Party Chairman Caroline Spelman answers our selection of the questions that you asked her here.
Jim: Caroline, can we have your assurance that making our voter software "fit for purpose" with Associations and Branches is in your top 5 priorities?
It's certainly one of my top priorities. Rolling out new software is never straightforward and there will be glitches, but having seen the advantages that the new system has to offer I'm certain it will be worth it. To be fair, our IT department are putting in a Herculean effort to get it up and running as quickly and easily as possible but complications will arise as they do with any organization embarking on an IT project of that scale.
James Maskell: Does the Conservative Party have any plans to make membership of the Party more affordable?
We've got some ideas in the pipeline for membership which you will hear about next year, but in terms of membership rates we do have the lowest standard suggested membership amongst the three main political parties. £25 is the rate at which we charge members who wish to join centrally, and it is the annual rate we suggest associations charge, but in line with our aim to devolve more power to local associations they have the right to vary the membership fees as long as a small registration figure is paid to CCHQ for each member in order to cover administration.
Alex Swanson: When is the leadership going to start appreciating and listening to the membership and activists instead of, as currently seems to be the case, regarding them only as an embarrassing and potentially dispensable source of money and election manhours?
When I was first elected in 1997 it was on a recount with a majority of just 582 so I am acutely aware and appreciative of the work done by our members and activists. Far from being embarrassing or dispensable I want the Party to invest in its members and activists so that there is a greater sense of unity and people feel their involvement with the Party is a genuine two way street. We are already making good progress, not least through Don Porter's tireless efforts in bringing CCHQ and the voluntary party closer together. As you may know the Conservative Policy Forum was established in 1945 and is still going strong. Just last month David Cameron wrote a letter of response to all CPF members in response to their latest submission. In addition our Stand Up Speak Up consultation on the policy group reports also marked a genuine commitment to engage with everyone interested in the Conservatives about the issues that matter to them.
Alan S: With Lord Ashcroft in charge of polling and marginal seats and George Osborne in charge of General election coordination, do you agree that there are too many chiefs and it would be better to have one person running the Tory operation?
Well surprisingly I don't agree! It's commonplace for modern political parties to have an election strategist as well as a chairman or president. In terms of Lord Ashcroft, if you have someone with acumen like his, who is willing to offer his expertise and support, you should welcome it. One of the most important leadership skills is being secure enough to bring in the best people to help and then to trust them to do the job. David Cameron is good at that and I like to think I'm not bad at it either. I'm really confident about how the Party machinery is performing, certainly it was good enough to force Brown into a U-turn over the autumn election but we can't be complacent. We know there are still some areas where we need to improve.
Tony Makara: Why is the shadow cabinet not quicker on its feet when responding to Labour claims that we have full employment, better standards in education, more access to NHS dentistry etc? These claims are clearly lies, repeated on a weekly basis by Labour, but the public are liable to believe them if they are not immediately countered by shadow cabinet members in the media.
I think our staff in the press office do a great job, and it's certainly not easy. If you compare the size of our press office with the might of the media resources available to the government we do very well. Of course, there are occasions when we can't get our spokespeople quoted as often as we would like but it is not through any lack of dedication on the part of our staff or our Shadow Cabinet. I can speak from experience as a shadow cabinet member who, along with my colleagues, are on call at all hours of the day and night in order to respond to stories.
Tony: More support needs to be given to our constituency agents. It always seems that the agents are the last to know anything even though we rely on them so much to get the message out first. Does Caroline think that agents are given enough support from CCHQ and does she think, given the very high turnover of agents, that they are paid (or incentivised) enough? I'd also like to know to how many agents did Caroline send xmas cards to?
Agents are vital to our Party's electoral success, there's no doubt about that. We are determined to give them all the professional support they require as well as ongoing training and development. Those commitments along with a more defined operating structure for all our field staff will also mean the opportunities for career progression are clearer. All agents employed by CCHQ should certainly have had a Christmas card from me but let me take this opportunity to wish all our field staff a Happy Christmas! [Caroline submitted her answers to ConservativeHome just before Christmas!]
HF: You have a large group of people to understand what is going on from, I have no doubt that you have a punishing travel agenda. But there are other ways you can augment the information you gain from personal meetings. Do you have regular monthly online surveys of the views of 1) Association Chairmen, 2) Agents and 3) MPs and candidates? If not, why not?
My diary is certainly hectic, balancing my duty as Chairman, work as a constituency MP and responsibilities as a mother. From the New Year I am aiming to undertake at least one regional tour each week and this will increase as we get closer to the local elections. During the numerous engagements I undertake as Chairman I get people's opinions and take them back to CCHQ to follow up. With regard to monthly surveys from CCHQ I am open-minded but experience tells me that participation rates can soon diminish and I would be wary of creating a job of work that would divert our staff from the job of winning elections if the same outcome can be achieved in a different way. Ultimately we want the relevant departments in CCHQ that work with particular groups of people to make sure there is strong two way communication throughout the year rather than just once a month.
CCHQ Spy: Do you read blogs like ConservativeHome? What is your view of them?
Yes, whenever I want to reread an internal memo that has been sent out in CCHQ! Seriously, I read them as often as I can, but realistically it's not every day. The speed and accessibility of the blogosphere is taking media in an exciting new direction. With the advent of blogging I guess politicians have to be thicker skinned than before as the readers' comments often contain opinions expressed in a way that would not make it into the letters section of the newspapers!
John Strafford: A Member of Parliament is always accountable to ordinary Party members. At any time they can call a meeting and put down a motion of no confidence. A Member of the European Parliament is only accountable at the point of reselection. Why has the vote of the ordinary member been taken away in the reselection process and the decision left to an Electoral College of Constituency Chairmen?
The vote of the member has not been taken away and you will be receiving your ballot papers for the Euro selections in the New Year. However, it is true that the initial "selection" of the candidates put forward for ranking is done by the Electoral College. Whilst this is not the same as the direct selection for MPs we are confined by having to work with the regional list system, not a system of our choosing and in my view one which has the problem of detaching an individual MEP from a specific constituency.
tbc: Do you not think we need more professional agents in key seats instead of groupings? I know of an agent who by themselves covers three marginals, two metropolitan councils plus a selection of less winnable seats. How can they make any impact?
In an ideal world we would have professional agents in every seat but realistically we have limited resources and we need to find the most efficient way of distributing them. We are hoping to increase the number of field staff we have, but the great thing about groupings is that it enables us to invest in top flight staff and equipment which can then service a broader geographical area. One of the first engagements I did as Chairman was to open the West Yorkshire campaign centre just outside Bradford and it's such a good facility that it really makes the case for them, but I accept that for some constituencies it is a difficult transition.
John: It is greatly appreciated that you are taking questions. Mine are somewhat direct, but well intended: Why has the A list effectively been reintroduced and why are associations being so strongly armtwisted to hold A list selections?
Do you think the A list is now appropriate at all, when all the evidence is that people on the A list are there because of who their friends are and there is a lot of evidence that selected candidates who were not on the A list have been more effective in terms of organising, time, candidate image, campaigning and getting publicity than their A list counterparts?
The record on selection of female candidates is still dismal. Don't you think we should have 50% all women shortlists for the final selections to fix the problem and have done with it - all other selections being open to all comers on the list?
The A list has not been effectively "re-introduced", what has happened is that associations are given the choice as to whether they wish to select from the A list or not. I am not persuaded of your suggestion that "all the evidence" points to candidates not on the A list out-performing their counterparts who were selected from the A list, if an association feels their candidate is under-performing, whether they have been selected from the A list or not, they should in the first instance take that up with their candidate. At present we have around 30% of those candidates selected which are women, this is a vast improvement on the 2005 selected candidate list but we still have a lot of work to do. We have no plans to move to all women shortlists but we must renew our efforts at all levels in the Party to get more women on the approved list and more women selected.
Jayne Black: There needs to be co-operation between the Associations and the party's central operations. Co-operation requires respect and communication. That said do you know that leaflets are being created and printed centrally and dumped on some Associations without anyone in the Association being given prior notice? Will you please promise to stop this and sort out the people who are failing to communicate?
Of course cooperation, mutual respect and communication are vital to the way our organisation works. If there has been a specific failure to communicate I will happily look into it, but through our network of field staff this should not be the case. With regard to leaflets, in the run up to and immediately after conference when Gordon Brown was dithering about whether to hold an election the field campaigning team produced some excellent leaflets which were given free of charge to a number of target seats. In all cases, these leaflets were produced at very short notice. Associations were told in advance so it may be that a mis-communication occurred within the association, but without knowing the specifics of your case I cannot be sure. We did have some very good feedback about these leaflets and many associations requested additional copies.
Anthony Broderick: It was said that George Eustice will return to CCHQ to manage external relations, can you confirm this? If not, can we have at least one person doing that job asap? The American political parties have more than one person to deal with blogs alone.
I've worked with George for a long time and I rate him very highly indeed. I think you are right and I agree that there is certainly a role for managing and coordinating specific external relationships. Successful businesses tend to be good at segmenting the market when it comes to communications and Andy Coulson has made great progress in configuring his team in such a way that we can do that.
Disraeli: Caroline, thanks for coming on here to answer questions. I have a couple of questions that I would like you to answer: A few years ago, the Guardian described you as "a Tory who Labour MPs think should be one of them." What did you make of that?
Do you think that enough progress has been made in getting people from non traditional backgrounds selected as candidates. I'm thinking particularly of those educated at comprehensive schools, those working in the public services and those who can easily relate to voters in some of the key battleground seats?
I'd almost forgotten about that Guardian quote - I don't mind to be honest as you have to bear in mind the context. At the time that article was written, New Labour was seen as fresh and speaking out on a whole range of issues which we were perceived as being ambivalent about, issues like domestic violence, childcare and international development. So in a small way that description of me may have helped change the public perception of what we Conservatives are really like. Under David Cameron the Party has really changed and adopted a more progressive, wide-ranging agenda focusing on the issues that really concern people, as a result it's harder to characterize my politics as being out of step with the rest of the Party.
On your second question, the short answer is: there is more work to do. We are making strong progress in increasing female and BME representation, but we have to keep our efforts up so that people from all backgrounds stand and get elected as Conservatives.
MJ: CCHQ finance department is crippling our association as they are not paying us 'our' money quick enough. Cash flow for us is a nightmare! I have spoken to some PPC's who experience the same. What is going on?
Without the exact details it is a bit tricky for me to answer this one, however if you want to write to me at CCHQ with the specifics I'm happy to look into this for you. As a general rule we tend to credit money to associations so that it is reduced from their annual levy. The idea of moving membership almost entirely to association control was to give associations far greater control over their own finances.
