Conservative party

David Cameron’s claim at PMQs that Gus O’Donnell had been asked at Leveson about whether he had offered any warnings on the hiring of Andy Coulson, was met with bafflement. But O’Donnell’s written submission does address this point. Question 30 - Please set out in full for the inquiry details of your role, if any, in relation to the appointment by the Prime Minster of Andy Coulson to a post in No.10. Your account should include a full explanation of the basis on which you were asked to advise. Mr Coulson was brought in as a special adviser to the Prime Minister. I was not involved in the process of appointing Mr Coulson. Mr Coulson was cleared to SC (security clearance) level and was undergoing DV (developed vetting) clearance at the time of his resignation.

How many seats will the Conservatives take from the Lib Dems at the next election? According to Lord Ashcroft’s latest polling, a dozen or so Tory-Lib Dem marginals look set to change hands. Surveying 17,000 voters in 17 seats*, Ashcroft has found the Lib Dems’ share has dropped by 15 per cent (compared to eight per cent for the Conservatives) with an overall swing of 3.5 per cent to the Tories. If this swing were replicated across the country, this would hand David Cameron another 15 seats in 2015. However, Ashcroft’s research suggests there isn’t a universal swing. For example in Newton Abbot, the polling suggests a nine per cent swing but in Wells, it was three per cent.

Mr Steerpike can exclusively reveal that former Deputy Speaker Nigel Evans is to run for a senior position on the 1922 Committee executive. The recently vindicated Tory MP remains popular on the backbenches, and has been keeping a deliberately high profile since being cleared on nine counts of sexual abuse. The all-powerful committee is the repository of backbench opinion and sets the agenda when it comes to internal Tory politicking. Sources familiar with the Evans bid are quietly confident that their friend will become a significant player in Tory circles again, come decision day.

Westminster has felt pretty dull recently, what with very little legislation and that. But now that, thanks to the bravery of Tory MP Bob Neill, could change. #LetBritainDecide fever could be back after Neill was the top Tory (not the top MP) in the Private Member's Bill ballot. And funnily enough, Neill chose to take up the baton from James Wharton and introduce an EU referendum bill, which could lead to the Prime Minister invoking the Parliament Act to get it into law - if it passes the Commons in the same way as the previous bill. This appears to be useful for the Conservatives on many levels. If Labour and the Lib Dems cause trouble in the Commons, they can argue that these two parties don't want to give people a choice: they #won'tletbritaindecide.

David Cameron addressed the 1922 Committee of Tory backbenchers earlier this evening. The meeting was upbeat because of the introduction of the winner of Newark by-election Robert Jenrick and brief because Cameron had to go off and see the Queen. Cameron only took a handful of questions but all touched on Europe. Cameron defended opting back into the European Arrest Warrant, saying it was part of being touch on terrorism. He also said that he knew that there were those ‘in this room’ who wanted to leave the EU altogether but the only way you’ll get an In Out vote is with a Tory government. Unsurprisingly, Cameron aimed plenty of fire at Miliband and Labour. He argued that while the Tories had a message for those voters who had gone off to Ukip, Labour didn’t.

It's safe to say that the Tories are very pleased with their ground effort in last week's Newark by-election, with praise heaped on those that put the hard slog in: From: Government Chief Whip Subject: Newark UPDATE Dear Colleague, Many thanks to the 86 colleagues who have made at least three trips to Newark (and in several cases, many more): Adams; Afriyie; Arbuthnot; Baldwin; Barclay; Blackwood; Blunt; Boles; Bradley; Burns C; Byles; Cairns; Cameron; Carmichael; Clappison; Clarke K; Colville; de Bois; Duddridge; IDS; Duncan; Ellis; Ellwood; Elphicke; Evennett; Fabricant; Francois; Freer; Garnier E; Goodwill; Gove; Grayling; Green; Greening; Grieve; Gyimah; Hague; Halfon; Hammond P; Hands; Harper; Hayes; Heald; Hollingbery; Hopkins; Hunt; Jackson; James; Javid; Jones A; Jones D; Jones.

You can judge a minister by their special advisers. Ambitious ministers surround themselves with aides who view their primary loyalty as being to the minister rather than the Prime Minister or the government as a whole. But those who are just happy to be in Cabinet accept the advisers they are sent by Downing Street and CCHQ. Theresa May was, without a doubt, in the former category. Her aides are ferocious defenders and promoters of her. Indeed, May is, in many ways, the Gordon Brown of this government. Anyone who her team thought was interfering in her domain got their head bitten off. Even on relatively minor issues like visas for Chinese tourists, they fought like tigers. No quarter is given to those who disagreed with the Home Office line, no matter how minor the subject.

Few modern-day political speeches need to be read in full, but Michael Gove’s today does. The speech to Policy Exchange's Education Conference contains what must be the moral core of modern-day Conservatism, that disadvantage must not be destiny. Though, the speech does take a very Blairite approach to means. Gove declares that ‘what’s right is what works’. The headlines have been grabbed by Gove’s argument that illiteracy can be ended in a generation. This is a noble aim and there’s no reason why this country should be so accepting of educational failure as it is.

Here's a clever way to get more exposure for your political slogan. You say it so often in speeches, press releases and planted questions from the whips that it seeps everywhere, you start dreaming it, and your opponents get very cross indeed. Then your opponents accidentally say your political slogan while all mithered. Then they get a bit jealous that it's popping up in every single piece of government literature so they complain about this political slogan, which they mention, again, thus ensuring it reaches more and more and more people. Bravo to an opposition that stays calm in the face of a barrage of 'long-term economic plans' designed to goad them and signify to voters that Labour has a short-term, wibbly sort of plan and only the Conservatives can finish the recovery.

[audioplayer src="http://traffic.libsyn.com/spectator/TheViewFrom22_5_June_2014_v4.mp3" title="James Delingpole and Michael Heaver debate whether Ukip stands for anything" startat=1222] Listen [/audioplayer]There are many words that you might associate with Nigel Farage, but moderniser probably isn’t one. Yet the Ukip leader is embarking on the process of modernising his party. He has concluded that it cannot achieve its aims with its current level of support. So he is repositioning it in the hope of winning new converts even at the risk of alienating traditional supporters. If this sounds similar to what David Cameron did after winning the Tory leadership in 2005, that’s because it is.

‘There are three stages to any coalition,’ House of Cards creator Michael Dobbs told me at Tuesday’s annual Macmillan Lords vs Commons tug-of-war in the grounds of Westminster School. ‘First there is the seduction, tearing off each other’s bodices over five days of negotiations. Then came the consummation in the Rose Garden, followed later by a period of sober reflection.’ And which stage are we in now? I asked the Tory peer ‘The “sod off” stage.

The Conservatives have accidentally emailed a database of their activists' details to other members, Coffee House has learned. The database, called 'volunteer record NEWARK' was accidentally attached to a generic thank you email for those campaigning in the by-election, and contained the email addresses of activists and MPs who had signed in at a certain station in the constituency. Sent from a generic email address belonging to the Tory chairman, the email thanked activists for visiting Newark, and asked them to continue campaigning by visiting the constituency again on polling day or making calls to voters from home or CCHQ. The database was attached at the bottom.

The Tories are looking ever more likely to hold Newark in Thursday’s by-election. In a new poll from Lord Ashcroft this afternoon, the Conservatives are now on 47 per cent of the vote, compared to 36 per cent in the last week’s Survation poll and 53 per cent at the 2010 general election: [datawrapper chart="http://static.spectator.co.uk/OevDw/index.html"] As you can see from the chart above, Ukip have dropped behind slightly their position last last week, but will certainly do better than their 2010 result. By-elections are notoriously hard to predict but this ultra-local poll doesn’t offer any indications that Roger Helmer has the momentum to take Newark.