A couple of MPs, many representing fairly good majorities, have planned for some time to retire over the next few years. One of the consequences of the resent hype around the possibility of a general election was that some of them had delayed any announcement about their intention to stand down just in case they needed to stand again at short notice.
This morning, however, one sign that Brown has now no option to call an early election is the announcement that one MP will not be standing again, Ann Widdecombe.
Ann is a great Member of Parliament and popular with the Conservative Party. She has a personality that stands out among her fellow MPs and will be missed after the next election, whenever it may be.
One of the most intriguing policies to come out this week was the £25,000 proposed levy on non-domiciled residents of the UK. There seemed to be a couple of different versions of how this might work reported in the press.
Is anyone out there capable of giving a more informed opinion of how it might work or how it may effect them?
David Cameron will give his main address to the party conference just after 2 o’clock, this afternoon. What should he be aiming for? For me it is clear that there is one remaining task.
It has been a clear fact that the conference audience has been completely united this week. The ordinary party members, perhaps because they are focussed on a possible general election within a month, have all had two main questions they wanted answered this week.
The first requirement was for a clutch of policies that can be used by activists on the doorstep. This has been delivered. We can talk about new ideas for pensions, inheritance tax, charges on non-domicled residents and others. Excellent.
The second need is the one that needs to be met by Cameron, today. That need is for a fresh articulation of what the Conservative Party stands for. It means we need a form of words that can be repeated by activists across the country. It requires a series of ideas that can be easily communicated that explain the values that were used to choose those policies that have been adopted from among all the ideas generated by the review groups.
This week the new policies and the coherence among ordinary members has given the party a strong platform on which to build and much of it will be of comfort to One Nation Conservatives. I am confident that Cameron will deliver the rest, today, when the stakes are high.
In the wee hours of this morning, the rumours running through the bar included a two-part theory on the events of today. The first part was that Gordon Brown would make surprise visit to Iraq to announce a cut in troop numbers. This happened this morning and has been welcomed by David Cameron.
The second part was that on his way back from Iraq, Brown might stop at Balmoral, where the Queen currently is, in order to ask for a disolution of Parliament. This rumour was taken seriously enough for some of the main conference speaker due on today to nip off to their rooms with their staff and work on second versions of their speeches to include rallying cries for an election.
We should know in the next few hours if the rumour mill can make it two out of two.
To mark the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union, last night we held a debate on the state of the union, today. Our four speakers were each asked to put forward one idea for reforming the current arrangements and they were well placed to make suggestions. David Mundell MP spoke for Scotland, Nick Bourne AM for Wales, Dominic Grieve MP for England and Sir Malcolm Rifkind gave his unique perspective as a former Scottish Secretary now representing the very-English Kensington and Chelsea.
The audience vote at the end was perhaps not a surprise. They chose to adopt a policy of English votes for English laws through a grand comittee, sitting at Westminster and made up of English MPs.
And it was a good audience, numbering over 110 and they provided some great questions, too.
What was a surprise was the level of press interest. There were two film crews, a dozen print journalists that wanted to talk to members of the panel and Newsnight’s Michael Crick. Sadly, I did not managed to catch any news last night so I have no idea if anything was carried. If anyone saw us mentioned, please let me know and post a comment!
The event did at least make the footnotes on the BBC website with comments from Sir Malcolm and the Western Mail for Nick Bourne.
I am sitting in a briefing from the Olympics organising groups with Lord Coe and Jonathon Edwards.
I have supprted the Olympics and bidding process for years. At one previous conference in Bournemouth some years ago a very angry Conservative member of the Greater London Assembly complained about the increase in their council tax as a result of the Olympics. At the time this was expected to be a total of £20 per year or so. The whingeing individual embodied the worst traits of negativity in the party. I offered to pay it their increase if that would lead to silence and it worked. My support was on the grounds that I was excited and proud to see the greatest sporting event in the world come to the greatest.
Fortunately, that negative strain of thought is not in evidence, today. There was a huge amount of support for the olympics and the concerns and questions are all about how things are being managed, and rightly so.
Hugh Robertson MP is also on the panel.He has done an excellent job of making sense of the numbers in the Olympics budget and making clear that the organisers have not gone over their original predictions. All of the reported ‘increases’ are not actually related to the games costs but are due to Gordon Brown’s attempts to blame Lord Coe for the money Brown wants to spend on regeneration.
Last night the TRG hosted two events, back to back. First off, Lord Hurd introduced his new biography of Robert Peel. He made the case for Peel as the first man to really deliver on the idea of One Nation. Disraeli may have had the finer way with works but it was Peel that delivered on them, not least by cutting tariffs on corn, timber and other basic goods, so that the masses could afford bread and other basic necessities more easily.
Lord Hurd’s address was followed by a book-signing and judging by the faces on the Politico’s staff, they managed to sell a good few copies, too!
We moved smoothly (!) from book-signing to the TRG-Mainstream reception. This was another well attended event with plenty of MP’s, MEP’s, businessmen, academics and ordinary memebers in attendence. The guest of honour was Oliver Letwin MP and Damian Green hosted the event. Oliver offered some insights into the policy announcements we can expect to hear this week. This is a crucial time for policies in the party and we will have to wait to see how this plays out.
It was also a joy, given previous experiences of recent years, to see that there were only a few people still in need of passes on the first night. The organisation of this conference does seem to have moved on somewhat, which is certainly welcome!
Thanks, as ever, to Clare and Tim C for putting these together. This was a good start for TRG@Conference 2007!
One final note… It looks like posts sent from my phone have slightly different formatting to the normal ones. Apologies for that. We will tidy those up when we can.
So, Did He Deliver?
The press over the last two days seems to agree and the polls out today, particularly the Guardian which puts the Tories and Labour neck-and-neck, back this up.
What did he get right? Most things. The key element for me, along with the warm words about education, the NHS and defence, was the tone and the philosophy that ran through the speech. What I was hoping to see, and what I did see, was a philosophy coming through that could be summed up on the doorstep with some juicy phrases. Some of the ones I noted down during the speech included:
One phrase I did no hear from DC, but which is already being used widely, is “Safer, greener Britain”. This did not sit easily with me the first time that I heard it as I thought the terms made an odd couple. However, it is being repeated and seems to resonate, so there you go. The connecting them is one of the Conservative Party protecting the country from the biggest threats and that was a good part of DC’s speech, too.
Was there anything wrong with it? The “no-script” approach might have jarred with some, but a larger number probably appreciated it. There were some sections that seemed a bit long, but even then there are audiences for some policies that might have felt left out had they been shorter. Really, though, these things are quibbles and the real answer to the question is no, nothing much.
So, the Tories now have a spring in their step and a bounce in their polls. Whether either lasts remains to be seen, but I think this is an overall vote of support in the Cameron leadership.
From a TRG perspective, it is all to be welcomed, and our members are likely to be able to campaign with enthusiasm and confidence should Brown not lose his nerve over calling an election.