Lobbyist attacks 'shambolic' Tory campaign
Updated on 05 March 2010
After yesterday's Channel 4 News poll showing plummeting Conservative support in key marginal seats, leading Tory lobbyist Peter Bingle emails colleagues to describe his "despair" at his party's election campaign.
Local councillors were today receiving their election marching orders from David Cameron.
But a growing number are beginning to find fault with the Conservative leader's battle plans, and fear they are about to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Peter Bingle is a top Tory lobbyist who used to be a London councillor, and was invited to the Conservative local government conference today. He did not attend, but if he had he might have given Cameron a piece of his mind.
After last night's Channel 4 News poll showing plummeting Tory support in key marginal seats, he sent out an email entitled "Musings of a Tory in despair". This programme received a copy. He wrote -
"The Tory campaign is shambolic and unless somebody of quality and experience takes control of it now there is a real danger of the Tories throwing away what should be an inevitable election victory. Should this happen, David Cameron will never be forgiven by his party and his party's supporters in the country."
Councillors at today's event, however, were uneasy but still believed victory was within their grasp.
To read the full Peter Bingle email, click here
Councillor Chris Griffiths, from Tendring District Council, Essex, told Channel 4 News: "As long as the party keeps going forward the way it has been and David Cameron delivers what he has been promising, which in my mind I have no doubt that he will, then I think that we stand a very good chance of claiming victory."
Councillor Chris Hayward, of Hertfordshire County Council, said: "I think there's plenty of time for us to claw back. Yes, of course it's disappointing that our majority in the opinion polls has fallen away, but I think it was inevitable it was going to fall a bit as we get closer to the general election."
They thought the row over billionaire Tory peer Lord Ashcroft's tax status wouldn't matter outside the Westminster village. Bingle was rather more forthright.
"I have already observed that the 'sleaze from Belize' is a toxic issue... it should have been sorted out years ago rather than in the middle of a general election campaign?”
David Cameron refused to answer questions today on why he only found out within the last month that Lord Ashcroft had failed to keep his promise to pay UK tax on his overseas earnings.
He tried to rally the faithful at last weekend's spring conference, but many grassroots Tories were not impressed.
"Nobody knows what the Tory Party stands for any more. David's speech at Brighton was simply more of the same. Was I inspired by the rhetoric? No. Did it convince me that a Tory government would give power back to individuals and reduce the size of the state? No. Did his Shadow Cabinet give me confidence that they would be able to take control of the government bureaucracy and deliver radical change? Absolutely not...
"Looking at the two rows of the shadow cabinet scared me. Is that really the best that the Tory Party can deliver?”
A Conservative spokesman said: "This is a lobbyist with his own agenda who has no understanding at all of what's going on in Tory HQ."
For more on the Channel 4 News/YouGov poll and the Ashcroft tax row
- Exclusive: Tory lead shrinks in key marginals
- Analysis: Tories short of overall majority
- Download the Channel 4 News/YouGov poll results
- Ashcroft comes clean over non-dom status
- Cameron knew Ashcroft was non-dom
- Hague told Ashcroft non-dom ‘in recent months’
- Exclusive: Ashcroft ‘not suitable for a peerage’
One of the party's young rising stars agrees. Shaun Bailey was at today's gathering. He is a parliamentary candidate in a marginal London seat - and he is not panicking.
"Towards the end you are always going to have a wobble because it's a crux,” he told Channel 4 News. "It's where the action happens.
"We will see how well we have done, including David Cameron, when we come to the polls and I feel like we are in the right position. Going forward we are in a positive condition.
"Our whole meeting here today is about what we are going to do next: we have a plan and we will get it done."
Bailey's more traditional colleagues feel the party has become obsessed with youth and image. Bingle described the poster campaign featuring an airbrushed David Cameron as hopeless.
His email concluded with the plaintive question: why has it all gone wrong? That is something a growing number of MPs, peers and parliamentary candidates are asking.
I quizzed one Conservative grandee if he feared David Cameron was going to lose the election. He replied "absolutely" and suggested the party tack to the right to shore up support. A frontbencher said that would be a terrible response to the polls.
Senior Conservatives badly need to agree on strategy - and fast.
