The return of 'Good week, bad week'

During the leadership race the 'Good Week, Bad Week' feature was very popular.  It returns today and every Friday...

Good week: Chris Grayling and Michael Gove were both tipped for higher things. ConservativeHome identified Chris Grayling as a leading candidate to replace Francis Maude as the next Party Chairman and Iain Dale tipped Michael Gove (fresh from his success over HIPS) to replace David Willetts at Education. Monmouth MP David Davies has also had a good week. His blog posts on the Cornerstone site have been must-reads. We have featured two of them on ConservativeHome (on building more prisons and making foreign visitors pay for NHS treatment).  He's written today about enforcing the law against female circumcision.

Bad week: Ming Campbell. The LibDem leader's week began with a 14% opinion poll rating. There was then ludicrous talk of him being relaunched as "the pinstripe radical".  It ended with LibDem MPs furious that he had held secret talks with Gordon Brown about ministerial positions. CCHQ was handed the propaganda gift of being able to present Britain's third party as being instinctively willing to prop up Labour. On GMTV this Sunday Lib Dem MEP Chris Davies will say that there are “real rumblings” about Ming Campbell’s leadership and that the Ashdown-Brown affair had been “a bit messy…the whole thing smells of backroom deals.”

The museums row also made this week a bad week for Hugo Swire.

Roundabout week: Webcameron. The frequency of posting has deteriorated significantly. It took three days to get footage of David Cameron's Tooting speech uploaded. A chat with Michael Heseltine took a similar length of time although yesterday's NHS speech was up more quickly. The site is in danger of making the dead tree press look fast.

Issue of the week: Will there, won't there? Be a referendum that is. The whole row threatens to be a big cloud over Brown's honeymoon.  Dan Hannan is sure that there won't be a referendum from Labour.

PS I wanted to call this feature 'Montie's No-Spin Review Of The Week' but Sam said 'no'.

Comments

[Peter Kingsman]

Chris Grayling has plenty of good weeks and thouroughly desrves promotion to a job with a higher profile.

Poor Ed. Shame on Sam for rejecting your 'Montie's No-Spin Review Of The Week' name.

[Editor]

Thank you Peter. You seem like a wise man!

[Ay up]

Au contraire, he clearly has a wise head on those young shoulders!

I'd say ToryDiary has had a very "Good Week", its increased loyalty to the party is slightly worrying but an honourable approach at this choppy time.

[Ali Gledhill]

I wanted to call this feature 'Montie's No-Spin Review Of The Week' but Sam said 'no'.

Why not go all Cameron about it? Tell him this is a new age for ConservativeHome - you need to engage with your readers and distance yourself from the mainstream media (some papers haveing similar sections). This is the time for recycling discarded sections on the blog whilst pretending they are new, exciting, and fresh. Old format + new name = perfect feature. In short: rebel.

[bluepatriot]

The BBC deserves to be in your bad week category. I'm surprised that you haven't covered the 'BBC is not impartial' report actually.

[John]

Editor:

In the discussions regarding Shadow Cabinet reshuffle I have seen little mention of the possibility of female MP's rising into the ministerial ranks.

Are there any who merit promotion noting that there are areas of great interest to women such as health which do not have any female ministerial representation?

The are also other areas such as Education and Work and Pensions where further female representation might also be helpful to the party's cause?

[Neighbouring Critic]

Given that Mr Grayling's own Constituency Association, Epsom & Ewell, has been in "supported status" for over a year; that in this middle class enclave they can only manage the election of 2 Conservative councillors (from a total of 38) and that a highly experienced team of campaigners (brought in from Croydon to assist in the LG campaign) walked away from the constituency due to "intransigence, discourtesy and lack of support" should Mr Grayling not focus his efforts on his own Association before even considering taking over the operation of CCHQ ?

[David Belchamber]

There is only one Monty who is allowed to spin and he plays for England; long may he continue to do so!

[Adam]

John, I think Iain Dale has tipped Maria Miller as a potential promotion to the Shadow Cabinet. I'd also look out for Eleanor Laing and Julie Kirkbride.

[Editor]

I second Adam's comments, John.

[Simon Chapman]

"Montie"?

[Justin Hinchckliffe]

Look out for Graham Stuart.

[Goldie]

If it's a bad week for Ming, so it is for Dave, because if Dave is to win the premiership the LibDems must do badly, and with Ming at the head, they will.

With Nick Clegg or some such, they might do better.

[Cllr. Sean Sullivan]

The problem with anonymous comments from such individuals as “Neighbouring Critic” is that they tend to be filled with obvious errors and an intention to attack someone on no identifiable basis at all.

Therefore let me identify myself. My name is Sean Sullivan and I am a councillor for Woodcote ward within Epsom and Ewell Borough Council and I am leader of the Conservative Group. Chris Grayling is my Member of Parliament and I am proud to have him as such.

It’s right to say that Epsom and Ewell has been in supported status for the past year. “ Neighbouring Critic” criticises us on the basis that the Conservatives have only two seats in Epsom and Ewell Borough, but, of course, the Association prior to supported status had until 2003 refused to put up any local Conservative candidates at all and in 2003 failed to contest more than half the available seats. Given that dire situation and the lack of any sensible business plan from the Association officers the Party Board quite rightly placed the Association into Supported Status. This was fully supported by Chris Grayling and from his hard work rose up a dedicated team of campaigners, many of them young and new to the party. That team took on an Independent run council in the local elections that had controlled the council for over 70 years. It is no surprise that with such entrenched independents and with the pre-Supported Status Association not contesting elections properly, that only two councillors were elected to Epsom and Ewell Borough Council.

Please note that due to a campaign headed by Chris Grayling the Conservatives moved from 4th to 2nd in share of the vote in the borough. I personally knocked on hundreds of doors during the local election campaign. The resounding response was one of support for Chris Grayling. One ridiculously Conservative lady declared that she would vote for him even if he was a Communist.

Chris knows how to run campaigns. He has united our entire constituency in fighting to save our maternity unit from Labour cuts. I don’t think you could find a single constituent who would not praise him in this regard. Demonstrating that he can appeal to voters of every ilk if the party campaigns on the right issues (and he has a great sense for what the right issues are).

To deal with “Neighbouring Critics” specific points: first, Chris Grayling’s constituency has 7 local councillors and not two, second the Association accepted mutual aid from Wimbledon, Kingston and Surbiton, Sutton and Cheam and Croydon during the campaign. Croydon activists ran the campaign in Prestons ward. It is entirely erroneous to suggest that any mutual aid was turned away. All of it was gratefully received.

Chris Grayling is a fine constituency MP. Despite all his hard work here, he has additionally been doing a great job as our transport spokesman in the shadow cabinet. He has led the campaign to save our hospital and is held in high regard by constituents of all political persuasions. I would not have been elected to the local council without the benefit of the high esteem he is held as our Conservative representative in Parliament
It’s all very well for anonymous individuals to attack the reputation of hardworking members of parliament. However maybe such individuals should check their facts before launching such unpleasant attacks.

I have to say that my personal wish would be not to see Chris as Chairman of the Party as we’d much prefer to benefit from his regular presence in the constituency. However, if he is called up, then the Conservative Party would be hard pressed to find a more dedicated and effective campaigner. Something which is so very crucial in the dawn of Brown.

[John T]

Good to hear a balanced response Sean - Chris Grayling has been one of our best performers and I think he would make a excellent Party Chairman.