Conservative party

While Conrad Black re-entered polite society at Lulu’s in Mayfair last night, the Hospital Club in Soho saw the advent of a new political force. A tie-less Douglas Carswell, the rebellious Tory MP for Clacton, took to the stage to launch his new book The End of Politics and the birth of iDemocracy, a work described by Dominic Lawson in last week’s Sunday Times as ‘as a revolutionary text… right up there with the Communist Manifesto’. Carswell thanked his wife Clementine for allowing him to lurk in the shed for weeks on end while writing his revolutionary tome, and then confessed that he had spent much of the time ‘Skyping

Charles Moore’s biography of Margaret Thatcher promises to be the most important British political book in decades. Tonight, we got a preview of it when Charles delivered the Centre for Policy Studies’ second Margaret Thatcher lecture. The subject was Thatcher and Europe. I won’t say too much about it because we’re running a version of it in the coming issue of The Spectator. But one thing that Charles demonstrated was that even when Thatcher was campaigning for British membership of the European Community, as then was, she was never in favour of the European project. One of the other thing that Charles’s lecture brought out was the shift in the

Throughout his statement on the European Council, David Cameron seemed slightly irritated. One sensed that the headlines of the last few days have rather got under his skin. Cameron began by declaring that the Council meeting had made ‘limited progress’, which is hardly much to report to the House. He also was unable to resist another pop at Chris Bryant; complaining that he still hadn’t apologised to him when the Labour MPs asked a question. It was striking what a pro-European tone Ed Miliband took in his response to Cameron. It was all about how Cameron was losing control of his party over Europe and needed more friends there. When

Theresa May’s political stock has risen this week. Announcing an intention to opt-out of EU law and order directives pleased Tory MPs while her decision not to extradite Gary McKinnon was popular. But we’ve also seen the Home Secretary operating -rarely for her – beyond her brief. She played a key role in pushing Andrew Mitchell out, something she effectively confirmed on the Sunday Politics. When Andrew Neil pressed her on this, she simply replied ‘I’m not going to talk about private conversations’. Here is the exchange:- listen to ‘Theresa May dodging Andrew Mitchell question, 21 Oct 12, BBC1 Sunday Politics’ on Audioboo

Sir George Young’s appointment as chief whip is testament to both the respect David Cameron holds him in and the Prime Minister’s intense dislike of reshuffles. This is the second time that Cameron has asked Young to step in after a colleague has imploded, the first time was in 2009 when Alan Duncan was caught complaining about how MPs were ‘treated like shit’ and ‘forced to live on rations’. I suspect, though, that one thing that marked Young out this time was that his appointment would not require any other changes in the government ranks. Sir George is one of the politest people that you’re ever likely to meet. I

Determined to keep the Andrew Mitchell story alive for as long as possible, Labour confirmed this morning that next week’s Opposition Day debate will follow the party’s call for Andrew Mitchell to receive a £1,000 fine for his outburst by the gates of Downing Street and debate police cuts. The idea is to highlight the ‘double standards’ line that Ed Miliband pushed yesterday at PMQs: while swearing at a police officer would lead to ‘a night in the cell for the yobs, it is a night at the Carlton Club for the Chief Whip’. As James reported last night, the 1922 Committee was largely warm towards the chief whip, with only five

In normal circumstances, five Tory MPs questioning the chief whip’s position at the 1922 Committee would send Tory high command into a panic. But tonight there is relief that only five MPs spoke out against Andrew Mitchell and that more than a dozen spoke in his support. I understand that Bernard Jenkin’s intervention was particularly effective, persuading at least one MP not to speak against Mitchell. Those present say that the mood of the room was largely in favour of the chief whip remaining in post. There’s a sense that while what he did was foolish, the issue has now been hijacked by the Police Federation and the media. Some

While some of his colleagues were dabbing tears from their eyes or pacing their Portcullis House offices in fury after being dumped by David Cameron in the reshuffle, Michael Fabricant seemed rather excited about his new-found freedom. The former whip tweeted on the day he resigned as a government whip that he was ‘ecstatic. Been kissed by 3 women (&1 man) MP’. He has since considered dressing up as Andrew Mitchell at a ‘highlights of 2012’ party, and gone in search of a pair of ‘toffs and plebs’ cufflinks in honour of the chief whip. So it was no surprise that today Fabricant decided to launch a smart little jibe

Grant Shapps, the perky new Tory chairman, has just been grilled on The Sunday Politics by Andrew Neil about the Tories’ majority strategy. In a sign of how tight the next election will be, Shapps stressed that you don’t actually need 326 seats to have a majority in the Commons because Sinn Fein don’t take their seats. He said he was able to “reveal” the Tories’ 40/40 election strategy:  “We’re going to defend our [40] most marginal seats, and we’re going to go and attack the 40 seats that we will need to win. We’re going to focus and target on those seats in a way that we’ve never done

Party conference season is over and it all felt very mid-term. It’s always best not to be swept away by the immediate reaction to leaders’ speeches. Miliband’s was surprisingly good, Cameron’s was not bad at all and Clegg’s was OK too. Where does that leave us? Just under three years until the next election with everything to play for. At the Jewish Chronicle we planned the usual round of political interviews. Simon Hughes was admirably frank. He has not always had the best relationship with the Jewish community, especially since his involvement with the all-party parliamentary group on Islamophobia. He said he was worried the case for a two-state solution