The Tory campaign is getting back on track

John

After the appallingly biased Newsnight on Friday (towards Labour natch), the BBC have since appeared to be even-handed. My non-political wife actually noticed and commented on it today.
Has someone had a word?
Are the BBC worried they've gone too far and wonder about reprisals after the GE?
Whatever, there seems to be a change in the air and I hope it stays.

Stephen

Peaking at the right time.

Andre

Cameron is good at feeling the pulse of the nation and speaking in the political vernacular of our times. Increasingly, I believe, the nervous electorate see him as a friend rather than a threat. Reservations about his willingness to cut tax and roll back public spending are as nothing as the haunting prospect of five more years of the secular left clunk-clique of Gordon Brown. Could it be that Cam will surprise us as Thatcher did with radical conviction politics the lance the boils of modern Britain? I hope so. Anyway he has my support

In2minds

Three days, three whole days, wow, I'm impressed, yeah.

Yosemite Sam

Even Dennis skinner is posh by the standards of my background. But I try to judge people by who they are and what they stand for. Cameron (and to be frank Osborne too), has impressed me from the moment I became aware of him. I am not distressed or worried by the vituperative anti-Cameron posts on this blog, everyone can have an opinion. The proof will be on the morning after the election - when I expect the Tories to get a majority of about fifty.

David Ossitt

John

“My non-political wife actually noticed and commented on it today.”

How can this be true?

Non-political that is; or could it be, that she is a highly intelligent woman who hides from you, the true nature of her own political opinions?

Richard

Wait for the storm!!!!
It's been a quiet week so far, Cameron has been making some noise, a bit like a young child running through an empty house)however what he has done is going through without much comment because it's just so light weight, opportunist and badly judged.
This Unite thing is not going down well and his speech in Lewisham was a farce. The speech in Shoreditch was just plain boring ...like a standup comic without any jokes.
Plenty of the week left yet though. Mandlesnake is never this silent without reason and Alistair Cambell's blog is getting less political everyday......something is brewing...get your tin hat ready.

GDT

I'd vote for G.W.Bush before I'd vote for Brown. All the Conservatives need to do is keep a steady line. Keep the same message and let Labour keep stumbling from one disaster to another.

TGF UKIP

Ah, James, if only wish really could be father to the deed, so fervently and faithfully do you wish then Dave really would be the shoo in he should be.

And John you clearly did not hear Naughtie on Today this morning. Mind you Clarke certainly did not help either himself or the Tories with a really limp, lame performance allowing himself, like Speccie hacks, to waffle on about Brown's favourite subject "the deficit" instead of the real problem and the one that people would comprehend if the Tories and their faithful media friends actually chose to mention it -the Tri££ion plus DEBT.

Nicholas

Good news.

My niggling worry is that Cameron's ideas for society may translate once in power to yet more nanny state. I hope not. I hope the Tory Great Repeal Bill becomes a reality and that Cameron returns more freedom, privacy and less state intrusion and interference to us.

David Lindsay

Full fanzine mode, then. Is there an Election coming up?

Liam Fox's appeal relating to his dodgy expenses has been dismissed entirely today. So, any chance of seeing him in court any time soon? What do you think? We have as much chance of hearing about it on the BBC or reading about it in the papers. Wrong party for that.

As to why that is, consider today's words of Michael Gove:

"At its best, New Labour was a recognition that the values of enterprise and aspiration could be fused with commitment to social justice and fairness. The party that best represents that fusion now is David Cameron’s Conservative Party."

Simon Denis

Mere mischief from Mr Lindsay - his speciality, it seems. Undoubtedly this is the start of a renewed Tory surge. Labour has shot itself in the foot with its baying, bullying refusal to answer hard questions. Despite the best endeavours of the Biased Bolshevik Corporation, Ashcroft brings people round to Lord Paul and the union "Unite", currently destroying our only major airline. In the end it will be seen that the recall of Hog Whelan and Serpent Mandelson are the Labour equivalent of asking Curzon to hold up the Empire, a futile gesture against the spirit of a new and hostile age. Roll on decolonisation!

JONNY

'This Unite thing is not going down well'

so even the thickest have noticed that

john skinner

David Ossitt
Re "non-political wife":
I'm always ranting on about BBC bias; she usually says: "Give it a rest, play another record".

General Zod

SO, DL, do you think somebody is protecting Tories with expense issues from prosecution?

No, you don't. You attempt clumsily to equate appealing against a repayment adjudication with being prosecuted for fraud.

There are plenty of Labour MPs in Fox's position.

You lot are on the run again.

Victor Southern

I am so glad that David Lindsay brought that up. Today the appeals were rejected of 5 current or former MPs - Liam Fox and 4 from Labour, Betty Williams, Chris Pond, Roger Casale and Shahid Malik. i must say that offences of any of these paled in comparison with those of the apparently immune Lord Paul and Baroness Uddin whose accommodation claims were simply hoaxes.

The whole story is often more interesting than selected excerpts.

Richard

The tories attack Unite at their peril.
Should Cameron win by a small margin he will be slaughtered by an outbreak of poor industrial relations....This is not like Maggie and the miners...he has no money or a years supply of coal like she had.
Not just Unite but many other unions have members in the public services. The very services that the tories are going to ask to take the brunt of the pain for his cuts.
A very angry public service and vengeful union bosses is not a good receipe for a "we all in this together" austerity policy. Unions have moved on from the Scargill days....the tactics are better and the weapons are more deadly.....
Just imagine a total transport strike 60 days after a tory victory and the problems of the deficit will seem insignificant.
Cameron won't have a single lever to push or pull, he will be forced to go back to the electorate and the people will force him out. Do not underestimate the risk of taking on the Unions from a position of weakness. Also I would suggest he does not personalise things either it will backfire on him big time.

Verity

David Cameron even had to have Mummy come on that TV programme with his wife and speak up for her brave little lad.

Barf-o-rama.

They're enjoying a mini-surge due to novelty value, not Tory programmes, for which there is no appetite. When voters come to mark their X, their minds are focussed on policies which will affect themselves and their families, not politicians wives.

I'm still predicting a hung Parliament. I am honestly puzzled about how Dave has managed to hang on so long ... there's something very weird about this.

David Lindsay

I don't know who you mean by "you lot", General Zod. I am a proud expellee from the Labour Party.

Think on the letting off of all but three MPs. Think on how all three of them are retiring anyway. Think on how all three of them come from the party that the Police and the CPS thought at the time was going to lose the forthcoming General Election, rather than from the party that they thought was going to win. Think on how the only token Tory whom they could find to prosecute was unelected and obscure. Think on how he did not have to appear in court with the three MPs, but instead at a different time when the mob had gone home.

Think on, and on, and on. Very long indeed. And very hard indeed.

Fergus Pickering

Little Richard, the word is 'recipe' or, if you are very old-fashioned, 'receipt'. And, alas, you have gone from your greengrocer's apostrophe to no apostrophe at all where one is required. And I am afraid your last sentence is illiterate. Look at it and TRY AGAIN. When you manage a whole post without childish errors I will be the first to congratulate you, so keep trying, youngster.

Major Plonquer

Thank you very much Richard for your message about: 'The tories attack Unite at their peril.'

You have just convinced me to switch my vote. Previously I was going to vote UKIP. Now I will switch to Tory. This is what happens when small minded people try to intimidate the rest of us.

Thanks to the information you've given me I will now whole-heartedly support ANY move to completely abolish trade unions. That they would even contemplate such ignorant behaviour, destroying our country and doing even more damage to our economy is unacceptable.

Thanks again for opening the lid and giving us all a look inside.

Simon Denis

Well done, Major. Ignore the mischief making crazies, like Lindsay; the cock-eyed purists, like Verity and above all the spawn of Mandelson, like "Richard". The first task is to void our country's bowels of Brown. We can go on to crush "Unite" like a fly. Do the bullying Labourite scum imagine that there are no other airlines available?

EC

James,

Has the Tory campaign ever been on track? If it has then,
continuing with your railway analogy, what keeps derailing it? Either the Sir Topham Hat, the fat controller in the guise of Eric Pickles, is "running a very bad railway indeed" or Thomas in the guise of Dave can't get up steam because his coal is wet.

Verity,

We do need a hung parliament - preferably off Westminster Bridge in batches of one hundred. The party political system has been self-serving and has led the nation up a siding where it is about to hit the buffers.

stephen

A concerning piece for Dave in today's FT. The Tories are just not connecting with the Govt workers and DE's in the North of England possibly not surprising. THe FT says Mrs T had 68 Tory Mp's in the North while currently only 18. Winning all these back would add 100 to Tories majority. A lot of work for William Hague and Ken Clarke, Osborne and possibly Dave are a switch off for Northern voters in the groups!

General Zod

Angry union threats will play straight into a new Tory government's hands, giving perfct justification for savage anti-union legislation. Watch that funding disappear.

TomTom

Today's FT has an article on Cameron's lack of traction in Northern England where he has only one MP in West Yorkshire....the fact that Cameron is essentially the product of a South-East Regional Party rather than a national party contains further stimulus to the break-up of England itself.

When Cameron finds that regions which have not benefitted from Labour's Credit Boom are paying the price for banker bonuses in London, he may have serious problems in areas already tense from the huge influx of foreigners in areas with little work.

It might be an idea to station more snipers at Catterick with helicopters....ah....that's something that is only a theoretical concept in British defence equipment !

Chris lancashire

Nice one Richard: we don't like the verdict of the ballot box so we'll go on strike.

Do, do go on strike and just like last week's attempt by 275,000 public sector workers - no one will notice apart from a few benefit recipients - the very people that should be helped.
Union power was finished 20 years ago in this country as most right minded workers realised the union bosses were in it for themselves, not the members.
Cheerio

echo34

Again Richard as per my last post,

What would labour do with the unions if they held onto power?

forget the nasty tories for just a second..

Simone

It was a wise move to make Samantha Cameron
high profile. She is very likeable. Sarah Brown, on the other hand, is a liability as soon as she opens her mouth.

There has been criticism about bringing the wives centre stage, but politics are different today. In our celebrity culture, many people want to know about the politicians' families. Fortunately for David Cameron and the Conservatives, I believe that a wide section of the public will relate to Samantha Cameron.

General Zod

I'm delighted to say TomTom that the only Tory MP in West Yorkshire (there will be more by June) is in the seat where I grew up, having displaced the unloved (and now forgotten) Labour MP who took over from Marcus Fox.

There would of course be more Tory MPs now, but for the outrageous gerrymandering boundary changes under Labour.

Does anyone think Ilkley votes Labour?

Alexandrovich

Simone: "In our celebrity culture, many people want to know about the politicians' families."
I suppose I'm in a minority but I don't. In fact, I couldn't give a toss.
You'll have to forgive me for resisting this airhead, populist culture.

Richard

@echo34
The last 13 years have been the most successful from the point of view of labour relations....fewest days lost due to strikes for over 50 years. My concern is that the tories are going to wreck the progress that has been made.
There is no need for the tories to open up old wounds and engage in a war that does not need to be fought.
The tories will take industrial relations back to the 70's and the damage is completely avoidable. Modern Unionist's are not militants by nature but if backed into a corner facing severe job losses and a government that is openly hostile they will react.
Anyone who thinks a total transport strike will be good sport or a fun day out for anyone is a fool.
Real lasting damage is not something that Shameron should toy with just for the sake of saving his face in what is a poor campaign. This is a tory party that has as many internal problems now as it has ever had.....wait for the first EU crisis.

Verity

Simone thinks many people will relate to, and want to know about, politicians' families. Other than a flutter of momentary interest on the part of the women, so they can judge her turnout, no one gives a monkey's about politicians' families. They care about their own families and what effect politicians' actions are going to have on them. Samantha Cameron is a complete irrelevance and it was one more misstep by Dave to feature her.

EC - I am strangely drawn to your solution. Batches of 100 would be good. The only tweak I would give it is, I would keep the major players out, like Jack Straw, for example, Gordon Brown, Harriet Harman and four or five others, for their Ceaucescu moment. In lieu of a balcony, the Members' Terrace would do nicely.

Bad Wolf

The Unions called a General Strike after the 1979 GE. Not that many people noticed or, indeed, participated. Union bullies need to be reminded that it's not their choice who runs the country despite the amount of money they throw at the Labour Party.

Simone

Alexandrovich:
Simone: "In our celebrity culture, many people want to know about the politicians' families."

"I suppose I'm in a minority but I don't. In fact, I couldn't give a toss.
You'll have to forgive me for resisting this airhead, populist culture."

OK, but with respect, remember that the Conservatives have to appeal to more than just people like yourself.
For instance, the website Mumsnet is considered to be very influential this time round. It could tip the balance. So an appeal to female voters is a good idea, and Samantha Cameron is the one to do it, in my opinion.

Simone

verity:
"..no one gives a monkey's about politicians' families. They care about their own families and what effect politicians' actions are going to have on them. Samantha Cameron is a complete irrelevance and it was one more misstep by Dave to feature her."

I disagree. The Conservatives are sometimes considered to be out of touch and cushioned from life's problems. The Camerons have had their fair share of troubles though, and many families will relate to that. It helps to build a picture of a leader who really understands and cares.

If Samantha had remained voiceless, she may have been perceived as haughty. The left wing press has already jumped on her aristocratic background and is trying to paint her as someone who is aloof and uncaring. So the left wing do understand that the image of the family matters to voters too.

Byron

The present bugdet rise in petrol tax would seem to me to be a winning argument for the Tories if they would attack and say they will repeal this as soon as they win the election.....I do not see how they could loose....yet I hear nothing about it.