Why Can't These Dinosaurs Depart the Stage
- 4 Sep 2007
Before the last election Lynton Crosby told us all that we should ask ourselves every morning: "What am I going to do today to help the Conservative Party win the next election?" These sentiments would of course be entirely lost on the Fourteenth Marquis of Lothian, who has le...
Winning from a Crouching Start in Chatham
- 1 Sep 2007
Yesterday I was offered a ticket to go and see West Ham play Reading this afternoon. I turned it down, partly on the basis that if I went, we would lose, but more due to the fact that I had already promised my friend Tracey Crouch, Tory candidate for Chatham & Aylesford th...
EDP Diary: When I Took My Mum to Zurich
- 31 Aug 2007
Being a politician sometimes involves taking big decisions, many of which will be unpopular. David Cameron is soon going to have to decide which of the menu of policies provided by his various policy commissions he will adopt and include in his manifesto. Over the last year, f...
Indicating to the Right? Return to a Core Vote Strategy? Er, No...
- 30 Aug 2007
At ten to seven this morning I woke to the sound of my mobile ringing. It was the Today programme. Oh God, I thought, who's died. Luckily no one had. They wanted to know if I could appear on their programme in the the following hour to talk about David Cameron's Newsnightinter...
EDP Column: My Five Minute Interview
- 30 Aug 2007
What is your idea of perfect happiness in Norfolk? Walking along Mundesley beach. When I was at university in Norwich in the early 1980s I used to drive out there at midnight from time to time and just wander along the beach listening to the waves crashing against the sand....
Charlotte Robinson RIP
- 29 Aug 2007
Sometimes you hear a piece of news which knocks you for six. During the last election campaign I had some fantastic help from some teenagers from the village of Worsted in North Norfolk, one of them being a young lady called Charlotte Robinson. Charlotte emailed me out of t...
Did John Gummer Eat a Dodgy Burger?
- 28 Aug 2007
John Gummer should have been pensioned off years ago. Indeed, I thought he had been. Remember the picture of feeding his daughter Cordelia a burger to prove that they were safe from Mad Cow Disease? Hers may have been CJD free, but if press reports are correct, his policy prop...
EDP Diary: An October Election?
- 16 Aug 2007
Further proof of Tony Blair’s obsession with all things American has come with the news that he has hired a top US lawyer to broker a book deal for him. Pundits reckon that a publisher may well fork out $12 million for his memoirs. If so, they’re mad. Not a single publisher ha...
My Rwanda Diary
- 29 Jul 2007
DAY ONE I've just finished packing for my trip to Rwanda. We leave at 8pm tonight from Heathrow for an overnight flight to Nairobi and then an onward flight to Kigali. I'm going to Rwanda to make three films for 18 Doughty Street - one on the genocide, one on life in Rwa...
EDP Column: The Plight of a Chief of Staff
- 29 Jul 2007
Dereham’s Andy Marshall can be justifiably proud of his terrific Open performance last weekend. He carried the dreams of all of us hacking golfers with him. Having made the cut on Friday he scored a memorable four under par on Saturday, a round he will surely treasure for the ...
EDP Column: My Rwandan Diary
- 27 Jul 2007
Over the last seven days I have had the experience of a lifetime. I’ve been in Rwanda making three films about the Rwandan genocide, life in Rwanda today and the 44 Conservative MPs and activists who have been spending two weeks on VSO backed social action projects. ...
Telegraph Column: Cameron Should Go to Rwanda
- 19 Jul 2007
Sometimes I wonder why I ever wanted to go into politics. Even as a parliamentary candidate, as part of the poor bloody infantry, everything you do is scrutinised through the cynical prism of a sceptical media. Every time you attend a community meeting or visit a school the cy...
EDP Diary: Up for an Award
- 18 Jul 2007
As you read this column, think of me as I spend a week in Rwanda along with forty assorted Tory MPs, candidates and volunteers. They have each forked out the best part of £1,000 to spend a fortnight on a VSO backed scheme to do good works in a country still ravaged by the afte...
The First 80 Pages of Alastair Campbell
- 14 Jul 2007
Having read the first 80 pages of Alastair Campbell's diaries I have two reactions. The first is that it's a brilliant read and I can't wait to read the rest of it on the plane to Rwanda on Thursday, but the second is that if it is an accurate reflection of the life of a newly...
Is the BBC Saying Sorry to Alastair Campbell
- 11 Jul 2007
I have just come back from doing an piece for 5 Live with Edwina Currie on Alastair Campbell's diaries. It was ostensibly to preview the 3 part BBC2 series which starts tonight. I had, in my naivety assumed that it was a three part documentary on Campbell and his reign of terr...
Telegraph Column: Will Ken Clarke Deliver?
- 6 Jul 2007
This week’s launch of Ken Clarke’s Democracy Task Force paper on parliamentary reform will go some way to dispelling the myth that Cameron’s Conservatives are policy-lite. As the rest of the policy groups prepare to announce their conclusions over the next seven weeks they wil...
Telegraph Column: Is Cameron Really Policy-Lite?
- 5 Jul 2007
After a fortnight of remorseless battering, Tory MPs at last have a spring in their step. Gordon Brown’s lacklustre performance at Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday proved to them that the new Prime Minister is far from infallible. The look on the faces of Labour MPs sai...
Telegraph Column: The Clunking Fist Takes Aim
- 28 Jun 2007
Having spent the early part of the week making the LibDems chase their tails, Gordon Brown’s clunking fist was yesterday aimed squarely at the Tories. Last week David Cameron was in two minds about carrying out a wide ranging reshuffle. His instinct is not to do so, bu...
The Strange Defection of Quentin Davies
- 26 Jun 2007
I have just spent an hour or two at the House of Commons. A few pointers on Quentin Davies... Davies was still voting with the Party last night at 5.48pm last night AGAINST Gordon Brown's Finance Bill. Rather strange behaviour for a man who has just written a letter indicat...
EDP Diary: Nominated for an Award!
- 22 Jun 2007
Some time ago a journalist friend of mine, who shall remain nameless for the purpose of this blog, asked me if her 15 year old son could come and do a week's work experience with me in July. I like to be helpful so I said yes and thought no more of it. Yesterday I got a phone ...