The following article was published on www.conservativehome.com Nothing
very contentious about it, but what does it say about the state of Party
membership. In four marginal seats
Party membership is less than 100. Not
that long ago a constituency with less than 100 members would have been a
Labour seat with a 15,000 majority. How
the Party has fallen? What are they
doing about it? Sweet F.A., because the
only way to reverse the decline in membership is to give power to the
members. This they will not do, so they
would rather see the Tory Party go out of existence rather than take the one
action that could save it. Sad, power
corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Con HQ announces first ten of forty target seat
selections
Sarah Newton MP, Deputy Chairman of the
Conservative Party, has just given ConservativeHome the names of the ten
constituencies who will taking part in the first of three tranches to select
the forty candidates in the Tories' 40/40
battleground strategy to win a majority at the next election. They
are:
1.
Birmingham
Northfield, Lab maj of 2,782
2.
Cheadle,
Lib Dem maj of 3,272
3.
Chorley,
Lab maj of 2,593
4.
Delyn, Lab
maj of 2,272
5.
Hampstead
and Kilburn, Lab maj of 42 in three way marginal
6.
Harrow
West, Lab maj of 3,143
7.
Morley and
Outwood, Lab maj of 1,101
8.
N E
Derbyshire, Lab maj of 2,445
9.
Sutton and
Cheam, Lib Dem maj of 1,608
10.
Vale of
Clwyd, Lab maj of 2,509
Sarah
told me that the forty seats haven't just been selected because of the size of
their majorities but because of examination of other factors including
demographic trends and local issues. Selection procedeures will begin on 16th November
and be wrapped up in time for Christmas in a sign that the party is determined
to benefit as much as it now can from early adoption.
None of these
first ten have fast-tracked candidates - that is candidates who fought the seat
at the last election and have asked to fight it again. A number of candidates
in the other thirty of the forty seats have asked to be fast-tracked and are
going through the relevant ConHQ and local approval processes.
Constituencies
with less than 100 members will have to choose a three person shortlist given
to them by a special ConHQ committee or choose their candidate by open primary.
Of this first list of ten four seats fall into this category - Birmingham
Northfield, Cheadle, Morley and Outwood and N E Derbyshire. The open primary
would be at a one-off meeting rather than constituency-wide ballot unless the
Association would be willing to pay for it. Something that by the nature of
their limited memberships seems unlikely. Sarah Newton insisted that
ConHQ would not be operating an unofficial secret A-list. She said that when
the party drew up the shortlists of three then all members of the candidates'
list would be considered.
100 members in a constituency of around 75000 voters - my calculator tells me that this is 0.13%. This has gone beyond a decline, members are now an endangered species. When the average age of members is taken into account one can only say that the membership is heading for certain extinction unless drastic action is taken. It is hard to see how the Party cannot realise this. One can only assume that they have no solution.
ReplyDeleteDerek,
ReplyDeleteThey may have no solution, on the other hand it may be part of their plan to forget about Party members and just rely on supporters. Less hassle and no accountability.