ConservativeHome's ToryDiary

Gaffe of 2008

Our final 'picks' of the year. Over the last 48 hours we have picked our Backbenchers, Frontbenchers, Moments and Speeches of 2008 and Ones to Watch in 2009.

Jonathan Isaby's pick: I am making my award not for one particular gaffe, but rather am presenting it to 2008's gaffemaker-in-chief, Nick Clegg, who has managed to put his foot in it on three memorable occasions during the year. First there was that GQ interview with Piers Morgan, in which the Lib Dem leader admitted to having slept with "no more than thirty" women. This earned him the tabloid nickname Nick Cleggover and has made him open to mockery in the Commons ever since. Then there was the moment when he appeared on a television phone-in programme during his party conference and was asked the level of the weekly state pension. "I think it's about thirty quid now, isn't it?" he said - only to be told it was actually more than three times that amount. And most recently he was daft enough to spend an entire 90-minute plane journey from Gatwick to Inverness discussing the shortcomings of his frontbench team with his chief of staff, Danny Alexander - in full earshot of a Mirror journalist. The hack took copious notes and helpfully shared all Clegg's opinions with the paper's readers, leaving Clegg to spend an uncomfortable day on the phone apologising to his colleagues.

Tim Montgomerie's pick: It has to be Brown's 'we not only saved the world' gaffe at PMQs. CrownBlog had it up on YouTube within minutes. It was funny, of course, but it also pointed to the fact that Brown seemed to be the only person in Britain (excepting debt collectors) who was enjoying the worst recession in the developed world - a point made musically by this ConHome video. During 2009 we'll learn that Red Gordon couldn't even save Britain, let alone the world.

Ones to Watch in 2009

Our fifth 'picks'. Already picked are our Backbenchers, Frontbenchers, Moments and Speeches of 2008.

Jonathan Isaby's pick: 2009 is the year when the pledge made by David Cameron during the 2005 leadership election to pull Conservative MEPs out of the federalist European Peoples' Party faction in Brussels should finally come to fruition. The man who has been doing the most behind the scenes to seek new alliance partners across Europe is Mark Francois, the shadow Europe minister. There's another six months' work to be done on this before the European elections, after which we will discover which political parties from across the continent are willing to sign up to a new grouping. European Parliament rules have been designed to frustrate the project - but if Mark can pull it off, he will attain folk hero status among Tory eurosceptics.

Tim Montgomerie's pick: I was tempted to choose Barack Obama for this category. He's certainly the one to watch on the international stage but he could also have a dramatic impact on UK politics.  If he undertakes far-reaching economic intervention he may boost Gordon Brown.  On the other hand his freshness and sense of change may boost David Cameron.  But, on balance, I've plumped for a domestic choice and my one to watch for 2009 is Boris Johnson.  He has already made a terrific start as Mayor - certainly exceeding my expectations.  I think of him freezing the Mayor's contribution to council tax.  Ousting Ian Blair.  Banning alcohol on the tube.  Stopping the extension of the congestion charge.  Introducing crime mapping.  ConHome surveys show that he's the most popular Tory amongst the grassroots - more popular than William Hague or David Cameron.  What will he do with the Mayoralty in 2009?  He has the opportunity to be a trailblazer for many Tory ideas although with his ideas on a new London airport and an immigration amnesty he has made it clear that he's his own man

Who would you pick out as the one to watch in 2009?

Speech of 2008

Our fourth 'picks'. Already picked are our Backbenchers, Frontbenchers and Moments of 2008.

Jonathan Isaby's pick: "The speech of the year for me was given by a man whose gift for rhetoric, comic timing and ability to command the attention of the House of Commons are all legendary. I refer, of course, to William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, and in particular, to his brilliant Despatch Box performance during the Second Reading debate of the Bill to approve the Lisbon Treaty back in January. Particularly memorable was the passage in which he imagined the reaction of Gordon Brown to Tony Blair becoming EU President. Relive it here."

Tim Montgomerie's pick: "David Cameron's speech to the Birmingham Conference was his best since becoming leader of the Conservative Party.  It didn't contain big policy announcements but it offered a sweeping statement of his conservatism.  At its heart was compassionate conservatism and a beautiful passage about the true causes of crime.  I was particularly glad that he defined himself as a conservative rather than a libertarian: "Freedom can too easily turn into the idea that we all have the right to do whatever we want, regardless of the effect on others. That is libertarian, not Conservative - and it is certainly not me." After hearing the speech The Sun declared David Cameron ready to be Prime Minister."

What was your speech of 2008?

Moment of 2008

Our third 'picks'. Already picked are our Backbenchers and Frontbenchers of 2008.

Jonathan Isaby's pick: "Unable to choose between them, I have picked two moments of the year - both of which I was privileged to witness at first hand. Firstly, there was the victory for Boris Johnson at the London mayoral election at the beginning of May.  He reclaimed the capital for the Conservative Party, confounding all those who thought that Ken Livingstone was unbeatable, and I thought it was such a good story that I wrote a book about it!  My other moment, just three weeks later, was another historic Conservative election win. Edward Timpson's gaining of Crewe and Nantwich - marked the first Tory gain at a by-election since I was in nappies and showed just how vulnerable Labour had become. As David Cameron declared in Crewe's Market Square the following morning, New Labour died on the streets of Crewe and Nantwich."  (Picture credit: News Biscuit).

Tim Montgomerie's pick: "My moment was the one hundred and eighteen billion pound moment.  The moment that Alistair Darling told the House of Commons that Britain was up to its neck in Labour's debts (and would be for years to come).  George Osborne's response to Mr Darling's PBR announcement was outstanding and was 'remixed' by ToryBear in this terrific YouTube.  George's 'Labour didn't fix the roof while the sun was shining' soundbite doesn't capture half of the outrage we should feel at what Labour has done to Britain.  In years of economic plenty - years we may not see again for a long, long time - we saw dependency increase dramatically.  The public services and welfare went unreformed.  Our energy and transport infrastructure went unrenewed.  Many years of very tough decisions lie ahead because of the Brown-Blair years of spin and squander.  Brown deserves a trouncing at the next election."      

What was your moment?

Frontbencher of 2008

The second of our picks of the year.  Earlier today we each chose our Backbencher of 2008.

Jonathan Isaby's pick: My choice for frontbencher of the year will come as no surprise to anyone who read this piece - in which I wrote about the man in question a little over a month ago. As Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Owen Paterson would not expect to enjoy the highest of media profiles, but he deserves this accolade in recognition of all the work he has put in this year towards creating a new political force in Northern Ireland through an alliance between the Conservative Party and the Ulster Unionists. He quietly beavered away on the project for most of the year, spending at least one day a week in the province, and the deal was finally sealed in mid-November. Owen should rightly feel proud of this achievement.

Tim Montgomerie's pick: Hardworking. Friendly. A master of his brief. Always in the media. The opposite of the Tory stereotype. The public face of a great team. I am, of course, talking about Eric Pickles MP.  After his role in the Crewe and Nantwich by-election campaign - following a successful masterminding of our local government advances - Eric shot to near the top of our regular shadow cabinet league table of members' satisfaction.  These memorable images captured his 'maestro' role on local elections night 2008.  Some jealous Cameroons briefed against him but he has deservedly retained the affection of colleagues and members.  My hope is that he'll become Party Chairman in 2009.

Who is your Frontbencher of the Year?

Backbencher of 2008

Over the new year period we will be presenting some end-of-year awards; starting with our personal choices for BackBencher Of The Year:

Jonathan Isaby's pick: "My selection for backbencher of the year goes to someone who could equally have been nominated for the frontbencher award - as he was a member of the shadow cabinet for the first half of the year. But the decision by David Davis to resign from Parliament and fight a by-election in his Haltemprice and Howden constituency - was always going to consign him to the backbenches, quitting as he did in protest at the Government's attempt to lock up terrorist suspects without charge for 42 days. He could have expected a serious Cabinet job in a David Cameron government but sacrificed those career prospects on a point of principle - a rare act in politics these days. SInce his re-election at the by-election - during which he assembled an impressive coalition of support to attack this increasingly authoritarian Government - he has remained an articulate and doughty defender of civil liberties and arch-critic of the Government."

Tim Montgomerie's pick: "My pick is Iain Duncan Smith.  It's a very biased choice as I also regard Iain as a close friend but the steady transformation of his reputation has been extraordinary.  His reputation was in tatters (unfairly) when his leadership of the Conservative Party ended but he now enjoys respect across the political spectrum and more importantly - as far as he is concerned - from the poverty-fighting groups that he pledged to champion when he was Tory leader and on the night he lost the leadership.  He is now used as a general commentator on social breakdown with media organisations using him to respond to stories that only have a loose political dimension.  But it is the ground-breaking work of his Centre for Social Justice that gives his work such credibility.  Always rooted in the wisdom of frontline poverty-fighters this year's published research includes the importance of the earliest years for child development, the breakdown of systems for children-in-care, Britain's asylum shambles, social housing and welfare reform.  No wonder, according to BBC research, David Cameron makes more mention of Iain Duncan Smith than any other Tory colleague."

Who would you have chosen as Backbencher of the Year?

Our picks of the year (II)

Yesterday we shared our favourite video, moment and funny of the year. Today we've got three related more to ConservativeHome itself.

Platform article of the year

Tim - Murdo Fraser MSP's article at the end of October: We must not allow nationalists to drive England and Scotland apart.  Some of the ToryDiary threads on the Scottish question have turned quite ugly in the last few months.  Murdo's piece hit all of the right notes and towards the end of the year David Cameron made it abundantly clear that he wasn't going to take risks with the Union.

Samuel - Paul Goodman MP's essay in January on the problems with Islamism in the UK - Islamism: from analysis to action. At 2000 words it was twice as long as I normally like Platform pieces to be, but every sentence was worth keeping. Writing shortly after Despatches' Undercover Mosque programme and Policy Exchange's survey showing that 40% of British Muslims want Sharia law and one in eight young Muslims would "fight the West", he looked at what makes a moderate Muslim, ways in which they can be supported, and how they should respond to the problem that "all terrorists are Islamists, but not all Islamists are terrorists". We've had a very good run of Platform pieces in the last two weeks, including: Caroline Jackson MEP's criticism of the new EU party grouping, Andrew Mitchell's Boxing Day article on the lessons to be learned from the tsunami, David Cameron's piece on the situation in Afghanistan, Ben Rogers' and Nirj Deva MEP's response to Bhutto's murder, Mark Brooks' piece on male victims of domestic abuse, Greg Clark and Jeremy Hunt's explanation of their thesis that Conservatives are the new progressives, Greg Hands' anecdotes about the immigration service... et al. If you have an idea for an article that you would like us to publish, please feel free to email me about it.

Regret of the year

Tim - Iraq has dominated geopolitics for the last five years and the divergence of US and British policy towards the conflict was the most important real story of 2007.  America, through General Petraeus' troops surge, showed that it was willing to try one more time to make the nation it liberated a half-tolerable place to live.  Brown couldn't get out fast enough - infamously playing politics with British troop withdrawals.  To say that Britain was defeated in Iraq is no slur on our courageous and badly-led troops but it is the truth.  It was also disappointing that the Conservatives were unwilling to champion the surge at the outset or credit it when it had succeeded in delivering a massive reduction in violence.  William Hague's response to Petraeus' success was bland at its best and the Shadow Foreign Secretary was too ready to credit Sunni leaders rather than American policy for the halving of violence despite the connectedness of the two developments.  Only the odd pairing of Iain Duncan Smith and John Bercow spoke up for the surge in the Commons.  I can only hope that David Cameron's recent visit to Washington signals the beginning of something different.

Samuel - It's been a good year generally, I started working on the site and related projects on a proper full-time basis at the start of January and have been lucky enough to travel abroad a lot and get to know some great people down in London. The Party is generally getting closer to what I wanted it to be like when I joined. One regret that comes to mind ConservativeHome-wise is something that has been raised with me by a few candidates, and that is the critical comments about them being posted on here by readers. I don't believe anything particularly nasty or libellous has been put up (if you ever see anything like that please don't hesitate to email us and we'll take action asap) but it's fair to say that perceptions of some candidates have been coloured by what is discussed about them online.  Other candidates laugh it off and say you need a thick skin in this game and also that it's healthy to be able to voice genuine concerns about an aspect of a candidates' past etc. Knowing which comments to overwrite really is a tricky one. We do try our best to avoid needlessly hurting anyone's prospects as well as needlessly muting opinions.

Highlight of the year

Tim - One highlight was an ICM survey that showed that twice as many MPs used ConservativeHome as any other blog.  I was more encouraged by the progress of the ConservativeHome Members' Panel, however.  It was widely quoted by the mainstream media during 2007 but when it showed unhappiness with David Cameron there were often 'shoot-the-messenger' complaints that it had been infiltrated by non-Tories.  But, after the dramatic events leading up to Bottler Saturday, there was a massive bounceback in the standing of Cameron and George Osborne, in particular.  Exactly the same population that had been dissatisfied was now largely satisfied with the direction of the party.  In recent weeks I've met a number of shadow cabinet members who have admitted that their own local Associations were decidedly negative from the grammars schools row until the Blackpool Conference.  The grassroots may be open to the charge of being fickle but the monthly panel survey does capture the temperature of the membership.  ConservativeHome's Agenda/ Manifesto for 2008 - launching on 7th January - will be based on Panel findings.  The December survey is still live here if you want to have your say.

Samuel - We had a fun but busy night liveblogging the local/Welsh/Scottish election results in May. Rather surreally we were doing so from St Stephen's Tavern opposite Parliament as the BBC had commandered it and filled it with pundits and cameras. We got information from grassroots activists from all over the country as well as some senior bods in Party HQ, which meant we were very often ahead of the TV networks. I think we left at about 5am and continued coverage a few hours later. I felt we'd done a good job of aggregating what was going on in the media and providing a place for Tory anoraks to chat about it all (there were almost 600 comments). I look forward to seeing how we can cover the next general election.

Our picks of the year (I)

Newspapers and blogs are full of reviews of the year at the moment. We'll be posting our own political highlights over the next couple of days, starting with these three...

Video of the year

Tim - I've cheated in this category and chosen two winners and both really are picks of the year.   Viral videos will be big at the next election and not for the squeamish but Guido Fawkes' video of Gordon Brown appearing to repeatedly pick his nose while sitting next to Tony Blair at Prime Minister's Question Time has been watched hundreds of thousands of times on YouTube.  The Australians also proved that politicians can never hide from their on-camera past. This vintage footage of Kevin Rudd eating his ear wax during a parliamentary debate was one of the most watched videos of the downunder election.  Unfortunately it wasn't enough to stop Labor's Rudd from ousting John Howard.

Samuel - A World Without America was the most successful viral video we made when based at 18 Doughty Street at the start of the year. It showed a British newsreader reporting on various crises that wouldn't have happened in a hypothetical world in which America didn't exist. It sparked both delight and hostility in the US, with it being played on national news networks and talk radio shows and attracting 12000 (and counting!) comments on YouTube. A great example of how the internet enables you to get a message out relatively cheaply - in this case, that it's easy to take America for granted.

Moment of the year

Tim - This has been the most extraordinary political year and we are spoilt for choice in this category.  Sam chose first and I probably would agree that 'Bottler Saturday' was the decisive political moment of the year. Avoiding being an echo, however, I'll choose the moment when Alistair Darling announced that the personal data of half the population had been lost by HMRC.  I choose that moment not because it was the worst deed of this Government but because incompetence is its hallmark.  The NHS computer fiasco, the release of foreign prisoners, the overpayment of tax credits, the run on Northern Rock, the mishandling of Foot and Mouth... This Government really would struggle to run a bath.  Although Labour is deservedly seen as being at least as sleazy as the Major administration I do not think sleaze will kill Brown politically.  It will be incompetence.  Most voters don't expect politicians to be particularly ethical but they do hope for basic management ability.

Samuel - Definitely Brown bottling out of the election. I feared we would have taken quite a beating from Brown if he called the election early. But, as Nick Robinson put it succinctly, he took the weapon that is choosing the timing of an election and "contrived to turn the weapon upon himself, wounding both his reputation and the morale of his party". He has lost his chance to ask to be given a chance. A couple of newspapers reckoned our exclusive story on it definitely being called off contributed to the disaster that was his announcement, which was nice.

"Funny" of the year

Tim - You can watch it on PlayPolitical here.  Acting LibDem leader Vince Cable became a superstar in the Westminster Village because of his From Stalin to Mr Bean jibe.  A cleverer and more human person would have laughed it off but Gordon Brown reacted with a stoney face.  Mr Cable almost never made the joke.  His wife had given it the thumbs down then he had tried it out on her.  Mr Cable was not actually first with the Bean idea, however.  That honour should go to Leo McKinstry who had made the Bean-Brown comparison a few days earlier in the Daily Express.

Samuel - Tony Blair meets Catherine Tate, and isn't bovvered. For Red Nose Day Tate went into her famous chavvy schoolgirl mode and did a scene with Tony Blair in No.10. After she waffles for a bit he cuts her off and after a pregnant pause turns the tables on her by coming out with the immortal "...am I bothered" line. People were amazed to hear those words come from our Prime Minister and he did it pretty perfectly. A good reminder of how much of a class act he is. Can you imagine how it would have went if Brown did it?!