Mark Wallace, Chris Jeffries - and media reporting

by Paul Goodman

2.45pm Update: Dominic Grieve, the Attorney General, has said that if necessary he will issue a notice to remind the media of their obligation to coverage the murder inquiry fairly.

Mark Wallace has written a superlative post on Crash Bang Wallace about the media's reporting in relation to Chris Jeffries.  He rightly doesn't take a view on whether Jeffries is or isn't guilty of any crime.  He no less correctly notes that a principle of our legal system is that people are innocent until proved guilty, but that the media is prone to assume otherwise if it doesn't like the cut of someone's jib.

It's worth reading Wallace's piece in full.  But I can sum it up by reporting his view, namely that - according to the media - the posh, solitary, oddball loner only child who's never married, pronounces words idiosyncratically, loves poetry, shows no interest in cars or sports, and has campaigned for a gun range and the prayer book "obviously did it".

Wallace also refers to the arrest of Tom Stephens in relation to the Ipswich prostitute murders.  Readers may remember the story of Colin Stagg.

Paul Goodman MP: I'm leaving the Commons before it becomes a place of cowed and toiling drudges

This article appears in the Bucks Free Press and has also been submitted to ConservativeHome.com.

Last week, the Daily Telegraph cleared me from its enquiries into the MPs’ expenses scandal – describing my housing bills as “modest”.  But I’ve no intention of hiding behind its brief and benign summary.  Today, I’m giving the Bucks Free Press the full details, as promised.

My most controversial claims are probably as follows.  I paid several bills late – including a 2004 Council Tax bill so tardy that I was required by Wycombe District Council to make the rest of the year’s payments in advance.  The Commons authorities also rejected two of my claims – one for a bed, and one for a mattress.

In the first case, they wrote to explain that the claim was against the rules, because my young son would sleep in the bed.  In the second, they didn’t bother.  Previously, they allowed claims for a cot, a stairgate, a booster seat, and a pair of child’s blinds.  Readers will draw their own conclusions about the intelligibility of the rules – let alone their reasonableness.

MPs should obviously pay their taxes on time, and I’m sorry to be so slow with bills.  But, in general, I defend my claims.  Voters can’t demand the commitment that they expect of MPs and simultaneously refuse them the means to carry it out.

And, yes, I’m afraid that means bills for housing and homes, utility bills, subsistence and travel.  No responsible Wycombe-based business would make an employee meet regularly in London until after 10.30 in the evening, and refuse to put him up in a hotel for the night.  The MP for Wycombe should be treated no less fairly.  My housing costs last year were roughly the same as those hotel costs, paid at a civil service rate.

For the record, I’ve never flipped a property for profit or inflated my claims to the maximum.  On the controversial accommodation allowance, I come in lower than most MPs.  And during the last Parliament, I not only voted against improved pension terms for MPs, but went on to refuse to take them.  I look forward to hearing from constituents who’ve also turned down large amounts of public money.

The voters of Wycombe have always been kind to me.  I suspect that, when the dust settles, they’ll consider their local MP, ponder, and conclude that while I have my faults – who doesn’t? – the Daily Telegraph’s summary is fair.  At the next general election, I could reasonably look forward, given the expected swing to my party, to gaining more votes than I lose and serving, under a leader I like and admire, to help make Britain a better place.

Paul Goodman MP: Should Britain engage with Syria?

Paul Goodman, MP for Wycombe and a Shadow DCLG Minister, weighs up the merits of engaging with Syria versus isolating it.

Politicians tend to travel abroad, when working, as guests of governments.  They therefore often see what those governments want them to see – and can end up thinking what they’re led to think.

I strike this precautionary note, writing about Syria, as a reminder to beware of the syndrome.  I’ve recently been there – not, as it happens, as a guest of the Syrian Government, but courtesy of the British-Syrian Society, which certainly has good links to it.

The latter has an unenviable reputation.  It holds sway over what’s in effect a one-party state – governed in theory by Baathism, a pan-Arab, mostly secular, socialist-leaning ideology, and run in practice by a largely Alawite clan network, headed by Syria’s President, Bashar al-Assad.

Human Rights Watch describes Syria’s justice record as “poor”, and reports that the Government “strictly limits freedom of expression, association, and assembly”.  A state of emergency has been in place since 1963 - three years before Bashar’s father, Hafez al-Assad, seized power in a coup.  It’s impossible for an outsider to understand exactly where and in what measure real power resides, amidst the governing network that Hafez patiently and ruthlessly established.

Paul Goodman MP: Boris Johnson defeated Islamic extremists as well as Ken Livingstone

Paul Goodman, MP for Wycombe and a Shadow DCLG Minister, welcomes Boris Johnson's victory as good news for community cohesion.

This result isn’t just a wonderful victory for Boris and the termination of Livingstone.  It’s also a defeat for the campaign – an exceptionally dirty one, at that - waged against Boris by a small band of separatists claiming to act in the name of all London’s Muslims. The effects of Boris’ win will be felt not only in the capital, but nationwide – and they’re worth probing in detail.

This campaign’s aim was to attack Boris as an Islamophobe; swing Muslim voters unanimously behind Livingstone; deliver the election for him; emerge, thereby, as a leading force in British Islam, and thus send an uncompromising message to the main political parties – follow our line, or there’ll be electoral consequences.

Its first shots were fired in January, when it was claimed that over fifty Islamic organisations in London had written to the Guardian endorsing Livingstone.  (It later emerged that some of the letter’s signatories had written only in a “personal capacity”.)  Its final salvo was the desperate advert, placed recently in the London Bengali paper “Janomot”, implying that Boris, as Mayor, would ban the Koran.

Paul Goodman MP: They may be terror-linked but we won't comment

Paul Goodman, Shadow Community Cohesion spokesman in the Commons, unearths extraordinary Government evasion over a Muslim group and a contested London mosque scheme.

Tablighi Jamaat is a controversial organisation which wants to build a large mosque close to the site of the 2012 Olympic stadium.  Its critics claim that it’s associated with extremism and terrorism.  Ministers may have a view on these claims – but, if so, won’t say what it is.

The Editor’s kindly allowed me to share with ConservativeHome readers how I unearthed this strange Government policy position (or lack of one).

Earlier this year, Conservative MPs began to receive letters which cited these claims.  Shadow Ministers were asked for a view.  Obviously, we don’t have access to the same security advice as Ministers, so the sensible course to take was to write to the Government asking for its view on the record.

I sent an enquiring letter to Hazel Blears, the DCLG Secretary.  The reply that I received from Parmjit Dhanda, the Community Cohesion Minister, took us a bit further.  It confirmed “that there’s no current planning application before Newham Council” (which we knew); said that the site “suffers from a number of development constraints” and that “the Council does not expect a planning application in the near future” (which was interesting), and that “Tablighi Jamaat is not proscribed and I’m sure you will understand that it is Government policy not to comment on organisations or groups that are not proscribed”.

Paul Goodman MP: After the bomb plots

Paul Goodman, a Shadow Minister in the DCLG team, sets out Conservative principles for relations with Islam.

Regular ConservativeHome readers will know that I’ve a special constituency interest in Islam and Muslims in Britain: the Editor’s kindly let me post on these matters in the recent past (here and here).  So I was delighted when David Cameron asked me last week to join Eric Pickles’ Shadow DCLG team to work with Sayeeda Warsi on community cohesion.  For community cohesion, read helping to sustain and build a common sense of Britishness.

Community cohesion, of course, is not – repeat not – just about Muslims and Islam.  Neither will it be central to cohesion in, say, East Yorkshire or West Devon (or, for that matter, in some parts of our suburbs and cities).  Other religions matter just as much – not least Christianity, which still boasts our state church: a very large number of Britons self-identify as Christians.  Indeed, some argue that religion isn’t a core element of community cohesion or Britishness at all.

But against the background of the attempted terrorist outrages in London and Glasgow – and Gordon Brown’s response as Prime Minister to both – I want to return to my special interest, and offer four principles on which, during the months ahead, to build a Conservative approach to community cohesion policy in relation to Islam and Muslims.

Paul Goodman MP: Levelling the childcare playing field

Paul Goodman MP is Shadow Minister for Childcare and MP for Wycombe.

We've just completed a major childcare consultation exercise with children's organisations, voluntary groups and charities.  The Conservative Women's Organisation has already undertaken its own survey of party opinion.  It's too early for a full policy response, since Iain Duncan-Smith's Social Justice Policy Group will be publishing its own proposals during the summer.  But this doesn't mean that the party is painting on a blank canvas: David Cameron, George Osborne and David Willetts have all made major speeches on childcare during the last year, and mapped out the strategic direction in which we're travelling.  I want to sum up where we are after roughly 15 months of David’s leadership.

Like schools and hospitals, childcare – like other aspects of policy for families - is a front-rank issue for voters.  At its heart are two vital aspects: the needs of parents (who more often that not have no option but to juggle work and family life in today’s 24/7 world) and outcomes for children.

Paul Goodman MP: Why I want to kiss Sir Menzies

Paul Goodman MP is Shadow Minister for Childcare and MP for Wycombe.

I’m tempted to cover Sir* Menzies Campbell’s face with kisses.

Thank you, Sir Menzies!  By setting out five tests for Gordon Brown – and confirming that the Chancellor, if he meets them, “will have changed direction, and embraced Liberal Democracy” – Sir Menzies has effectively penned a key Conservative slogan for the next election: “Vote Liberal – and get Brown”.

And just to confirm that he meant what he said, “a party official suggested it was the first indication that Sir Menzies would be interested in forming a coalition if the Lib Dems held the balance of power”.

Why on earth did he do it?  Why did the Liberal leader tell Britain’s voters what the Westminster village already knows – namely, that the Liberal Democrats would never consent to form a coalition with the Conservatives?  (After all, Sir Menzies didn’t offer “five tests” to David Cameron, did he?)

Complex and convoluted answers will no doubt be offered.  Some will no doubt claim that Sir Menzies’ words were part of some cunning plan to win back voters who supported the Liberals at the last election but have since then drifted to Labour.

I doubt it.  More Liberal Democrat MPs have the Conservatives in second place than Labour.  They held or won their seats in 2005 by attracting centre-right voters.  There’s already a limit to the number of Labour votes that they can squeeze (especially with core Labour voters looking to return to or stick with Brown).  There’s no point in alarming these centre-right voters by reminding them that in a hung Parliament Sir Menzies would angle for a coalition with the next Labour Prime Minister.

My explanation’s simple.  Sir Menzies, like the late John Smith, is a centre-left lawyer from north of the border.  And like John Smith and like Donald Dewar, the Liberal leader is of the generation of centre-left Scottish politicians who worked together to bring about devolution.
The fruits of devolution, of course, already include a Lab-Lib coalition in Scotland.  Lib-Labbery and Lab-Libbery is, as the cliché has it, in Sir Menzies’s DNA.  And can any ConservativeHome reader name another senior left-of-centre Scottish MP who, like the Liberal leader, sits for a Scottish seat, and was also instrumental in forcing through devolution?  Clue for the baffled: have a look at the top Ministerial slot on the Treasury website.  We should all want to kiss Sir Menzies for spelling his plans out so clearly. 

Paul Goodman: Islamism - from analysis to action

Paul Goodman is MP for Wycombe.

Last summer, my Wycombe constituency found itself in the media spotlight after the alleged airplane bomb plot. Four of my constituents were held. Two have been charged with serious offences. As I write, a local school which bars the niqab or veil for both educational and social reasons is facing a human rights court battle with a legally-aided parent.

Some readers may not know that Wycombe has the largest proportion of Muslims of any Conservative-held constituency. Relations between Muslims and non-Muslims are an important issue locally. And they are, by and large, good. There is a growing Muslim middle class, and the whole community makes a huge contribution to the town. Employment levels are high – compared, at least, to Oldham or Burnley, whose visible troubles we’ve largely avoided. The tradition of the main mosques is moderate and sufi-influenced. Its leadership condemns terror unequivocally. Local Muslims have helpfully made it clear that wearing the veil isn’t an Islamic requirement.

Nonetheless, the local veil case is a reminder of the fragility of relations across Britain. So was the recent Dispatches programme entitled "Undercover Mosque", and yesterday’s Policy Exchange report which found that one in eight young Muslims are prepared to "fight the west" and that four in ten wish to live under forms of sharia law. As Munira Mirza - one of the report’s authors and herself a Muslim – put it:

"There is clearly a conflict within British Islam between a moderate majority that accepts the norms of British democracy and a growing minority that does not".

Paul Goodman MP: Wycombe, the Muslim community, and the battle of ideas

Paul Goodman is MP for Wycombe

MPs tend to reconcile. The instinct to smooth over difficulties is part of our make-up. After all, we want to appeal to as many of our voters as possible. We aim to get elected - and re-elected. This instinct is perhaps especially strong if one’s constituency is affected by a terror plot and a media tornado, as mine has been during the last ten days. One speaks words of comfort and seeks to bring people together.

Wycombe has - I’ve said - good community relations. The vast majority of my Muslim constituents abhor terror. They’re peaceful and law-abiding. Hostility towards Muslims is reprehensible. Furthermore, local community leadership is good. Islam has an important role in modern Britain, and the social traditionalism of Muslims – their attachment to marriage, to strong family life, to the claims of religion – has a natural appeal to political conservatives.

All this is no less true for being said often. The Muslim community (which is overwhelmingly Kashmiri and Pakistani in origin) is well integrated into the formal life of High Wycombe: councillors who are Muslims sit for both the main political parties. The town boasted Britain’s first Conservative Asian Mayor. The Mosque tradition is moderate. There is a growing Muslim middle class. Employment levels are high – compared, at least, to Oldham or Burnley, whose visible troubles we’ve largely avoided. In short, High Wycombe is a success story.

Paul Goodman MP: Childcare - choice, information and social justice

Paul Goodman is a great friend of ConservativeHome - posting throughout the leadership contest on behalf of the Davis campaign.  David Cameron appointed Paul to the Treasury team as Shadow Minister for Childcare and he posts on his new brief below...

Our opponents propogate two myths about the Conservative Party and childcare...

• The first is that we're authoritarians, who believe that all mothers should stay at home.
• The second is that we're libertarians, who believe that childcare can simply be left to the market.

Obviously, these myths are mutually inconsistent.  They're also untrue.

These are early days in David Cameron's leadership.  But they're not too early for us to communicate our convictions and ideals to voters, or to counter myth with truth.  We not only recognise but welcome the choice which many modern mothers make - to pursue their aspirations by working in the labour market.  (Others, of course, work in the labour market mainly or entirely because they need the money.) And we not only acknowledge but believe strongly that childcare is about more than markets.  It's also about the life chances of children - about ensuring that they’re well cared for, well fed, well raised, well introduced to the world around them, and ultimately able to fulfil their potential.

When David asked me to serve as Shadow Minister for Childcare, he told me that childcare will be a vital issue at the next election.  Although it’s far too early to set out detailed policy, I want to describe the present situation as I see it, and explore three key principles on which our childcare policy should be informed: choice, information, and social justice.

The childcare status quo could be described by setting out a long list of facts and statistics.  It's probably more useful - and certainly more straightforward - to try to describe it from the point of view of parents, as reported to voluntary sector groups that specialise in childcare.  So let me quote an anonymous parent from Greenwich whose words are reported in the Daycare Trust's document "Talking about childcare - conversations with parents and children from low-income parents".

The parent says:

"They need to make it so that all walks of life can understand it…they need to simplify it for everyday people…not everyone's a brain box…I'm not that intellectual when it comes to reading or problem solving."

I suspect that these words capture the flavour of childcare for many parents from different backgrounds in Britain today.  Juggling the demands of work and home and family, perhaps relying on a relative or neighbour for childcare during working hours, or relying on that relative or neighbour to take your child to a nursery early in the day, or to collect that child later in the day; struggling with costs; searching for information about childminders or breakfast clubs or playgroups; negotiating one's way through the tax credit system; looking for childcare outside work hours - all this is breathtakingly complex, and especially formidable for single parents or parents from disadvantaged groups.  The words of that parent from Greenwich convey a sense of childcare as a maze.

I believe that the three principles of choice, information and social justice can act as a guide to negotiate that maze.  First, choice.  It's obvious that the first providers of childcare are parents - but, like many obvious facts, it bears repetition.  Parents know better than governments what's best for their children.  It follows that they must be free to make the childcare choices they want.  Gordon Brown is uneasy with this simple truth - and with choice.  The childcare system which he's built up since 1997 gives more support to parents who work in the labour market than those who don't: for example, parents who don't work in the labour market can't access the childcare tax credit.  Brown's system also gives more support to formal than informal carers: informal carers can't usually access the childcare tax credit either.  (Theresa May produced imaginative proposals to improve access to this tax credit in our election manifesto last year.)

These are snapshots of some of the problems caused by the way in which Brown is increasing childcare demand.  His complicated cats-cradle of tax credits and benefit payments and funding streams provides more help to some families than others on much the same incomes.  As the detailed work of CARE has demonstrated, one-earner couples are clearly disadvantaged by the present system.  Patricia Hewitt effectively conceded this when she said during the last Parliament when Minister for Women:

"If I look back over the last six years I do think that we've given the impression that we think all mothers should be out to work, preferably full-time as soon as their children are a few months old".

Other European countries have found simpler and fairer ways of increasing childcare demand.  Finland, for example, offers a homecare allowance worth up to 40 per cent of average female earnings to parents of under-threes.  Norway pays a similar allowance to parents of under-twos.  France has its allocation parentale d'education.

So much for the childcare demand problems exacerbated by Brown.  What about the supply problems?  During the last Parliament, David Willetts cited some of the restraints which prevent new childcare facilities from opening up and new people from entering the childcare workforce: planning laws, health and safety, the way in which VAT is levied, the 17-page form which you have to fill in if you want to become a childminder.  If these and similar problems aren't tackled, further increases in childcare demand will be swallowed up by higher prices – and British childcare is already expensive, with occupancy rates that have actually fallen.  Conservatives are natural pruners-back of red tape, rules and regulations.  We should have a gleam in our eye about the opportunities that the next Conservative Government will have to cut childcare red tape, increase supply and at least stabilise the price of childcare.

But most parents, of course, don't simply want childcare choice.  They want informed childcare choice.  This is where the second principle that I want to set out - information - comes in.  Parents often find it hard to get reliable information about childcare locally and nationally - perhaps especially about the effects that different sorts of childcare have on children.  This territory is contested, often bitterly.  The traditionalist corner argues that daycare damages children's life chances.  Daycare organisations, unsurprisingly, argue the opposite.  As the research continues to roll out, conclusions must be tentative.  But the evidence I've seen indicates that high-quality daycare is good for older pre-school children.

This raises the question of whether the dash for childcare quantity under Brown has been accompanied by a rise in childcare quality.  High-quality childcare means a higher-status, better-qualified, better-paid childcare work force.  This is a desirable goal, but it comes with a price tag.  Building a higher-status workforce means spending public money – and there are always limits on the spending of public money.  The point was put forcefully last year:

"Given the scale of the cost, and the competing demands on the public purse, it is not realistic to think that we can provide universal and high quality care to all families free of charge."

The speaker was Ed Balls, now the Labour MP for Normanton, and one of Brown’s main advisers.  During the early part of this Parliament, we’ll be examining how the next Conservative Government will simplify childcare information; untangle the knot of current childcare funding streams; provide high-quality childcare, and learn from successful childcare provision in other European countries, in which formal education often starts later.

But childcare choice - even informed childcare choice - is not enough.  Conservatives don't believe that choice floats values-free in a moral vacuum.  For us, choice is not an excuse for making selfish decisions, but an instrument for achieving social justice.  Brown sees childcare as playing a part in the struggle against child poverty.  Brown didn’t invent that struggle:
Shaftesbury, Wilberforce, Disraeli and MacMillan were fighting it long before he was born.  But improving children’s life chances is obviously a point of consensus between us.  However, while we’ll always agree with Brown about battling against child poverty, we will often disagree with him about the means.

Brown’s main means is central control from Westminster and Whitehall, backed up by targets, with a heavy emphasis on state provision.  We’re committed to retaining SureStart: indeed, Theresa May and Tim Loughton advanced plans to improve it before the last election – SureStart Plus.  But it must be conceded that the Government’s own research shows that SureStart’s results are disappointing.  So we will also want to examine, in the wake of the current Childcare Bill, how government can enable the private and voluntary sectors to play a larger role in raising the life chances of children.  And since good life chances are inextricably connected to what happens in childrens’ early years, my colleagues will be looking more widely at ways of improving our families’ policy.

These are huge challenges.  We’ll only be able to meet them if we engage voluntary organisations, businesses, think-tanks, faith communities, interest groups, party members and (most importantly) parents in our policy review of childcare.

Your contribution is valuable and your views are welcome...

Paul Goodman MP: Seven Observations

Paul Goodman MP writes his last post for the Davis campaign.

The Editor has asked me to write (or should that be trumpet?) a last post.  Since the result won’t be announced until later today, it would be inappropriate for me to declare who it’s being blown for.  So here - instead of a fanfare, riff, blast, trill or raspberry – is a brief improvisation entitled “Seven Observations”:

(1) This long-drawn-out leadership contest was widely expected to lower morale and sap expectations.  Instead, it’s allowed a sense of reinvigoration and renewal to blossom.  Party conference was expected to showcase division; instead, it provided a platform for debate and discussion.  And in the new Parliamentary session, rampant Ministers were expected to taunt a hamstrung opposition; instead, that session has seen the resignation of David Blunkett and the first defeat of the Government in the Commons since 1997.

(2) As I’ve written before, DD must take much of the credit for this turnaround.  He went into the members’ ballot as the underdog.  He leaves that ballot as the underdog.  It would have been easy for him to fold his bid after the Parliamentary stage.  Instead, he took the long and winding road of the membership stage, with all that it entails: nationwide hustings, television debates (in which he excelled), hectic travel, ceaseless media scrutiny – all carried out despite the expectation by others of defeat.

(3) If David Cameron wins, expect attention to be focused quickly on, inter alia, the question of the relationship between the party and the European Peoples’ Party.

(4) If DD wins, don’t expect attention to be focused quickly on anything, because nearly everyone will be too surprised to react and (in some cases) to think, though not (in all cases) to comment.

(5) Whoever wins, expect the party to end its quarter of a century as the anti-establishment party of British politics.  Remember: you read it here first.

(6) Whoever wins, expect also to see the long dominance of the conservative media over the Conservative Party (which began in the Major era) to come to an end.  David Cameron has already been greeted as a diamond geezer by the Sun, yoked the Daily Telegraph to his chariot wheels, and survived some passing unhelpfulness from the Daily Mail.  DC is clearly prepared to tell conservative commentators politely but firmly when he disagrees with them.  Expect no less of DD.

(7) I’ve enjoyed blogging on this site very much.  I’ve enjoyed no less reading the threads which have followed from others, have intended from time to time to post a thread myself commenting on some of the comments, and am sorry that my lack of technical prowess has prevented me from so doing.

Paul Goodman MP: Are Tories About To Re-Join The Establishment?

Paul Goodman has been blogging regularly from the Davis Campaign.  This is his latest entry.  Michael Gove has been posting for Camp Cameron.

Will this leadership contest see the end of the Conservative Party of the last quarter-century?  I ask the question because a shift seems to be taking place in the party's view of the establishment - and, consequently, in the party's view of itself.

The establishment is easier to name than define: indeed, there's lots of disagreement about what it is - even about whether it exists at all.  For what it's worth, I'll risk a description, if not exactly a definition.  I’d describe the establishment as the governing class.

This class, of course, is always changing: it's certainly changed a great deal since Henry Fairlie wrote about it in 1955.  Today, that establishment is a liberal establishment.  Its locations haven't changed all that much: the Universities, the Inns of Court, the BBC, much of the world of the arts.  Its attitudes, however, have changed out of all recognition - towards (for example) race, Israel, women, Christianity, markets, the United States, sex, censorship, animals, the environment and rights.  There are lots more examples, but these will do for a start.

Many of these changes are clearly for the better (i.e: markets).  Some of them are for the worse (i.e: the United States).  Most of them have advantages and drawbacks.  (A rising awareness of human rights violations abroad is a good thing; the human rights culture at home is not.)  But whatever the rights or wrongs of the establishment may be, the Conservative Party's attitude towards it has been broadly consistent since the Thatcher era: we've opposed it.  We've been the anti-establishment party.

Margaret Thatcher promoted this view in government, saying that "The Lady's not for turning".  (John Major tried to buck the trend with his gentler, kinder conservatism, but this didn't last long.)   William Hague continued it in opposition with his "commonsense revolution".  Only last May, Michael Howard promised support for "the forgotten majority".  The incarnation of the Conservative Party as an anti-establishment force was, and perhaps remains, Norman Tebbit.

The party has won four elections and lost three since Lady Thatcher became its leader, but while its vote has strayed up and down, the nature of that vote has been consistently Tebbitised, as it were.  Class categorisations can be misleading, but it's none the less true to say that we've won new support among what could be called the upper working and lower middle classes, but lost support elsewhere among the wider middle class.  In 2001, my first election, I found more enthusiasm for the party in houses with small drives in High Wycombe than houses with long drives in Marlow.  My seat, being Conservative, isn't typical, but I think that the illustration holds good.

Since 2001, a consensus has slowly emerged that we can't go on like this.  We've lost the wider middle classes, it argues, because we're seen as the nasty party.  We're seen to care about the countryside, but not the cities and the suburbs; about the regiments, but not the threat to the environment from global warming; about Gibraltar and Zimbabwe, but not (as David Cameron has put it) about Darfur.  We're believed to care, this consensus argues, only about people like us.  It claims that we lack the D-factor - decency.

You don't need me to tell you that this belief – energetically promoted by our opponents -  is untrue, or that it's a grotesque insult to the contribution to clubs, charities, voluntary groups and faith communities made by our members up and down the land.  Its wrongness and unfairness is beside the point I want to make.  (And debating how it has come about would take too long.)  That point, very simply, is that a consensus has emerged which holds that the voters won't listen to our message until we change our image.

I quoted David Cameron on Darfur a few lines ago, but this consensus view is shared to some degree by both leadership candidates.  One's slogan is "Modern conservatism".  The other's is "Modern, compassionate conservatism".  Are all readers sure about whose is which?  When candidates' rhetoric converges like this, you can be sure that their viewpoints converge too.

And convergence about analysis is matched by convergence on action.  Certainly, there are important differences: tax and spend is a clear example.  But there are also huge areas of overlap - the most noticeable, perhaps, being on social justice, and the agenda for change formed during the last Parliament by Iain Duncan-Smith and promoted in this one especially by Liam Fox.

So let me make a prediction.  Whichever David wins, expect to see a sharp and sudden change in the party’s approach to the establishment – to the BBC, to the older churches, to the judges, to the residually anti-Thatcher element in the world of the arts and the media, to the liberal intelligensia.  Expect to see the party become more of an establishment party.  Expect to look back to the last but one leadership election, and perhaps call this change the (posthumous) triumph of Michael Portillo.  And if you don’t like it, don’t complain afterwards that you weren’t tipped off in advance.

This about-turn would of course be more sudden and sharp under David Cameron.  I will welcome much of it, whoever wins.  Yes, the party must change.  Yes, it must recover its reputation for decency.  And no, we can’t go on as we are.  But I also believe that the party ought to be deeply uncomfortable about the prospect of being drawn back into the embrace of the establishment.  Our quarter-century as an anti-establishment party has seen many faults and flaws, but it’s been stamped none the less with a deep seriousness: impatience with what’s second-best, dissatisfaction with the status quo, an unwillingness to be fobbed off with excuses or accept that nothing can be done, a hunger to change Britain for the better.  Let’s not abandon the best of the old while pursuing what’s good in the new.

Paul Goodman MP: My thoughts after Question Time

Paul Goodman's fourth blog from Camp Davis reflects on last night's Question Time debate.

First things first: I’m not going to start by claiming that DD won tonight’s debate.  (I believe that he did – but then again, I’m a DD supporter, so my view must be discounted.) Indeed, I thought that David Cameron stuck to his guns, despite some extremely hostile questions, and that the criticisms of him by some bloggers on this site are unfair.

Those bloggers, and most others, are currently claiming – and they’re writing as I’m writing – that DD was the victor.  I’ll go on to make a prediction.  I watched the debate at the BBC’s Millbank office with lobby journalists and commentators.  I believe that they will also write tomorrow morning that DD won.

If the settled view, both tomorrow and afterwards, is that DD lost on a platform in Blackpool, but won on national television, questions follow: why, and what will happen next in this leadership election?

I believe that the answer to first question is simple.  DD’s authority, experience, clear sense of policy direction, command of detail and faith in Conservative beliefs and ideas shone through.  And while his conversational style doesn’t lend itself to platform rhetoric, it’s made for tv – where the next election, after all, will be decided.  I think that fair-minded viewers, watching DD last night, could imagine him as Prime Minister.

I won’t argue that DD is now set to win this election.  But I believe that this contest is no longer a stroll to the finishing line for one candidate – if it ever was.  After last night, the two Davids are set battle all the way to the winning post.  The race is back on, and this extraordinary leadership contest is alive again.

This is because the debate will have been watched closely by very many party members.  Many of those who previously inclined to David Cameron won’t - having seen the programme - switch their vote immediately, or maybe at all.

But they will pause, and ask questions.  Am I sure (they will ask) how to cast my vote?  Should I weigh up the merits of the two Davids again?  Wouldn’t it be wise to ponder their merits, study their policies, and weigh up their merits  – rather than voting in a rush?

I believe that many party members will conclude from last night that their vote is too valuable to cast hastily or lightly.  I’m also convinced that they will be right to do so.  David Cameron isn’t entitled to easy votes because of one good conference speech.  And DD isn’t entitled to easy votes because of one good television performance.  Naturally, I think that DD will benefit from a careful weighing-up of the merits of the candidates: I would do, given my bias.  But it must be true none the less that careful votes are better than careless ones.

Paul Goodman MP: Let's deploy our policy strikeforce early

Paul Goodman posts his third report from the Davis campaign.

Michael Gove writes in his second blog:

"It’s...necessary for those who are putting a specific figure on tax cuts now to tell us what precise level of Government borrowing they envisage in four years time, what proportion of Government spending they would allocate to debt repayment, and what then would be left for tax cuts or public spending."

This is a reference to the DD tax package.

DD has made specific tax proposals - to cut tax by the equivalent of £1200 a year for the average family. He's also set out ideas which would probably incur more public spending - such as, for example, his manifesto plans to increase school choice.  David Cameron has also made specific tax proposals – such as, for example, his commitment to introduce tax breaks for marriage, childcare and social action zones.  And he too has set out ideas which would probably incur more public spending - such as, for example, his manifesto plans to improve Britains's science base.

So if Michael's thinking is to be applied consistently, it’s necessary for David Cameron, as well as DD, to tell us (since he's serious about the tax pledges he's made) what precise level of Government borrowing he envisages in four years time, what proportion of Government spending he would allocate to debt repayment, and what then would be left for tax cuts or public spending.  If money is to be made available to improve Britain's science base, does that mean a rate of growth in the science budget faster than other departments?  If so, which will be cut to make up for that?  The schools budget?  But what about the commitment to invest in education?

Fortunately for both Davids, there's a way round the problem - namely, to strike the right balance between vision and detail.  DD has set out a specific tax package.  He's also set out a growth rule to explain how it would be delivered.  David Cameron has also made some tax pledges.  I expect that he will soon provide a growth rule equivalent of his own - perhaps in his forthcoming CPS lecture.  At this stage, that's the right balance.  In other words, each David needs an A-Z to show us where he’s going.  Neither needs an ordnance survey map.

The key difference between the two isn’t what direction to travel in.  It’s when to start the journey.  Michael provides a different figure of speech to illustrate the same point.  He writes:

“The Conservative Party has, in the past, acted as thought it believed a policy on tax was an effective substitute for a policy on the economy overall. That’s like trying to win a football match by fielding only one player. Even if he’s Wayne Rooney he can’t do it on his own.”

This is right.  The party needs eleven players, not one.  But if tax cuts are our Wayne Rooney, the question is: when should they be out on the pitch?  During the last two elections, our tax pledges came late.  They came off the substitute’s bench, so to speak, only five minutes or so before the final whistle.  DD believes that they should be on the pitch right from the start – and stay on for the full 90 minutes.  This must be right.  Even Wayne Rooney needs time to score the winning goal.