Some rush extracts just emailed to me by Jonathan Sheppard after his interview with Head of Candidates, John Maples MP...
Maples wants to be selection dictator in his perfect world (1min15secs)
"I would like to be able to run this like a dictator. I could achieve what I want. I could get the right candidates in the right seats, the right percentages of women and ethnic minority candidates but the party's not going to wear that and each association has autonomy. The rules have been a process of negotiation and agreement with the voluntary side of the party."
Unfair A-list achieved objective (6mins40secs)
"The problem with the A list is that it was unfair on quite a lot of men but on the other hand it did achieve the objective we set of getting more women selected."
Tories failing to attract new women in large numbers (12mins15secs)
"800 people on it at the moment - 140 waiting for a Parliamentary Assessment Board - not enough of those are women - only 1/5 are women. On the list as a whole only about a third are women."
