CCHQ gets crunched
Fraser Nelson 10:29am
When news of the Tory budget cut was broken by Conservative Home it was spun as a prudent cost-cutting. Yet there is (as ever, with CCHQ) plenty of comic chaos behind the scenes. The basic problem was overspending in the boom years. Last year the cash was flowing in from bankers who could easily spare £50,000 and would pay even more to touch the hem of David Cameron. Things were going so well that, according to one version I’ve heard, David Cameron personally added £2 million to the budget, saying the party had to spend to get more cash. Other sources say it wasn’t Cameron, the machine just grew fat on its own. But either way, one thing’s sure: they should have put more money away for a rainy day; fixed the roof when the sun was shining. Those bankers don’t have any cash anymore.
As charity donations have plunged, so too have political donations – and this has hit the Tories disproportionately hard, because they get more individual cheques. Labour get huge cheques from the unions which are often seemingly repaid in state donations such as the “modernization fund” or some such.
The group of those donating £50,000 has almost halved, I’m told, but other bigger donors have stepped up to the plate. The upshot is a 10 percent budget cut. Not catastrophic, but still enough for a shake-up. I hinted a few weeks back that there may be another shake up to the Conservative Research Department. I’m now hearing that it will be effectively disbanded, its staff sent to work with Shadow Cabinet members, and the Tories will instead rely more on ideas being churned out by think tanks like Policy Exchange, Reform and the Centre for Policy Studies (where yours truly is on the board). Under UK charity laws, they have to be cross party so Labour can benefit too*.
Those at the hard end of the cuts point out that there is precious little bloodletting in Norman Shaw South, the former Met HQ which is now the Cameroons’ nest. Those surviving argue that CCHQ needs to focus on core election-winning strategies, and other operations such as outreach to womens’ groups, ethnic minorities etc have had to go. And anyway, CCHQ will be reduced to a skeleton staff if Cameron wins the next election and his aides become Spads. So axing the 22 CCHQ staff and others is seen by the more optimistic Tories as preparing for this great day. The return of Oliver Dowden to CCHQ shows it can still lure back some of the heavyweights that were allowed to slip away last year.
But at the root this cost crunch is a rather embarrassing fact: the Tories didn’t see the crash coming (very, very few did) and imagined this bankers’ jackpot would keep on coming. It was, in fact, a freak event and CCHQ is, like so many businesses, being forced to readjust. It’s bad, but hardly terminal. For as long as the Tories are the overriding favourites to win the next election, they won’t go bust.
* Being a cross party think tank is less of a burden that it may sound, given that the real ideological dividing line is not so much between Labour and Tory but between liberals and statists. Blair, Milburn, Cameron, Laws, Gove, Purnell & Field are on the right side of this line. Brown, Balls, S Hughes, the unions (in my darker moments, I think Lansley) and the Tory paternalists are on the wrong side.
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TrevorsDen
December 7th, 2008 11:06am Report this commentPardon me but can you point your tommy gun where it belongs - at the lying conniving bar-stewards in this miserable misbegotten government?
Clive
December 7th, 2008 11:08am Report this commentBut they are doing the right thing unlike the government: they are cutting their spending to match their income.
JJ
December 7th, 2008 11:49am Report this commentI'm sorry but you can't put any of the Blairites in the anti-statist camp! The evidence of the last 11 years, of big government statism contradicts that! Just because they're neoconservatives, and they like the free market - doesn't mean that they're anti-state. Infact, pro-state, pro-market is the new labour project.
A Footsoldier
December 7th, 2008 12:29pm Report this commentIt strikes me tha the House of commons has a dementing speaker on its hands. Perhaps Miss Harperson should send a kindly Dr round to ask him the time, the name of the Prime Minister and to repeat his address.
A. Footsoldier
December 7th, 2008 12:31pm Report this commentPerhaps you have a dementing poster... wrong thread...apologies
Gordon Musgo
December 7th, 2008 12:50pm Report this commentAnd will they go running back to the constituency parties where the loyal folks whom they have been ignoring for their new mates remain at the roots of the party?
Will they be told to FO until they come up with some proper oppostion and conservative policies? Hope so.
TrevorsDen
December 7th, 2008 1:17pm Report this commentActually Clive, they are doing the 'wrong' thing.
The governments entire philosophy revolves around us spending for Britain.
Lets face it - this makes sense. Especially against the background of the government forcing the banks to lend them money so that the government can buy a share of the banks.
Get with the programme Clive or there will be a knock at the door to cart you off to a re-education camp.
Me? 'I love Big Brother'.
Gawain
December 7th, 2008 2:02pm Report this commentIts another sign of lack of real ambition. The big cheques might be drying up but there are tens of thousands of middle class people under economic and cultural attack from this government. Thousands of small donations could make up for the fewer big ones. Isn't that how Obama won ? The Tories aren't even asking and its probably too much like real work for the Cameroons.Very depressing, the country relly, relly needs rid of Broon and his gang!
TGF UKIP
December 7th, 2008 2:07pm Report this commentFraser, what a fascinating final astericked nine words those are from you of all people. For who is more of a classically patrician, paternalist, One Nation Tory than your mate Dave. I really am beginning to think there is hope for you after all.
PS, if they feel these circumstances require them to make a 10% cut and disband departments, why on earth can't they get out there and make the case for our overspent and over borrowed government doing the same. Your piece in the fanzine a couple of weeks ago, Fraser, would blaze an admirable trail for them.
Dave B
December 7th, 2008 2:19pm Report this comment@Gawain
I think that's unfair. The tories are trying to up small donations, and activists.
They take credit card donations via their website.
https://www.conservatives.com/Donate.aspx
Send out regular emails, often linked to videos.
http://www.conservatives.com/Video/Webcameron.aspx?id=e4f1c1a8-1f61-4be0-83ab-4ca36a915740
Dave B
December 7th, 2008 2:36pm Report this commentI wonder if this is good news for Direct Democracy's platform?
Peter Oborne explicitly describes 'The Plan', as being with the grain of contemporary Conservative thinking.
http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=10479
If the Party is cutting back on policy development, a coherent, pre-packaged, to an extent pre-sold, platform must surely be an easy default choice?
Cogito Ergosum
December 7th, 2008 5:51pm Report this commentGawain:
The Tories recently sent a letter to me, and probably to all CP members, asking for donations and standing orders. Some ratbag told the Mirror, who are chortling as one would expect.
JohnAnt
December 7th, 2008 6:21pm Report this comment"This is Rupert. Until last month, Rupert was a caring Conservative. But then he lost his job: the first and only job of his life so far. He may be forced into having to work for somebody, or may even have to leave politics altogether. Rupert has been using his specialised expertise to scrape off old Tory values and triangulate New Labour policies, applying them carefully to make them look like shiny new Conservative ones. Now he is on the scrap heap, at only 35. Will you give to help Rupert, and many like him?
You won't? Oh dear."
Carol
December 7th, 2008 6:57pm Report this commentFraser, are you working for the Labour party now or what????
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