ConservativeHome's ToryDiary

They don't make 'em like they used to

To mark the 30th anniversary of the Conservative Party Archive at Oxford's Bodleian Library, the Conservative Party’s historic poster collection has been published online.

Click here to open the image-viewing browser to see over 600 digitised posters.

Lord Parkinson, Chairman of the Conservative Party Archive Trust, said:

"By placing these posters online, we hope to open up the study of Conservative history to a new generation. They show that Conservatives have always stood for freedom, for the rule of law and safeguarding our national identity. By contrast, Labour Governments throughout history have increased taxes and extended the intrusive state – Gordon Brown’s Government is no different."

Many of the posters echo current political issues...

Tories increase headteachers' powers to deal with epidemic of violence and disruption in schools

In a powerful contribution to Platform, early last month, Graeme Archer brought alive the problem of school breakdown.

It is a MASSIVE problem.  140,000 pupils were suspended from secondary schools in 2005/06 for violence or persistent disruption.  The rate of suspension is twelve times higher in the most deprived areas than in the least.  Surveys of teachers suggest that a third have been physically attacked and one-in-five threatened with a weapon.  Early retirement amongst teachers has tripled.  As Justice Coleridge said on Saturday: family breakdown is the leading cause of these and other social problems.

The Tories already have a growing policy platform to renew the family (although it needs to be much bolder) and today, David Cameron and Michael Gove announce their school discipline strategy for Giving Power Back To Teachers.  Measures include:

• Parents will lose the right to appeal to a tribunal and overturn a headteacher's decision to exclude a disruptive pupil;
• Abolition of Labour's new idea that schools must take in one excluded child for every child they exclude;
• Ending the financial penalty that means a school loses a whole year's funding for an excluded child even if many months of costs have been incurred.
• Bonuses for teachers who take effective action against disruptive pupils.

Other measures are set out in the full document - a PDF of which you can read here.  

A Telegraph leader - unfairly - describes the Tory ideas as "a painfully cautious step in the right direction".  The Telegraph is much more impressed with Gordon Brown's ideas on army cadet forces:

"Much more encouraging is that Gordon Brown appears to favour cadet forces, and is keen to increase their number in comprehensive schools. The objection that delinquent pupils will flock to use the guns is nonsense: they will be put off by the uniforms and the discipline. And the primary function of a cadet force is not to train children for military service, but to inculcate initiative and responsibility.  Young people who have been answerable, not just for the performance and safety, but for the behaviour of others, make better citizens and better parents. If the Prime Minister understands this, in defiance of his own party's pacifist dogma, we applaud him for it - and we wish him luck."

We'd urge The Telegraph to be more cautious.  The Brown-Blair years have often been characterised by good ideas - and this is another - but they've been more associated with inept implementation.  Britain no longer wants a government good at announcements but it craves one that will get things done.

New all party group set up to defend First Past The Post

Daniel Kawczynski MP is leading efforts to create an All Party Parliamentary Group devoted to defending the FPTP electoral system against the possibility of Brown pushing a new system through Parliament. If he did, a system like Alternative Voting would wipe out the Tory majority, as predicted in the latest ICM poll.

A copy of his letter to Labour MPs has been copied below. Twenty-five Labour MPs joined straightaway (especially those with experience of PR in Scotland) and three to four times that number are expected to join in the coming months - a sufficiently high number to make Brown think twice when he already has so many other rebellions brewing.

Cameron condemns Ed Balls' "crazy" attack on faith schools

Just interviewed by Adam Boulton for his Sunday Live programme, Tory leader David Cameron attacked Ed Balls' confrontation with faith schools as "crazy".  Some of the best schools in the country were faith schools, he said, and under the Conservatives they could expand if parents wished.

Mr Cameron also told Sky viewers that he supported tighter classification of cannabis.  He admitted that he was wrong to support the relaxation of classification when he was a member of the Home Affairs Select Committee.  The potency of cannabis as used today and its mental health side-effects had, he said, persuaded him to support a tougher approach.

Mr Cameron said he did not agree with Boris Johnson on an amnesty for illegal immigrants.  The danger, he said, was that one anmesty only encouraged more immigration and further amnesties.

He declined to pick a candidate for the US Presidential race but heaped praise on John McCain as an inspiring man who was on the right side of the free trade debate.

The Conservative leader said that he was encouraged by the latest opinion poll putting the Conservatives 11% ahead of Labour but that there was "not an ounce of complacency" within the Tory team about the outcome of the next General Election.  Voters were weary of a great new dawn after jumping into Blair's arms in 1997.  The Conservatives need to show that they had the right response to Britain's two great challenges: economic uncertainty and social breakdown.

PS Why on earth did Sky bother to ask the public for questions to put to Mr Cameron?  55 questions were left on the Boulton & Co blog but only one of those questions was asked by our reckoning.

ICM: Tories on course for fifty seat majority

A new ICM poll for tomorrow's Sunday Telegraph would put David Cameron into Downing Street and he'd have a parliamentary majority of very nearly fifty according to electoralcalculus.co.uk.

The poll offers four other interesting findings:

1. If electors were allowed a second preference as well as a first preference vote - a scheme apparently under consideration by Team Brown - the Tory majority would be wiped out.  David Cameron would have 325 seats; the same as all the other parties combined.
2. Exactly the same proportion of voters - 36% - identify Brown-Darling and Cameron-Osborne as best-placed to run the economy.
3. 23% say they are more likely to vote Conservative if there was a promise to cut spending and taxes.  8% say that it would make them less likely to vote Conservative.  We're still waiting for someone to ask if people would be more likely to vote Conservative if they slowed the growth in spending and cut taxes!
4. Britons are split on whether Britain should adopt the French idea of boycotting the opening of the Beijing games in protest at the Tibet crackdown.  Earlier today ConservativeHome commended such a boycott.

Hague calls on Brown to press China on human rights

"If the Prime Minister is going to welcome the Beijing Olympic torch to No. 10 Downing Street he should clearly remind the Chinese government of their public commitment to improve their human rights record in the run up to the 2008 Olympics.

The PM should also be clear that the international community is looking to China to end repressive measures against human rights activists, to give immediate access to Tibet and surrounding areas to UN and other independent observers, and to allow full and free reporting of the Olympic Games including access for journalists and unfettered use of the internet."

Boycotting the Olympics' opening ceremony - an idea that Sarkozy and Kouchner have floated but Labour ministers have been critical of - seems to be an ideal way of sending a clear message about the importance of democracy and basic human rights.

We personally know scores of Tories attending human rights and Tibet rallies as the torch comes through London tomorrow. Click here for details.

Westminster insiders say Tories have best media operation

Regular ConHome readers may remember our involvement in creating a new daily poll of political insiders.  The panel is now up and running and collected data all last week.  From Monday the results will appear on PoliticsHome.com.  Before then, however, various blogs and newspapers have been covering the pre-launch results.  We have learnt that the PoliticsHome.com index of 100 political insiders...

• Thinks by 3-to-1 that Boris will be London's next Mayor (within this Times story);
• Expects the next General Election to result in a hung parliament (Coffee House);
• 50% believe that the British political system needs fundamental reform (Guido);
• 55% think that Speaker Martin will be gone in a year (Iain Dale);
• 60% blame Gordon Brown for Labour's difficulties over 42 days, rather than Jacqui Smith, Labour backbenchers or the effectiveness of David Davis (Martin Bright).

And today we learn that the Conservative media and communications team is most effective at communicating its strategic message.  The Daily Telegraph's Three Line Whip reports the finding on p8 but it doesn't have the breakdown of exact results.   The insiders were asked to rate the various party machines on a scale of one to ten where ten equals most effective.  The Conservatives scored an average of 6.2, Downing Street scored 3.8, Labour 3.6 and the LibDems were at the bottom of the pile on 3.4.  Perhaps press releases like the one below caused the LibDems to score so badly...!  (Hat-tip to Guido).

This gives us an opportunity to thank those hard working staff at CCHQ who are always helpful to ConservativeHome - particularly Henry Macrory, one of politics' nicest people and a most effective Westminster operator.  Many thanks guys and we are glad that political insiders recognise your effectiveness.

The PoliticsHomeIndex of insiders will transform understanding of Westminster village opinion.  We'll no longer be dependent upon anecdotal temperature testing, however interesting (Steve Richards found three commentators earlier this week who had nothing but disdain for Nick Clegg) but will be able to test the opinion of at least one hundred journalists, MPs, movement leaders and other Westminster powerbrokers.  There'll be lots more about the Index and PoliticsHome's other goodies on Monday - the site's launch day.

"Economic optimism at its lowest since 1980"

Ipsos-MORI published their monthly tracker yesterday although it was actually carried out a fortnight ago.  Compared to its previous poll the Tory lead has grown from 2% to 5%.

UK Polling Report zeroes in the most important findings:

"The economic optimism figure continues to get worse - this month 67% of respondents told MORI they expected the economy to get worse with only 7% expecting it to get better. The net score of -60 is now worse than the poll straight after September 11th 2001, which was the lowest point in recent years, far lower than Black Wednesday and the stock market crash in 1987 - you have to go all the way back to March 1980 to find such pessimistic public expectations about the economy."

Shadow cabinet satisfaction ratings for March

No great movements in the latest rankings of the shadow cabinet, as voted by the grassroots.  William Hague and David Davis continue to trade places as the most rated member of the shadow cabinet with William Hague finishing top this month. Sayeeda Warsi, Andrew Lansley, Patrick McLoughlin and David Willetts all continue to rise up the table.  Francis Maude takes a tumble this month - probably because of his remarks about tax.

Listed below are the shadow cabinet ratings for the last six months with the most recent on the right.  The ratings represent the percentage of Conservative members satisfied minus those dissatisfied.   

1. William Hague +84% | +88% | +87% | +85% | +84% | +87%
2. David Davis +83% | +88% | +88% | +80% | +85% | +83%
3. George Osborne +79% | +85% | +81% | +76% | +70% | +66%
4. Liam Fox +65% | +69% | +71% | +64% | +65% | +64%
5. Chris Grayling +47% | +59% | +58% | +69% | +66% | +62%
6. Alan Duncan +47% | +51% | +55% | +55% | +57% | +57%
7. Michael Gove +53% | +61% | +58% | +52% | +50% | +55%
8. Lord Strathclyde +48% | +54% | +54% | +53% | +49% | +51%
9. Nick Herbert +38% | +41% | +44% | +40% | +44% | +44%
10. Eric Pickles +38% | +41% | +45% | +39% | +39% | +42%
11. Pauline Neville-Jones +25% | +38% | +38% | +30% | +35% | +38%
12. Philip Hammond +36% | +42% | +42% | +38% | +40% | +35%
13. Andrew Lansley +43% | +45% | +46% | +49% | +26% | +32%
14. Caroline Spelman +24% | +30% | +32% | +32% | +31% | +30%
15. Sayeeda Warsi -4% | -2% | +18% | +16% | +19% | +27%
16. Jeremy Hunt +19% | +20% | +21% | +24% | +26% | +26%
17. David Willetts +3% | +7% | +13% | +17% | +20% | +22%
18. Peter Ainsworth +16% | +22% | +23% | +18% | +22% | +20%
19. Oliver Letwin +17% | +23% | +21% | +20% | +21% | +20%
20. Patrick McLoughlin +27% | +28% | +29% | +10% | +14% | +20%
21. Owen Paterson +16% | +17% | +18% | +15% | +15% | +19%
22. Andrew Mitchell +19% | +20% | +19% | +17% | +20% | +18%
23. Cheryl Gillan +10% | +14% | +16% | +13% | +15% | +13%
24. Theresa Villers +9% | +14% | +14% | +11% | +14% | +10%
25. Theresa May +6% | +20% | +15% | +10% | +12% | +10%
26. David Mundell -3% | +3% | +2% | -2% | -1% | -2%
27. Francis Maude -2% | +5% | +4% | +1% | +3% | -9%

Promoting National Socialism

Guido Fawkes has noted that on the day No.10 confirms the appointment of their new web guru, they sent out an email linking to an unfinished Downing Street online discussion forum called Promoting Prosperity, ahead of tomorrow's Progressive Governance Summit.

It's not a good day for whoever they paid a no doubt considerable sum to design the logo either....

11pm: The heavily-promoted website has now been password-protected.

1pm next day: Website finally back up with new logo. Guido rightly questioning why the taxpayer is paying for a self-described centre-left summit.

Innovation at the heart of public policy

Here's our (belated) "pick of the paragraphs" from this morning's interesting speech by David Cameron at the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts. Go to NESTA's website for a video and transcript, and WebCameron for a blog post on the speech.

Technology changing our lives: "There were no computers in classrooms when I was at school. When I first started work, it was still “word processors” not computers – and not everyone had one. But today the Cameron household’s weekly shop is done online. And the Cameron family holiday tends to get booked on the internet. More seriously, I take a close interest in the new disciplines such as biotechnology that scientists are using to fight illness and disease."

Social innovation: "I think that innovation should not be limited to science and the economy – as it overwhelmingly is in the Government’s recent innovation strategy. They say their strategy is about innovation in general, but the weblink to it is actually “scienceinnovation.pdf”, and the bulk of the document is about promoting innovation in the economy. I want to talk this morning about innovation in its broadest sense. Most of all, I mean innovation in public policy – what might be called social innovation."

Government's failure: "Before New Labour came to power they talked about social innovation and social enterprise too. Ten years on, I think there’s a sense of disappointment. Too often, as so often in the past, top-down government has stifled innovation rather than stimulated it...  Indeed, the odd thing about the Government’s innovation policy is how un-innovative it is... Whitehall and innovation don’t go together, for the simple reason that innovation is the product of many heads not a few, and free thinking not state control."

The debt bomb ticking underneath Gordon Brown's electoral hopes

George Bridges, until recently David Cameron's campaign director, has a must-read article in this week's Spectator.  George has been mining the records of Experian, the credit rating agency.

He discovers that 5.1 million households have 'sub prime' credit ratings and these are overwhelmingly concentrated in the seats that we need to win in order to oust Labour:

"Labour won its 20 most marginal seats by a combined total of just over 9,000 votes. And - crucially - there are almost 100,000 households in those 20 marginal seats that are in the subprime category. Several Cabinet members may find the repo company - rather than the local Tory candidate - to be their greatest political enemy. In Bolton West, Ruth Kelly's seat, some 7,200 households are in the high-risk group, a figure which dwarfs her 2,060 majority. In Jacqui Smith's seat of Redditch, Experian places 10,800 households at risk. The Home Secretary's majority is a mere 2,720."

This is George's conclusion:

"Ever since the Conservative leader worked in the Treasury, watching the pound fall out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism, Conservatives have shied away from focusing on the economy. Now they must do so with a vengeance. An attack narrative must be formed: Gordon the stealth-taxer, serial spend-and-waster, the man who jilted Prudence and led the nation into an asset bubble. The man who inherited an economic boom, and went on to oversee the largest orgy of property speculation and debt creation in British peacetime history - how can you trust him again?  Whatever the results of the credit crunch, it is fairly clear that its first casualty is the feeling of prosperity. It is giving way to something that we have not seen in politics for some time: fear. Fear that the bills will keep on rising faster than one's salary. Fear of the day when your mortgage comes up for renewal. After an absence of 15 years, economics is back at the heart of politics. People are looking for assurance. And the next election will be won by the party that is most trusted to provide it. For millions of voters and David Cameron, it is payback time."

Is George right?  Is the economy about to become issue number one?  It might be the only issue that could give the Tories a working majority.  Despite recent double digit opinion poll leads the consensus within the Westminster village is that Britain is heading for a hung parliament. 54% of the political insiders who contribute to the new PoliticsHomeIndex are currently predicting a hung parliament as the most likely outcome of the next General Election - with the Tories the largest party.

The right economic strategy may be the difference between being the largest party and the majority party.  As Fraser Nelson points out, elsewhere in The Spectator, the electoral mountain is still a huge one for the Tories to climb and he notes the various attempts by Team Cameron to stay close to the Liberal Democrats.

What Brown's abolition of the 10p band means for 5.3 million families

The above list comes from a research note just produced by CCHQ.  A senior political editor told ConservativeHome only two days ago that the Conservatives were now producing the best research material of the three political parties. 
Download a PDF of the whole research paper... and let's hope it appears in lots of newspapers tomorrow.

PMQs: Hague says ending of 10p tax band will hurt five million poorer families

8.15pm PlayPolitical:  Watch Harriet Harman's first PMQs as Gordon Brown's Deputy

EDITORIAL VERDICT: William Hague was not at his best although he chose the right topic: Labour's regressive scrapping of the 10p tax band and its impact on five million poorer families.  Vince Cable flopped - asking a question about The Queen which risked being ruled out of order - and was.  Harriet Harman certainly exceeded expectations.  She appeared confident and although like her boss - didn't really answer any questions - she'll be pleased at this performance after yesterday's humiliation.

12.25pm: Tory John Baron asks what is unique about Britain that we need such a long period of detention without trial.  Ms Harman responds by saying that she won't listen to a party that wants to abolish the Human Rights Act introduced by Labour.

12.19pm: Charles Walker MP asks Harriet Harman to condemn the BNP candidates who suggested rape was a myth.  The Deputy Labour leader urges all Londoners to vote for mainstream parties and stop the BNP getting a seat on the London Assembly.

12.16pm: Cable asks if Mrs Harman thinks the Queen was over-reacting by cancelling her anniversary celebrations or was in touch with the public mood.  The Speaker rules a question about Her Majesty as out of order.

12.15pm: Loud cheers for Vince Cable as he gets to his feet. How many? How many? MPs shout.

12.13pm: The facts are, Hague finishes, council tax has doubled under Labour, 5m families are worse off, 300,000 small businesses are worse off.  Why do the British people have to wait two years in order to get rid of the Cabinet responsible for all of this?

12.10pm: Mr Hague jokes that Gordon Brown has gone to a palace so will probably be lost by now. He invites Mrs Harman to confirm that people do feel economically insecure and apprehensive.  The Labour Deputy Leader says that international economic turbulence has worsened since she wrote remarks for her blog quoted by Mr Hague.

12.06pm: William Hague notes Harriet Harman's stab-proof vest and her remarks that she wears a hard hat on a building site etc and asks if she wears a clown's outfit when she goes to Cabinet.  Harman responds by saying that she won't take fashion advice from a man who famously wore a baseball cap.  She then responds to William Hague's questions about the ending of the 10p income tax band.  Mr Hague said that more than 5m low income families will be worse off this weekend.  Ms Harman says she won't take lectures from a man who opposed the minimum wage.

12.04pm: Harriet Harman responds by asking why Theresa May, Shadow Leader of the House, isn't asking questions for the Conservatives.  Are women seen but not heard in the modern Tory party, she says?  She then answers William Hague's question on Zimbabwe.  She promises every effort from the Government to ensure Robert Mugabe respects the democratic wishes of the Zimbabwe people.

12.03pm: William Hague congratulates Harriet Harman on being the first female Labour MP to answer Prime Minister's Questions Time; she must be proud to follow in the footsteps of Margaret Thatcher.

Grassroots remain united behind David Cameron

The numbers aren't quite as high as those that immediately followed last autumn's dramatic events but David Cameron continues to enjoy very high levels of support from the Conservative grassroots.

1,525 Tory members were surveyed from 28th March to 31st March.

Cameron calls for other NATO nations to help pay for UK and US military

Liam Fox, William Hague and Pauline Neville-Jones were all at Chatham House this morning for a speech on NATO from the Tory leader.

Here are the key sections of the speech - Crossroads for NATO:

There are too many caveats governing NATO nations' commitments: "The problem is not with a national caveat per se.  The decision to deploy troops in combat is the most important decision a sovereign government can take, and it is inevitable that they should wish – and are sometimes constitutionally obliged – to be able to retain an ultimate say in how their troops are deployed.  The problem is with the proliferation of national caveats that started in NATO’s Balkan operations and has got completely out of hand in Afghanistan. Last month the Times reported that examples of national caveats currently range from a  ban on deploying out of area, to no night flying, to no flying in poor weather, no involvement in riot control and no venturing from bases without the maximum force protection or too far from the nearest hospital.  This is no way to fight a war. Decisions in NATO are unanimous. No enterprise can be undertaken unless every member agrees. But once a government has agreed to send troops on an agreed enterprise, there has got to be a basic doctrine, that if you’re in, you’re in."

Lines for William Hague to use tomorrow against 'Harriet Stab-Proof Vest Harman'

We've already blogged on Harriet Harman's crazy decision to wear a stab-proof vest on a visit to her constituency but, with Gordon Brown away, she faces William Hague at PMQs tomorrow.  Let's feed him some lines...

David Davis: Lords report demolishes Labour's economic case for mass immigration

A cross-party House of Lords committee, chaired by Lord Wakeham and including Lords Lawson and Lamont, has rejected the Government's economic case for migration this morning.  The Government's argument that immigration produces £6bn of economic benefits a year  is dismissed as "preposterous". The report wins coverage across this morning's newspapers and is leading broadcast bulletins.

Shadow Home Secretary David Davis welcomed the report - particularly its backing for a limit on immigration from outside the EU (a long standing policy of his):

“This cross-party committee of distinguished peers, including a Professor of Labour Economics and former Chancellors, have demolished the Government’s case on several fronts.  They show unequivocally that the benefits of the current immigration policy to ordinary UK citizens are largely non-existent. There are a series of long-term risks to the economy, not least the disincentive to train, and it presents absolutely no answer to the pension crisis.  We are delighted they say there should be an explicit target range for immigration through controls on non-EU applicants. This is a policy that we have been arguing for, for years and which the Government has consistently rejected.”

Sir Andrew Green of MigrationWatch also welcomed the report, seeing it as vindication for his organisation's work:

"This report is a watershed.  A heavyweight committee of Parliament has torn to shreds the government's economic case for the massive levels of immigration which they have actively encouraged.  Having lost their smoke screen of dodgy economic arguments, they now have no alternative but to implement a sharp reduction in numbers.  The public will accept nothing less."