Are party high-ups conspiring to stop a David Davis leadership?

There is speculation in this morning's Observer* that the proposed changes to the Tory leadership election rules are being designed to keep David Davis out.

Mr Davis is thought to be very popular with party activists but his fellow MPs like him a lot less.

Derek Conway MP, a lieutenant of David Davis, told The Observer: "The counsel I would have for people talking about a rule change is that the public will see it as irrelevant and that it will not necessarily produce the result intended. We've got a lot to do and that's a distraction."

Comments

[Jack Stone]

David Davis is not the man to lead the Conservative party. He is a man of the right who will make the mistake of the last two elections and only try to appeal to Conservative core support by putting forward hard right policies.

The Conservative Party will only win the next election if they speak to the whole country with policies for the whole country.

George Osborne and David Cameron are the only members of the Shadow Cabinet who speak the language that would set the Party on the road to victory if either spoke it as leader.

[Jack Stone]

I have just read that David Davis has said that the Conservatives should not copy the Blair agenda at a time when that agenda is failing. I agree but it would also be a mistake to go back to a Thatcherite agenda which he and his supporters seem to want to do when that agenda is not an agenda for the future but an agenda of the past.

[Stephen Gash]

For the Conservatives to win the next General Election, regardless of who leads the party, they will have to engage more with their natural support. This lies in England. However, all the English are told is how the Conservatives lost the 2005 election because they concentrated on England too much (George Osborne), income tax will be reduced in Scotland (David Davis) and that the Welsh will be asked whether they want their assembly converted into a full parliament (Michael Howard).
No party (as usual) has even thought about consulting the English on how they wish England to be governed. This would be a novel experience for the English. Such consultation should include the option of an English Parliament. We are pretty much fed-up with being told why such a thing should not happen, and we wish to be done the courtesy of being asked. The current set-up gives New Labour and Liberal Democrat MPs in Scotland disproportionate power over English matters. The Conservative policy of English Votes on English Legislation (EVEL) makes MPs in Scotland redundant, as does an English Parliament. This has to be tackled. What is good enough for Scotland is good enough for England, we want an English Parliament.

[Ian Campbell]

I will not be voting Conservative in the foreseeable future. I'm so fed up with the political mistreatment of England by all the three main political parties that I have joined the SNP in order to campaign for the break-up of the UK. The Conservative party parades its Unionist credentials but no Conservative has been able to explain what benefit the Union is to England. England is the Gulliver of the UK, tied down to the ground,ignored, its identity suppressed, threatened with extinction and partition. 'One Nation' Tories should start remembering that for more and more people in England the nation is England, not Britain.