ConservativeHome's Seats & Candidates blog

Sheryll Murray selected for South East Cornwall

The selection occurred last night.  More here.

A public service announcement for non A-list candidates

Chatham & Aylesford would welcome local applicants for consideration. Any candidate on the approved list who can demostrate a reasonable connection to the constituency are welcome to apply.  For further information please contact the Association Office in West Malling on 01732 842794 before Monday 30th October.

Related link: Mid Norfolk resists CCHQ on candidate selection

Thirty seats in third phase of second tranche

The closing date for these applications is 2.00 pm on Thursday 9th November.

1. Berwick Upon Tweed
2. Brentford and Isleworth
3. Brighton Kemptown
4. Brighton Pavilion
5. Chatham and Aylesford
6. Colchester
7. Copeland
8. Dover
9. Elmet and Rothwell
10. Gedling
11. Gloucester
12. Halesowen and Rowley Regis
13. Hampstead and Kilburn
14. Hastings and Rye
15. Hereford and South Herefordshire
16. Ipswich
17. Keighley
18. Newquay and St Austell
19. Newton Abbott
20. North Norfolk
21. Northampton North
22. Plymouth Sutton and Devonport
23. Portsmouth South
24. Rossendale and Darwen
25. Rugby
26. South Basildon and East Thurrock
27. Sutton and Cheam
28. Tynemouth
29. Wirral South
30. Wolverhampton South West

Gordon Henderson selected for Sittingbourne and Sheppey

Background here.

Sittingbourne & Sheppey selection

This seat is held by Labour MP Derek Wyatt by just 79 votes.

Sittingbourne & Sheppey Conservatives are being tight-lipped about the contenders but  Gordon Henderson - the current media spokesman for the seat and PPC in 05 - is in the running, but definitely not reselected yet as somebody seems to have briefed today's Kent on Sunday!

Round two of the selection was this morning, with the final round this evening.

Deputy Editor

Burton open primary

In a familiar scenario, this Lab/Con marginal is being contested by the former PPC and three A-listers:

Adrian Pepper (Pictured - property and marketing consultant and Burton PPC 05)
Beverly Nielsen (Midlands Business Woman of the Year)
Mark Pawsey (Rugby-based owner of a catering supplies business, Nuneaton PPC 05)
Andrew Griffiths (West Midlands Euro candidate 04, Chief of Staff to Hugo Swire MP, not to be confused with Andrew Griffith who is also on the A list)

The selection will be on Thursday November 2nd, email East Staffs Conservatives if you are a local - "of any political persuasion" - interested in attending.

Deputy Editor

Finals at Cleethorpes and Brigg & Goole

Martin Vickers and Andrew Percy are the finalists at the Cleethorpes selection scheduled for 8th November.  Alan Lockwood will replace Andrew Percy in the final if Andrew wins the final at Brigg & Goole a week earlier.  Brigg & Goole, where David Cameron's father in law Sir Reginald Sheffield is Association Chairman and overseeing the selection, will be between Percy and another A-lister, Julie Moody.

A-lister George Freeman selected for Mid-Norfolk

ConservativeHome sends congratulations to George and to the Mid Norfolk Tories for repeatedly resisting CCHQ's attempts to quota-ise their selection process.

George's number one choice was the seat of Mid Norfolk and dropped out of at least one other selection race to focus his efforts on this seat.

George fought Stevange at the last General Election and is a practical supporter of a more compassionate brand of conservatism.

6.30pm update on 22/10: Contrary to Iain Dale's report I am told that all 120 seats were occupied at the selection and that some members had to stand. That equals about 30% of qualifying members.

Related link: Mid Norfolk resists CCHQ on candidate selection

Third wave A-listers

ConservativeHome understands that about twenty more individuals have been added to the A-list.

Here are a few of those twenty so far identified by ConservativeHome:

1. David Branch, Candidate for Southwark and Bermondsey in 2005
2. Sarah Candy, Businesswoman and Essex County council cabinet member
3. Alf Doran, Councillor and North West Region Euro candidate 2004
4. Eddie Hughes, Candidate for Birmingham Hall Green in 2005
5. Giles Inglis-Jones, former soldier and PPC for Ashfield, now HR and Development Director at CCHQ
6. Kay Mason, Chairman of Norwich North
7. Kabir Sabar, PPC Walsall South 2005
8. David Senior, Candidate for Shipley in 2001
9. Claire Strong, Eastern Region Euro candidate 2004

Related links:

• FIRST WAVE A-LISTERS
• SECOND WAVE A-LISTERS

Edward Leigh MP makes direct attack on A-list

In one of the most direct attacks on the A-list since John Hayes MP questioned its membership, Edward Leigh MP (another Cornerstoner) has written to this morning's Telegraph and complained about the failure of A-listers to apply for northern seats.  This is the full text of his letter:

"Sir – It has come to my attention that a number of key northern marginal seats are receiving very few applications from the "A-list" of Conservative candidates. Sometimes total applications are down to single figures. In some cases, only one or two men are applying for seats on which the fate of the country will turn.

You might think it a disaster that so few have applied. In fact, hundreds of people on the "Approved" list have been prevented from applying, in large part because they are the wrong sex.

This is blighting careers, discouraging activists and is contrary to natural justice. It cannot be right that talented people are excluded from Parliament in this way. We need them for government.

The Conservative Party is nothing if it is not about allowing people to rise up irrespective of race, creed or gender. Are we now the party of arbitrary quotas to exclude white, Christian, heterosexual men because, for all their abilities, they are just that?

Incidentally, could it be that the few men who get on the A-list think themselves so brilliant that they are above standing for a northern marginal, especially as so many of them come from London's political elite?

The obvious solution is now to open the A-list to all according to ability and nothing else. I rather thought this was Conservatism in action."

Mr Leigh's letter is the most outspoken attack on the A-list so far from a Tory MP.  His opinion will strike a chord with the 94% of Tory members who do not believe that the 'Priority List' candidates are necessarily the most talented candidates.

In the last week CCHQ have added approximately twenty names to the A-list in a bid to address the 'applications deficit' that Mr Leigh's letter highlights.  In due course ConservativeHome will attempt to identify that twenty.

Laura Sandys selected for Thanet South

More tomorrow.  Much more tomorrow!

11am update on 17th October:

• Warmest congratulations to Laura.  By all accounts she is one of the nicest people on the candidates' list and will make an excellent and hard-working MP for the people of South Thanet.  The TSCA have chosen well and they chose by an overwhelming majority - two-to-one.  David Cameron will also be pleased to see another A-list woman adopted.
• It is not, of course, good news for Mark MacGregor.  ConservativeHome has made no secret of its belief that Mark MacGregor is not fit to be a Tory MP.  A combination of two lacklustre campaigns in 2001 and 2005, a letter from Tory MPs registering opposition to his candidacy and unhappiness at CCHQ scheming all combined to thwart MM's ambitions.  It is unlikely that any other selection committee of a Conservative Association will now wish to embrace Mr MacGregor and his controversial past.
• LS' selection also affects Mid Norfolk where she was one of four finalists.  Mid-Norfolk have announced that A-listers Kit Malthouse and Priti Patel will be in Saturday's final.  KM and PP were tied in the previous round.

Mid Norfolk continue to insist on doing it their way

On Saturday Mid Norfolk chose two men and two women to go through to the final selection meeting.  A half-women shortlist was exactly what CCHQ wanted but the good Tories of Mid Norfolk didn't choose Vicky Ford and Laura Sandys because they had to choose two women.  No.  They chose them because they decided that they deserved to be in the top four.

The Association rejected Gillian Shephard's instruction (who was acting on behalf of CCHQ) to use a half-women shortlist (according to Central Office's new guidelines) but naturally ended up with a two men, two women shortlist in a much more meritocratic way. 

Mid Norfolk also told CCHQ that the whole Association would take part in the final selection - not just the Executive as Gillian Shephard had also attempted to impose.

Mid Norfolk is a model for every Association.  If you think people should be shortlisted on merit - not according to a quota - and that every member of the Association has the right to help choose your candidate then stand by your convictions and politely ignore CCHQ's diktats.

Gareth Johnson reselected for Dartford

Gareth stood in this Lab/Con marginal last time around, and in Lewisham West in 2001.

Dr Howard Stoate MP has a majority of 706.

Deputy Editor

Last four for Mid Norfolk

Vicky Ford, George Freeman, Laura Sandys and James Tunbridge.

Related post: Mid Norfolk resists CCHQ on candidate selection

Mid Norfolk resists CCHQ on candidate selection

Central Office's ambition to increase the number of female Tory candidates has enjoyed a few good days but at least one Association has not been willing to meekly agree to David Cameron's half-women shortlists.  Mid-Norfolk - one of the plum seats currently selecting - told CCHQ that they would choose according to their own criteria and would not be bound by artificial quotas.  As it happens the Association is choosing roughly 50% men and 50% women but it is happening naturally rather than by diktat.  Mid-Norfolk's declaration of independence should encourage every other Association wanting to choose in its own way.

The eleven candidates remaining in the race are as follows (it has been updated in recent days  as other contenders have been selected elsewhere):

1. John Flack
2. Vicky Ford
3. George Freeman
4. Samuel Gyimah
5. Brandon Lewis
6. Kit Malthouse
7. Anne Marie Morris
8. Priti Patel
9. Adam Rickitt
10. Laura Sandys
11. James Tunbridge

The field of eleven will be thinned down to four tomorrow and the final selection will be on the 21st.

Angie Bray is adopted for Ealing Central and Acton

Angie Bray, London Assembly Member, was last night selected for Ealing Central and Acton.  ConservativeHome sends warmest congratulations to Angie.

Angie's selection is the latest in a good run of A-list women winning selections.  Annunziata Rees-Mogg, Sarah Newton and Louise Bagshawe have all been adopted in recent days.

Another Rees-Mogg selected (for Somerton and Frome)

Annunziata Rees-Mogg has been selected tonight for Somerton and Frome.  Somerset looks set to become something of a Rees-Moggdom if things go the Tory way.  Her brother Jacob Rees-Mogg was adopted for NE Somerset in late July.  S&F was held by the LibDems by 812 votes at the last General Election.

The controversial Mark MacGregor inches closer to readoption

Central Office received a series of complaints about Mark MacGregor.  Lord Tebbit – who intervened in the last election campaign against MacGregor - complained about MM’s factionalism whilst he was part of the Federation of Conservative Students.  The Opposition Chief Whip, according to an impeccable source inside CCHQ, noted that a significant number of MPs would be unhappy if he was selected.  Iain Duncan Smith complained of the ways in which MacGregor was involved in the unfounded allegations against his wife.

Central Office at the highest level chose to ignore these complaints and haven’t stopped there.  According to ConservativeHome’s three Thanet South sources (partly backed up a leaked email), CCHQ has actively blocked a leading rival from being interviewed after the Association had actually voted to interview him.  Slowly but surely the race appears to have been fixed to see MacGregor prosper even though he is not an A-lister.

This whole incident is further ammunition for those who want the secretive Candidates' Committee replaced with an open and transparent panel – the members of which are democratically elected by the voluntary party.

Neil Carmichael reselected

Neil Carmichael was last night voted to again be the parliamentary candidate for Stroud. Neil, who wasn't on the priority list, is a former farmer and academic who fought the seat last time, coming just 350 votes behind Labour MP David Drew.

Deputy Editor

Sarah Newton selected for Truro & Falmouth

An open primary of 150 people was held last night in Truro, with Sarah Newton being selected out of three candidates.

Sarah, who wasn't on the priority list, was Director of the International Longevity Centre (UK) from 2004-2006, and said her main issue would be the NHS crisis in Cornwall.

The seat is held by the LibDem Matthew Taylor with a 5131 majority.

Deputy Editor

Louise Bagshawe selected for Corby

Congratulations to Louise.  More tomorrow...

Related link: Louise answers your Q&A here.

Bedblockers II: Grey list won't make way for A-list

A survey for The Sunday Telegraph reveals that two-thirds of the Conservative Party's oldest MPs do not intend to stand down at the next General Election.  The older MPs include Michael Mates, 72; Sir Peter Tapsell, 76; Sir Alan Haselhurst, 69; Bill Cash, 66; Richard Shepherd, 63; and Sir Patrick Cormack, 67.  CCHQ had hoped for more retirements so that A-listers could be given plum seats.  CCHQ will not push this issue too hard, however.  During the last parliament the Notting Hill set's talk of bedblocking MPs caused outrage and threats of legal action.  Many Tories worry that the party cannot afford to lose the parliamentary and ministerial experience of the older MPs.

A-lister failed Parliamentary Assessment Board but was still fast-tracked

Shipley MP Philip Davies has launched a strong attack on the A-list in this morning's Yorkshire Post.  He compared the way the list works to "gerrymandering".

The Yorkshire Post's Simon McGee also reveals another twist to the already controversial fast-tracking of Rehman Chishti on to the A-list:

"Rehman Chishti, who fought the 2005 election as Labour's candidate against Tory party chairman Francis Maude, moved over to the Conservatives amid a fanfare of publicity last March and in the same month attended a Parliamentary Assessment Board.  Party sources said a panel, including Mr Cameron's parliamentary private secretary, Desmond Swayne, failed him. Under rules which have applied to countless long-standing Tory hopefuls, Mr Chishti should have been made to wait at least 12 months before being allowed a resit – but one was organised for him just weeks later.  He passed the second assessment and his name was placed on the list over the summer.  The revelation was met with alarm last night. One angry A-list candidate, who asked not to be named, said: "Things like that completely undermine the A-list and turn it into even more of a joke than it's already perceived.  "How can it have any credibility when they bend the rules like that?"  Mr Davies said: "I don't see why people who have worked for the Conservative Party for years should be pushed to one side to make way for somebody who has been working against the party for years. Everybody should be treated equally."

Related link: B-listers miss opportunity to collar Cameron