Monday, August 21, 2006

Tories go into conference season in by far the best shape

As I said in Friday's post on David Cameron's latest attempt to solve the West Lothian Question, last week's Tory aims and values statement was high on woffle and low on specifics.

Despite that, and the ongoing internal difficulties over candidate selection, however, it is clear that the Conservatives go into next month's party conference season in far better shape than their opponents.

Unlike both Sir Menzies Campbell and Tony Blair, Cameron can go to his conference knowing there is absolutely no threat to his leadership.

More on this theme in weekly podcast which is available HERE.

6 comments:

MorrisOx said...

Sort, of Paul. They're in good shape in the sense that there are (A-list murmurings aside) no obvious intergalactic Battles of the Ego about to be unleashed.

But as for policy it all remains pretty much formless.

Mind you, I suppose that's what passes for good shape these days.

Our best hope is for some forceful outbursts about A-lists, with the conference doubters finally won over by an impassioned crie de coeur from Louise Bagshawe (who a blushing Iain Dale gives way to, ;)

PoliticalHackUK said...

True, but only by default.

Labour is still divided by the succession and restless for the change, while the Liberal Democrats are running on the spot, trying to keep up, but seeing the Tories invading their political territory, with Ming impotent in the face of the young pretender.

The Tories do seem to have a renewed spirit about them, but there's still this policy vacuum. To a degree, this isn't important - Cameron's all about setting the mood music and changing attitudes towards the party and you only need to start selling policies when they can get you votes, but the polls suggest a strong distrust of Cameron's policy-lite approach. Yes, he's saying all the right things, but not telling us how he intends to lead the country to the promised sunlit uplands. All he's promised so far is a return to fox-hunting and withdrawing the Tory MEPs from a political group in Europe that nobody has ever heard of - even that has been delayed until he can think of an excuse not to do it.

He's still all spin and no substance.

Snafu said...

Pssst, don't mention tax cuts or immigration!

Ellee Seymour said...

I may have dropped a clanger on Iain's comments about Tory bloggers and the Party conference today when I recommended your site as being a Conservative one that should be included on the list. Now where did I get that impression from? Are you offended? I think I asked you about this before and you never answered. Am I right or not so I can respond to my public correction on Iain's site?

I have a new site now, http://elleeseymour.com

Ellee Seymour said...

Iain is putting together a list of Tory bloggers for the conference and asked for recommendations, so I naturally included your site, and was then reminded that you are not a Tory blogger. I don't know why I keep making that mistake. I would like to respond to this, but need to check my facts first, I need some confirmation from you about this one way or the other. I remember you hedging this question before, but if you could come clean, that would be very helpful.

I also have you listed on my Tory blogroll and you have never complained. What am I to think?

Paul Linford said...

Ellee

Many moons ago I was local government reporter on my local paper at a time when the county council was Labour-controlled and the city council was Tory-run. The city Tories were convinced I was a raving red socialist, while the county Labourites were sure I was a lickspittle lackey of Thatcherism. I concluded that this wasn't a bad place to be for a political journalist.

Now, nearly two decades on, you have me down as a Tory blogger, while some other blogs list me as a Labour and at least one (the Daily Pundit) as a Liberal. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.