Conservative party

Thursday

Jonathan Jones

Hints of a U-turn on the ‘charity tax’

The pressure is ramping up on the government to reverse its decision to cap tax reliefs on charitable donations. The Times is against it — their leader this morning calls the move a ‘blunder’. And the Telegraph doesn’t like it either, saying that ‘Even from a distance of 8,000 miles, it must be apparent to David Cameron that the Government made a mistake in the Budget by capping tax relief on charitable giving’. Even Tory MPs are speaking out against the measure, including Mark Pritchard, Conor Burns and, in a piece on ConservativeHome, Chris White. And Number 10 does seem to be preparing the ground for a U-turn — or

Wednesday

Tim Bale

Right to reply: UKIP won’t prevent a Tory majority

All the recent chatter about UKIP being a big obstacle to a Tory majority in 2015 would be funny if it weren’t so sad. I’m never sure whether those who bring it up really believe it, or whether they’re just desperate to scare their fellow Conservatives into not swinging too far to the supposedly soggy centre. Either way, it simply won’t wash. Basically, the British electorate, like most electorates in advanced democracies, is like one big bell-curve. Most voters like to think of themselves as somewhere in or towards the middle, although there is of course a tail to either side. In PR systems, this tail can be big enough

James Forsyth

Shapps has ‘deep reservations’ about the ‘conservatory tax’

There is deep unease among Tory ministers about the proposals for a so-called ‘conservatory tax’. The idea, which was pushed hard by Chris Huhne when he was Energy Secretary, is that when anyone does substantial home improvement work they would be made to make other changes to make their house more energy efficient. It is estimated that this would add about 10 percent to the cost of adding a conservatory or an extension to your house. The government is currently consulting on the policy. But I understand that Grant Shapps, the housing minister, has ‘deep reservations’ about it. He fears that the proposals are anti-aspiration and could risk bolstering the

Sebastian Payne

The rise of UKIP

Who represents the biggest obstacle to a Tory majority in 2015? The natural assumption is Labour, but it’s looking more and more likely that the party David Cameron should be most worried about is UKIP. Tim Montgomerie has written in the Times this morning (£) about the reason behind this, the ‘split of the right-wing vote’: ‘Team Cameron has always believed that the Tories’ right-wing voters could pretty much be taken for granted. The theory was that they had nowhere else to go and that Mr Cameron had to devote all his energy to winning swing voters. This gamble worked as long as Tory-inclined voters were primarily motivated by a

Monday

James Forsyth

The Tory leadership is still fighting John Major’s battles

Bruce Anderson has written a typically trenchant piece today describing the Tory party’s treatment of John Major as ‘the most unworthy, the most shameful, period in Tory history.’ Based on both how close Bruce is to those around David Cameron and my own conversations, I would say that this is a verdict that many in the Tory leadership would agree with. Indeed, the way in which Major was treated by some Tory backbenches has informed — often with calamitous consequences — Cameron’s approach to party management. Take, for instance, Cameron’s effort straight after the election to neuter the 1922 Committee and turn it into the Conservative Parliamentary Party. This move was

Wednesday

Ross Clark

Cameron’s tragic flaw

The latest issue of The Spectator is out tomorrow, of course – but we thought CoffeeHousers might like to read this piece by Ross Clark in advance. It’s about what he calls David Cameron’s ‘tragic flaw’: impoliteness. Premierships do not end in failure, as Enoch Powell once asserted, but in tragedy. They start with a beaming figure disappearing behind the door of No. 10 – even Edward Heath, immortalised now as the Incredible Sulk, entered with a radiant grin. And they end with a haunted shadow of a politician creeping out to a waiting car, his every character flaw having been chiselled to destruction. Over the past week, the tragedy

James Forsyth

Ed Davey’s ‘pro-European’ claim has Tory ministers fuming

There’s barely disguised fury among Conservative ministers about Ed Davey’s claim that the coalition may well be more pro-European than the Labour government was. One complained to me earlier that it was typical Lib Dem mischief making and that ‘if they are not going to behave like normal ministers then we shouldn’t either’. Indeed, this minister went on to suggest that William Hague should publicly slap down Davey for his comments. I doubt this is going to happen. Davey is the leading Lib Dem on the Cabinet’s European Affairs Committee and I suspect there’s little appetite in the Foreign Office for a coalition row over Europe. But Davey’s comments do

Peter Hoskin

The Lib Dems will relish a scrap over civil liberties

They’re languishing in the polls, their leader is considerably more unpopular than either David Cameron or Ed Miliband, they face a difficult set of local elections in May — and yet the Lib Dems still seem relatively upbeat at the moment. Why so? Mostly, I think, it’s because they feel that asserting themselves is starting to pay off. Not in votes, perhaps, but in perceptions. They cite the Budget as a defining moment in this respect: they got the increase in the personal allowance that they wanted, the Tories got most of the blame for everything else. That’s why I suspect some Lib Dems will be quietly delighted at the

Tuesday

Jonathan Jones

Web surveillance plan divides the coalition

The government’s under fire from members of both coalition parties over its plans to extend the state’s investigatory powers to cover new means of communication. Currently, under section 22 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPA), public bodies can obtain communications data without the need of a warrant or any external authorisation. This gives them access to a wide array of information including the location, time, date and duration of a phone call or the IP address from which an email was sent. Over 100 public bodies — from the Home Office and local councils to the Food Standards Agency and the Charity Commission — can make use

Monday

James Forsyth

Cameron loyalists say his Tory critics are a small minority

The drumbeat of criticism of David Cameron and George Osborne by various Tory MPs, summed up on the front page of today’s Telegraph, has drawn a reaction from those MPs loyal to the leadership. Kris Hopkins, the founder of the 301 group of Tory MPs, complains that the trouble is being whipped up by a ‘small group of disaffected people’ and that ‘the nature of their criticisms shows that this is about their egos not making the country a better place.’ At issue here is who speaks for Tory MPs. Hopkins claims that the vast majority of his colleagues are ‘committed and supportive of the Prime Minister and his team’

James Forsyth

Tory ire focuses on Dave’s uni friend

The grumbling in the Conservative party at the moment is reminiscent of Tudor court politics. No one is prepared to criticise the king directly so instead various personal favourites of the monarch are targeted. At the moment, the chief proxy for discontent is Andrew Feldman. To the Cameroons’ critics, he sums up everything that is wrong with the way the PM and his team do politics. Feldman is co-chairman of the party not because of his standing in the party or the country but because he is a friend of Cameron. To further irritate their critics, their friendship dates back to them serving together on the ball committee of their

Jonathan Jones

Now Cameron and Osborne take flak from their own side

The bad headlines continue for Downing Street this morning, with the Telegraph front page declaring ‘Tory MPs round on Cameron and Osborne’. Of course, Tory backbenchers griping about their leadership is nothing new and, usually, ‘concern that Government policies are being poorly explained to voters’ or a suggestion that ‘a senior MP should be appointed as full-time Conservative Party chairman’ wouldn’t make the front page. But after the two week onslaught Downing Street has just suffered — from granny tax to cash for access to petrol panic to pasties — the disgruntled chattering reverberates that bit louder. And the nature of these complaints is different than, say, the ones we

Sunday

James Forsyth

Cameron must take on Whitehall

I doubt that, come the election in 2015, many voters will remember the row about putting VAT on pasties or Francis Maude’s advice to fill up a jerry can with petrol. But what will be on their minds is whether the government is competent and, to use that dread phrase, ‘in touch’ with their day to day struggles. It is for this reason that the key question about the last ten days is whether they make David Cameron realise that the civil service machine just doesn’t work anymore and that he needs to change the way he governs. The early indications on this front are encouraging. Those who have been

Peter Hoskin

Everyone’s a loser

Have the opinion polls ever looked more discouraging, overall, for the Tories during this government? Not that I can remember, although I’m happy to be corrected. Not only does YouGov’s poll for the Sunday Times (£) have Labour ahead by nine points, but there are also some pretty dismal supplementary findings. For YouGov, both David Cameron and the coalition score their lowest approval ratings since the start of this Parliament. For ComRes in the Independent on Sunday, 72 per cent of respondents reckon the government is ‘out of touch with ordinary voters’; 81 per cent say the government created ‘unnecessary panic’ over fuel; and so on. It’s probably no surprise

Peter Hoskin

Cameron needs a proper solution on party funding — and soon

Today’s ‘cash for access’ revelations (£) are, taken individually, less perturbing than last week’s. What we learn is that David Cameron (and other ministers) met with donors on occasions (and at locations) other than those already disclosed, and that Peter Cruddas was more involved with this process than Downing St would have us believe. There is very little added to the most serious allegation from a week ago: that big money donors could gain special insights in the policy process, or even involve themselves in it. But, taken as a whole, today’s revelations are extremely tricky for Cameron. Not only do they keep the story going, but they also highlight

Saturday

Peter Hoskin

A question of motivation

Flitting through the opinion pages this morning, there’s one headline that stands out far more than any other. It’s on Charles Moore’s column for the Telegraph, and it reads, ‘Even I’m starting to wonder: what do this lot know about anything?’ What follows underneath is effectively a catalogue of the ‘small things’ that may accumulate and cause voters to question both the coalition’s motives and its ability. I’d recommend that you read the article in full, but here is one passage from it that deserves highlighting. It concerns Francis Maude’s jerry can line: ‘But now that I have heard the Conservatives’ private explanation, which is being handed down to constituency

Friday

Fraser Nelson

This is what politics has become

George Galloway’s victory last night is a reminder of a wider problem in British politics: the low regard in which all main political parties are held. By-elections can throw up quirky victories, usually ironed out in the general election. There won’t be an army of Galloway’s marching on parliament at the next election. It’s like Glasgow East: a classic Labour safe seat-cum-‘rotten borough’ taken for granted (and ignored) for so long that the ruling party’s apparatus had atrophied. Like John Mason in Glasgow East, Galloway won’t last long.    But the same phenomenon which took Galloway to victory last night, and humbled the main parties, is also at work in

Peter Hoskin

The Tories shouldn’t gloat about Galloway’s victory

An unedifying week in politics keeps on getting worse. The Tories have this morning sent out a press release headlined ‘Warsi: If Labour can’t win in Bradford, how can they win a general election?’ The full quotation follows further on: ‘If Labour can’t win one of their safe seats in these tough economic times and in a tough week for the Government, how can they win anywhere? Not in half a century has an opposition come back from such an appalling result to win a majority at the next general election.   This tells you everything you need to know about Ed Miliband’s weak leadership.’ It’s characteristic of much of

Peter Hoskin

George Galloway is an MP again

‘This represents the Bradford Spring!’ said George Galloway after triumphing in the Bradford West by-election last night. So, let’s get this straight: comparing his victory in one of the many fair elections held in this country each year to the dangerous and fragile struggle for democracy across the Arab world? Yep, that’s right — and it leaves a nasty, bitter tang in the air. But we shouldn’t be one bit surprised. Bluster, exaggeration and provocation are, after all, what Galloway does best. And now he will be able to do these things in Parliament for the first time since May 2010, when he was deposed from the Bethnal Green seat.

Thursday

James Forsyth

Cameron needs a proper party chairman

Normally, when a Tory government is in trouble, the party chairman is sent out to put themselves between the bad story and the Prime Minister. But Baroness Warsi and Lord Feldman have been noticeable by their absence in the past few days. As Paul Goodman points out, it has been Michael Fallon — not either of the chairman — who has been touring the broadcast studios trying to hose down this story. This whole episode has been yet another reminder of why Cameron needs a proper party chairman. The party chairman needs to be solid under fire, a good media performer and, for reasons that Tim Shipman explains, an MP.