise; I know what he meant but I’m not sure it was the best way to express it. He needs to express it how the man on the street would ie the country at the moment is in a mess – unfair and injust after 13 years of Labour failure. DC wants to be the person to put that right.

But we need to spell out in practical terms what the Direction of Travel is and how that’s done. And we need to give people some reasons to vote Conservative as opposed to reasons to vote against Gordon. I think DC’s policy of attacking the PM has reached its optimum effectiveness and has now started to decline. I want to see less barracking and more focus on what a Tory government will deliver. Cllr Richard Lowe, an emminent Tweeter, collated the following:

1. A cut in net immigration of 75%

2. No more early release for convicted criminals

3. A two year freeze in council tax

4. The abolition of inheritance tax for all families except millionaires

5. Cutting politics with 10% cut in the number of MPs and 5% cut in pay

 6. Headteachers to be put in charge of school discipline

7. Restoring the link between the basic state pension and earnings

8. New laws that will give householders more rights against burglars

9. The budget deficit cut in half by 2014 so future generations don’t live in debt

10. Abolition of Labour’s expensive ID cards

I’m more comfortable with some things than others on that list but politics isn’t an all-or-nothing craft. These would be 10 reasons that if nothing else explain to a public fed up of waiting what the Conservatives stand for. And most of them represent current policy - not that you’d think it from our reticence in coming forward. So come on DC, let’s hear about them and let’s have a bit of fearlessness. Ignore those who say that we are losing support because we’ve gone to the left and keep to the centre ground. Stop bashing Gordon – tempting though it is – and start selling yourself, selling the party and its promises and selling a Conservative Britain as a place that has voted for change and is fairer for all.

I don’t believe that Labour will win the election, the polling in key marginals is still heavily in our favour. But we must show some mettle, some work ethic and a willingness to let people into our confidence if we are to finally summit the mountain we have struggled for so long to conquer.

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Direction of Travel

February 20, 2010 — admin

Come on David, it's not rocket science!

Last night was Woking Constituency Conservative Association’s annual general meeting at which Humfrey Malins gave his farewell speech and Jonathan Lord the first of what we hope will be many. During his speech, Jonathan talked about many interesting things, including references to helping the poorest in society that I think it does well for the grass roots to hear.

One of the subjects he touched on was this idea that the Conservative Party has no policies. I firmly believe that this is a message that Labour spinners, aided by the BBC, Grauniad and others are determined to repeat over and over for our consumption – that DC is a salesman with nothing to sell except the art of selling itself. A Blair mark two. Jonathan argued, quite rightly, that there are many examples of Conservative policy out there and that in-depth policy details are not the norm before a general election; Margaret Thatcher didn’t have them in 1979, nor Tony Blair in 1997. What the country understood about these two Leaders of the Opposition, Jonathan said, was their direction of travel.

Cllr Mike Smith asked Jonathan what it was that bound these policies together, the central message to activists and candidates to sell on the doorstep. He, along with others including myself, don’t yet get the sense of an overarching theme to Conservative policy that defines a direction of travel.

It’s desperately needed if DC is to win a convincing rather than narrow victory. And it’s not rocket science. The concept that binds our policies together is three-fold; self-empowerment, opportunity and the fulfillment of aspiration. The credibility gap that the Conservative Party has is linking its support for the wealthy and Middle England, the encouragement of entrepreneurship and businesses and the rolling back of inheritance tax with its desire to help the poorest in society achieve a better life.

Our problem is that we only ever talk about one of these at a time. The first allows our opponents to claim we are the party of the few, not the many. The second provokes a reaction among grass roots that the party is abandoning its core voters. But these two flanks of the spectrum are inextricably linked and go hand-in-hand.

We want to allow people who have been succesful the opportunity to enjoy the fruits of their success. We want the prospect of that enjoyment to be an aspiration that creates excellence in its pursuit. We believe that leaving an estate to the next generation is a self-empowerment that begets striving for success. And we will fight for the right of the well-off to enjoy their lives – as long as they pay a fair share to those less fortunate. The successful business creates employment, tax revenue and generates investment in this country – it is also key to our recovery from this dreadful recession.

Similarly, while I am not entirely comfortable with DC’s phrase Broken Britain, there are parts of Britain that don’t work. In some areas, people have poor life chances and little hope of being anything other than a criminal or lifelong welfare recipient. We have to show these people when they are young that we believe in them. We have to demonstrate through community policing, social services and educational opportunities that with hard work and self-belief, anything is possible. And we have to be serious about it, knowing that it is in society’s interests that we address this problem.

In between these extremes, there are countless other examples of people who want the government to help them achieve their aspirations through the tax system, employment regulations, adult education, public sector reforms and so on.  I’m not big on small government - the government should be there to help the people who elect it. I’m big on enabling government - a government that leaves people alone when they are doing well and picks them up when they need help.

But we need to hear more from DC and the party about the link between the two things above. We are not the party of the few,  nor are we the party of the many; we must be the party of everyone.

I believe that with the economy being how it is, voters will forgive a lack of specific, concrete promises. But they will not forgive a listlessness, a lack of direction. Now it is for DC to elucidate the various Conservative policies that are out there in these strategic terms – it is not only voters who need to hear it but his own party too.

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Lord oh Lord, Lib Dems get personal

February 16, 2010 — admin

Jonathan (centre) at Woking Community HospitalThere may still be two months to go before an election is called but already the Liberal Democrats are beginning to show that they are far more comfortable talking about personalities than policies. The latest attempt to smear our excellent parliamentary candidate Jonathan Lord comes from Spiderplant Land, where a load of hackneyed drivel masquerades as an informed piece of opinion.

The blogger in question has already got the number of times Jonathan has stood for parliament wrong, amusingly confused Jonathan’s current place of residence five miles away with somewhere 25 miles away and stated quite catagorically that he knew nothing about Woking, despite the fact that she has never met him. She then sought to blame our literature for the faulty information! The Lib Dems really need to learn the difference between blogging and blagging.

In addition, the “anonymous” comments that she quotes from ConservativeHome (and which have now been removed) originate from someone know to be a compulsive fibber, who is not a Guildford party member and doesn’t even appear to be on the electoral roll in Guildford or Waverley. Still, that’s about the standard of reasonsing that underpins most Lib Dem policies, so expect to see these fake “quotes” used again.

I have stated before how impressed I have been with Jonathan’s commitment to Woking since he was adopted as our candidate. Last week, he visited Woking Community Hospital to emphasise our commitment to the NHS, something I know he feels strongly about. This weekend, he is campaigning – by which I mean knocking on doors rather than tweeting friends like @RosieSharpley – in opposite ends of the borough because he wants to listen to concerns and articulate the Conservative message of change and recovery.

People who have seen Jonathan at events and visits will tell you that as well as being a great communicator he is usually the last to leave, wanting to spend time with the hosts who are usually busy during the event itself. Jonathan is a dynamic, intelligent and experienced man with a record of getting things done in the public and private sector. He has fantastic connections within the Conservative Party that will help Woking – should he be elected – get its voice heard at the highest level.

After 13 years of being punished by Labour for being in Surrey, Woking deserves that opportunity once again. Don’t be seduced by Lib Dem untruths and heresay – it may suit them locally but it is not in the best interests of the constituency or the country.

Update 16/2: For those that can stand it, Spiderplant Land has responded at some considerable length here.  It’s typical baseless Lib Demmery. But it gives me a good indication of what we can expect going forward. For the record, I have not smeared Rosie Sharpley above – I’ve talked about Jonathan, save for plugging Rosie’s Twitter account (I think Twitter is marvellous but a very limited campaigning tool).  She’s right though - it’s not worth responding to. So I’m going to get on with our Horsell In Touches instead.

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We’re going to the chapel

January 17, 2010 — admin

Back in the spring of 2007, I watched Francis Maude give one of the most unimpressive performances on Question Time that I’ve ever seen. The background for this was the announcement that the Conservative Party intended to commit to the idea of rewarding married couples through the taxation system. His answers were defensive and and a little condescending and I held my head in my hands as the Conservative Party once again went back to basics.

Even back then, I knew that just as the original back to basics had started the decline of John Major’s government, so the new version – despite its different presentation – could seriously damage a future Conservative challenge; people don’t want to be told how to live. And now the issue is back in the news - not because it’s new but because given everything that has happened since St David’s Day 2007, Labour feels that the Conservatives are vulnerable on this issue – and they are dead right.

I’m not against marriage – heck, I’m getting married in June. I’m not even going to argue with the fact that marriage is a preferable institution from which to create a stable family unit. I’m not arguing that kids from married families statiscally don’t do better at school and stay out of trouble. Marriage is the most important building block of our society and we disregard it at our peril.

But marriage is not a magic wand – it is a means to an end. Marriages create stability, continuity and an environment of care, which is why it is so good at nurture and creating stable and balanced households. But it doesn’t have a monopoly on love, stability and care. There are plenty of co-habitees, single parents and same-sex relationships that provide exactly the same environment. Equally, there are plenty of marriages that provide very little in the way of any of these positive things.

My problem with the Conservative policy of rewarding marriage in the tax system is that it alienates people who don’t fall into this category, many through no fault of their own. The break-up of any marriage is always a tragic and deeply traumatic event, particularly when there are children involved. But it happens – sometimes people who fell in love with all good faith simply fall out of love, or fall more in love with someone else. It’s one of the most difficult things about being human – but being human is all that it is.

I feel very uncomfortable about levvying a financial penalty against those involved in such a sad chapter of their lives – even though to them it would no doubt pale into insignficance compared to everything else. To me, it smacks of kicking people while they are down, of turning our backs on them when they need support most and of keeping a whole lot of other people, many of whom will be relatively vulnerable, off a list of “the favoured” because they – for whatever reason – cannot or don’t wish to embrace a formal marriage arrangement.

I understand what the Conservative Party is trying to do here – but it’s all wrong. It allows our opponents to paint us as an exclusive party – as if we didn’t have enough trouble with that already. I seriously don’t want the Tory Party to be the party of the rich – I want it to be the party that leaves the rich alone, looks after the poor and increases mobility from poor to rich. But it’s difficult to get that inclusive idea across when you illustrate it with policies like this one.

And the party only has itself to blame. By trying, in the spring of 2007, to impose its grass roots’ preferred way of living, we have been overtaken by circumstances to a point where we are left with a policy that DC would probably reverse in an instant if he could – he’s already tried and then had to go back on himself - but can’t. Despite the recession, despite the sensitive issue that taxation policy has now become, he cannot go back on the marriage promise for fear of losing grass roots votes and another Lisbon-like U-turn. On one side his better judgement, on the other ConservativeHome and the Daily Mail. Rather him than me.

It’s what happens when you announce things three years ahead of an election. Okay, there’s nothing wrong with supporting marriage but I’ll bet that if DC could choose something now that he’d announced in 2007, it wouldn’t be this.

The Conservative Party must support people, not institutions if we wish to remain on the centre ground.

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Faint praise

January 6, 2010 — admin

Faint praise from the future powerbrokers

A decent performance at PMQs doesn’t mean much when your own party starts tearing into you a few minutes later. The PM is in real trouble at the moment, not because people love DC or because of the polls but because a large section of his own party have no confidence in him as their leader.

Worse, some of them are so convinced that the election is lost that they are prepared to challenge him – why would you do that if you thought there was a cat’s chance that you could win? The news channels have been doing this to death all afternoon and evening, although they have been successfully spun by the government into the “Ministers back Brown” line.

Actually, they’ve been doing no such thing. While Ed Balls and Alan Johnson did give clear messages of support, it is to note that others have not. The Chancellor satisfied himself with:

“As far as I’m concerned we should be concentrating on the business of government and getting through the recession. The PM and I met this afternoon and we discussed how we take forward economic policies to secure the recovery. I won’t be deflected from that.”

Not a ringing endorsement, then. Harriet Harman, ambitious deputy leader said she the Cabinet were “getting on with our jobs as ministers in a government that Gordon leads”. She might as well have added “for now” on the end of that statement. So too David Miliband who, despite not responding at all for ages, eventually chipped in with an account of his day, saying he “was working closely with the prime minister on foreign policy issues” and “supported the re-election campaign for a Labour government that he is leading”.

For now. And is that he Gordon Brown or he David Miliband?

Balls and Johnston aside, if I were Gordon Brown, I would be really worried. Clearly most of his cabinet are sticking with him for the sake of the election rather than the fact that they believe his leadership is right for Britain. How many of them seriously believe that he would make a better leader of the country than DC? Are they prepared to guarantee that they would support his continued leadership after the election? Or even if they won it?

Lobby journalists have been busy assuring us that most backbenchers support the PM – of course they do. Lobby rumours spread quickly and no-one wants to stick their necks out to leaky journos. I’d keep an eye on this one – it’s possible that at this very late stage the Labour party can’t be bothered to get rid of the PM. But if there were two years to run, he’d be gone. And it might happen yet.

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Which is it, Gordon?

January 5, 2010 — admin

The PM spent most of last year talking about how the Conservatives were going to cut their way out of recession. Now, with the publication of the first part of the Conservative manifesto, he has decided to try and say that we are planning to splurge our way out of it with a £34bn black hole.

Labour has form on dodgy dossiers - as we all know - and the compendium of lies that they released in response to the manifesto certainly fell into that category. But they succeeded in one way – the central message of the manifesto, the draft plans for the NHS, did not get an airing on the news. DC has to brush aside this silly question about how much of a promise is a promise and make sure that people know about our ideas and innovations for the future of the country.

As Stephanie Flanders points out, we should be mounting a two-pronged attack here – one with our own ideas and one with some serious hay-making about Labour’s own planned cuts. Where I think she is slightly off the mark is in saying that by talking about the nature of the promises rather than the content, the first day was a Labour success – DC made the point well that the promises are only tentative because of the economic mess Labour has bequeathed.

But he needs to start being more ruthless about ignoring journalists’ questions and getting his own message out. Tony Blair was a master of this art and it contributed a significant part of why he was able to seal the deal in way that DC has yet to. And Nick Robinson is as good a place as any to start.

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Tracking the story

December 8, 2009 — admin

There’s been quite a bit in the nationals recently about the narrowing of the polls, with some putting the Labour lead in single figures. It’s not hugely surprising, I think we are see the Eurosceptic Conservative contingent flipping over to UKIP, which are votes I don’t necessarily think will stay there at the polling booth. In addition, I think there are a couple of other things happening.

People forget that polling is a highly subjective craft that can be made to go one way or the other. Back in the summer of 2008, DC was regularly polling 15 to 19 point leads and the race was on in the press to rubbish the PM and publish the poll with the most ridiculous possible lead. Now the race is on – led by the Observer a couple of weeks ago, to follow the line that the general election is going to be a very close-run thing and publish the “breakthrough” poll that suggests a hung parliament is more or less certain.

I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing for the Conservatives – people will shy away from a hung parliament and where they shy to will more likely be David Cameron than Gordon Brown. These polls are focussing activists and reminding them success is not, nor ever has been, certain. We’ve been here before during the Brown bounce, during the weeks following the collapse of Lehman Bros (about this time last year) and yet the PM has been hammered in subsequent local and Euro elections.

There is no doubt that a sense of optimism about the economy is helping Gordon Brown. But that sense of optimism is totally misplaced because the truth is that he hasn’t been straight with people in this country about how hard it will be after the election to pay off the cost of recession.

And I think that is where DC needs to go next. The economy may feel better, but it’s going to get worse again once those votes in 2010 have been cast. While Labour patters on about Eton and tried to get everyone interested in class warfare, the Conservatives should be sticking with the change argument and the feeling that whatever the apparent green shoots, the party to deliver change and steer the recovery competently is the Conservatives. I think that message will stick.

We also need to take on Labour about it’s appaling record on poverty and wealth creation. A Conservative strategy for poverty alleviation is a vital tool in the governmental box. By getting people into work, we lower the welfare bill and get debt paid off quicker. On the other hand, Labour’s attempts to get people into work have been spectacular failures because they aren’t serious. Far better to leave people on benefit and voting Labour for fear of the Conservatives, they reason.

By taking on Labour over poverty, aspiration and the real cost of recession, we’ll get them busy clearing up after us rather than standing still while Labour plays dirty with the politics of envy. It’s positive message from us about change; and a negative one from them about fear of change.

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On the March

December 6, 2009 — admin
Could Gordon be gone by April?

Could Gordon be gone by April?

There appear to be loudening whispers around Westminster at the moment that a March election could be on the cards. March 25 seems the most likely date for it if the PM wants to go early as it gives more time.

Evidence to suggest that this is at least an option being considered is increasingly stacking up. Firstly, there were the Labour Party staffing advertisements, which have been appearing in greater numbers recently. Secondly, it would offer the PM something of an advantage of surprise. It could also allow him to fight on the basis of Christmas-boosted economic figures and allow him to postpone the pre-Budget report until after an election.

It has certainly caught the minds of journalists at very high-placed political news outlets such as the Spectator, New Statesman and Daily Telegraph. Things don’t just pop into so many journalists’ minds at the same time on the same subject by chance – someone is briefing them. It could be Alistair Campbell, brought back to feed the PM with some snide one-liners about class war. Alternatively, it could be coming from the Conservative side, talking up a March election to get activists focussed and make Brown look scared if he waits until May.

It could be both but it’s certainly an interesting Phoney War. My own feeling is that the election will be on May 6 because Labour simply doesn’t have the money to run two separate campaigns. But then the PM could go on March 25, spend everything on the general election and leave the local elections to dangle – it’s not like Labour’s local government presence could get much worse anyway.

Polls at the moment seem to be narrowing slightly to Labour’s advantage – or more accurately, since the Labour vote is static – to the Conservatives’ disadvantage. A lot of that I think is the fall out from the Lisbon Treaty and Eurosceptics switching to UKIP. Hopefully, by the election time they will understand that a vote for Lord Pearson and his merry crew is a total waste of time and actually helps the PM stay on for another five years. I am confident that many of these UKIP waverers will stay within the Conservative Party but there is a huge amount of work ahead.

The most important thing is not the opinion poll figures but getting your supporters out to vote for you. If Labour thinks they have more chance of doing this in March, so be it.

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Labour’s Smearing Group

October 29, 2009 — admin

It is good news that Nadine Dorries has been paid an undisclosed damages by Damian McBride for the disgusting smears that he tried to perpetrate against her. It’s a bit surprising to me that it hasn’t attracted more media attention but they probably want to give it a wide berth for fear of accidentally repeating the libel.

Nadine, who is great to follow on Twitter as @NadineDorriesMP, has two more cases against McBride, who also resigned as editor of the ever-optimistic LabourList website. It’s also fair to say that other Labour figures, some of them involved in the online world, were “in on the joke” as well and it gives an idea of just how hollow the “no more spin” mantra from the PM was.

The truth is that Labour is spinning more and more heavily as the PM gets more and more desperate. Mandelson, Whelan, Draper, Campbell and Blair are all back on the scene – differences put aside – as the see the end of the tracks up ahead. Privately, all apart from Brown probably believe the situation is hopeless; and that’s fine as they all have plenty of other things to do. But that one last challenge – to keep DC and the Tories out – is irresistable. If they fail, that will only be as expected and if they succeed, they will have pulled off the greatest political escape act in British history.

The process of trying to achieve that goal is going to include some heavy hitting from Labour, backed by the government machine and a compliant BBC that fears being pulled apart by the Conservatives as the price of 15 years cosying up to Labour. There’s going to be a lot of dirt, a lot of scheming and a fight to the end. And that’s before you put the Liberal Democrats into the equation.

Election 2010 will be the most keenly fought, bare-knuckled political slug-out certainly since 1992 and probably ever. Technology has made the process of electioneering as underhand and sly as the art of hacking itself. The disgraceful smearing of Nadine, George Osborne and DC was just the beginning and I hope that Tory high command is ready for the onslaught.

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On tightening polls

October 11, 2009 — simonashall
Will it be a closer race as the election approaches?

Will it be a closer race as the election approaches?

Cllr Denzil Coulson responded to my post on the seventeen-point post-DC speech poll lead with a Tweet that a 45% Conservative poll rating at the next election was “very unlikely”. Lo and behold, another poll put the Conservatives on precisely 45%, which I duly tweeted for his attention.

“You and I know that polls tighten during the election campaign”

came the response via Twitter and it’s not an unreasonable one, so I thought I’d look into it, starting in 1992. Back then, polls weren’t as frequent or, as we subsequently came to realise, as accurate as now. But looking seven months out from John Major’s photo-finish election win, ICM/Guardian on 14 September had Con 39, Lab 39 and LD 17. That was the same result in MORI/Times 10 days later. By 12 October, there was a Lab 43, Con 41 LD 12 poll done by ICM/Guardian. I’m not being selective – those are the polls I can find. In the end, the result was Con 42, Labour 34, LD 18. Not much sign of a tightening there – except for one away from the October 12 ICM Labour lead.

In 1997, it is a slightly different story. A November 1 MORI poll has Lab 54, Con 30, LD 12 and a Lab 47, Con 34, LD 15 poll followed the next day by MORI. All other polls in November had Labour above 50 and the Conservatives on around 30. The final result - Lab 43 Con 30 LD 17 – is indeed a tightening of the polls seven months out; but which way are the polls tightening? As in 1992, the move was away from Labour as people who, when questioned, said they would vote Labour stayed at home.

In 2001, four polls in December put Labour on around 46, the Conservatives on 33 and LDs on 15. The actual result – Lab 41, Con 32 and LD 18 – was similarly due to Labour voters staying at home, a lack of enthusiasm for the Conservatives and aggresive Lib Dem campaigning. Yes, a tightening – but a tightening away from Labour. During the last election polls seven months out showed Labour at around 38, the Conservatives on 31 and the Lib Dems on 21. The election result was Lab 35, Con 32 and LD 22 – very close to the polling figures in November.

A few things to note:

1) The Labour vote has always been lower in the election than the average polling figures seven months out, probably due to lower turnout among Labour voters

2) The Conservative vote in polls seven months out since 1992 has been very close to the results on the night

3) The Lib Dem vote has always been higher in elections than polls because they campaign so well

It is also worth stating the obvious – that it depends which polls you look at and where the votes are cast is more important than how many are cast. But the evidence above suggests that Labour’s percentage on the night will be lower than their current polling, that the Lib Dems will do better (just as well given that they are on 16% today)and that the Conservative vote will hold around about where it is now ie the average for the month.

We are, of course, all hostages to fortune and whatever surprises the next seven months may hold. But a quick glance through records shows that the Lib Dems relying on a tighening of polls during an election campaign to produce a hung parliament might be a little misguided. It’s still a possibility if we don’t work hard enough, though.

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